Chapter 3: Personality, Perception, And Attribution Flashcards
Individual Differences
The way in which factors such as skills, abilities, personalities, perceptions, attitudes, values, and ethics differ from one individual to another.
Interactional Psychology
The psychological approach to understanding human behavior that involves knowing something about the person and about the situation.
Personality
A relatively stable set of characteristics that influence an individual’s behavior.
Trait Theory
A personality theory that advocates breaking down behavior patterns into a series of observable traits in order to understand human behavior.
Integrative Approach
The broad theory that describes personality as a composite of an individual’s psychological processes.
Strong Situation
A situation that overwhelms the effects of individual personalities by providing strong cues for appropriate behavior.
Locus Of Control
An individual’s generalized belief about internal control (self-control) versus external control (control by the situation or by others).
General Self-Efficacy
An individual’s general belief that he or she is capable of meeting job demands in a wide variety of situations.
Self-Esteem
An individual’s general feeling of self-worth.
Self-Monitoring
The extent to which people base their behavior on cues from other people and situations.
Positive Affect
An individual’s tendency to accentuate the positive aspects of herself or himself, other people, and the world in general.
Negative Affect
An individual’s tendency to accentuate the negative aspects of himself or herself, other people, and the world in general.
Projective Test
A personality test that elicits an individual’s response to abstract stimuli.
Behavioral Measures
Personality assessments that involve observing an individual’s behavior in a controlled situation.
Self-Report Questionnaire
A common personality assessment that involves an individual’s responses to a series of questions.
Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) Instrument
An instrument developed to measure Carl Jung’s theory of individual differences.
Extraversion
Being energized by interaction with other people.
Introversion
Being energized by spending time alone.
Sensing
Gathering information through the five senses and focusing on what actually exists.
Intuition
Gathering information through a “sixth sense” and focusing on what could be.
Thinking
Making decisions in a logical, objective fashion.
Feeling
Making decisions in a personal, value-oriented way.
Judging
Preferring closure and completion in making decisions.
Perceiving
Preferring to explore many alternatives with flexibility and spontaneity.
Social Perception
The process of interpreting information about another person.
Discounting Principle
The assumption that an individual’s behavior is accounted for by the situation.
Selective Perception
The tendency to select information that supports our individual viewpoints while discounting information that threatens our viewpoints.
Stereotype
A generalization about a group of people.
First-Impression Error
Forming lasting opinions about an individual based on initial perceptions.
Projection
Overestimating the number of people who share our own beliefs, values, and behaviors.
Self-Fulfilling Prophecy
Allowing expectations about people to affect our interaction with them in such a way that those expectations are fulfilled.
Impression Management
The process by which individuals try to control the impressions others have of them.
Attribution Theory
A theory that explains how individuals pinpoint the causes of their own and others’ behavior.
Fundamental Attribution Error
The tendency to make attributions to internal causes when focusing on someone else’s behavior.
Self-Serving Bias
The tendency to attribute one’s successes to internal causes and one’s failures to external causes.
