Chapter 1 - Introduction

Question 1

What is “personality”?

Dictionary and psychology definitions

Answer 1

Dictionary definition:

• state of being a person
• characteristics and qualities that form a person’s distinctive character
• sum totally of a person’s physical, mental, emotional, and social characteristics

Psychological definition:
- unique and relatively enduring internal and external aspects of a person’s character (influencing behaviour)

Question 2

Self-enhancement

Answer 2

The tendency to promote oneself aggressively and be conspicuous (some cultures see this as a desirable trait, others - primarily Asian cultures - do not)

Question 3

What is an evaluation of personality useful for?

Answer 3

• use in diagnosis, education, counselling, and research

- understanding of a person’s natural tendencies as a predictor of behaviour

Question 4

Reliability

Answer 4

Consistency of response to a psychological assessment device

Question 5

Validity

Answer 5

Extent to which an assessment device measures what it is intended to measure

Question 6

Self-report inventories

Answer 6

What: subjects answer questions about their behaviour and feelings
Example: Minnesota Multi-phasing personality inventory (MMPI)
Advantages: objective scoring, quick assessment
Disadvantages: not suited for people who have limited reading skills, also limited by tendency to provide socially desirable answers

Question 7

Online Test Administration

Answer 7

Advantages

• less time-consuming and expensive
• objective scoring
• accepted by younger employees
• prevents test takers from looking ahead at questions and changing their answers

Question 8

Projective tests

Answer 8

1. Rorschach Inkblot test
   - Freud’s favourite method of assessing
   - creator has set of 10 he would use to assess
2. Thematic Apperception test (TAT)
   - shown a picture and asked to speculate what is going on in the photo
   - word association and sentence completion were assessed

*interpretation is subject and reliability and validity of these are low

Question 9

Clinical interviews

Answer 9

Involves asking relevant questions about:

• past and present life experiences
• social and family relationships
• reasons for seeking psychological help

Advantages - problem areas can be explored in detail
Disadvantages - subjective

Question 10

Behavioural assessments

Answer 10

Observer evaluates a person’s behaviour in a given situation (occurs during clinical interview - intake)

Questions: frequency of behaviour? Triggers of said behaviour?

Advantages: provides valuable insights
Disadvantages: less systematic

Question 11

Thought and Experience Sampling

Answer 11

Thought sampling: records thoughts and moods in a systematic manner (provides sample over time)

Experience sampling: participants are asked to describe social and environmental context in which the experience being sampled occurs

Relies on technological developments

Advantages: determines how context influences thought and mood
Disadvantages: participants may forget to record activities - emotions and mood effect nature of info reported

Question 12

Personality research method

Answer 12

1. Clinical methods (case study)
2. Experimental methods
3. Virtual research method
4. Correlations method

Question 13

Case study

Answer 13

A detailed history of the individual

• contains data from various sources
• consistencies in patients lives are used by theorists to generalize their findings

Advantages: provides in-depth view of one’s personality (various parts of their life in different contexts, looking at patterns to get wider view)
Disadvantagese: no precision and control of experimental and correlation methods - subjective (biases may be present in client or on practitioner) - accuracy of childhood memories cannot be checked

Question 14

Experimental methods

Answer 14

Involves determining effects of variables or events on behaviour (situation arranged by psychologists)

Advantages: well controlled and systematic
Disadvantage: safety and ethical reasons restrict control over some aspects of personality and behaviour - dependant variable is influences by subjects attitude

Question 15

Virtual research methods

Answer 15

Online test administration
- psychological tests, opinion surveys, and subject responses to experimental stimuli

Advantages: fast responses, inexpensive, reaches broad range of subjects
Disadvantages: sample may not represent the population - honesty and accuracy of data is questionable (no accountability)

Question 16

Correlations methods

Answer 16

Measures the degree of relationship between two variables (-1.00 to +1.00)
- stronger extremes in results is when we can begin to make predictions

Question 17

Define “Theory”

Answer 17

Provides the framework to describe data in a meaningful way

Set of principles must be:

• testable and capable of stimulating research
• able to clarify and explain data by organizing those data into coherent framework
• help understand behaviour