CHAPTER 8: RAYMOND B. CATTELL AND HANS J. EYSENCK Flashcards
How are Raymond B. Cattell and Hans J. Eysenck connected?
Both were educated at the University of London.
Both theories are based on sophisticated statistical techniques, and both place great importance on the role of genetic factors in personality.
True or False: Cattell and Eysenck examined similar sets of data using similar techniques but arrive at very different conclusions.
True: The theories differ in several significant ways.
What did Cattell and Eysenck share?
An interest in development from infancy through the later years, and with the exception of Allport’s theory, they also traced many abnormal adult behaviours to problems or conflicts that occurred during childhood.
What does Cattell and Eysenck’s theories focus on?
The idiosyncratic expression of each individuals personality, to deemphasize average group processes, and to place only minor emphasis on scientific methods.
What do Cattell and Eysenck’s theories represent?
Dinstinct departures. Both emphasize the scientific discovery and measurement of basic psychological traits possessed by all people.
Both use scientific rather than clinical methodology, and although both devote considerable time attempting to understand psychopathology, they are primarily concerned with explaining the personality of normal adults.
Both are more interested in the contributions of biological and genetic factors than in developmental events.
Where was Raymond B. Cattell born?
Standfordshire, England.
England entered World War 1 when Cattell was 9 years old.
Did World War 1 have a major effect on Cattell’s life?
Yes: Seeing hundreds of wounded solders treated in a nearby house that had been converted into a hospital taught Cattell that life could be short and one should accomplish as much as possible while once could.
What was Cattell’s major?
Physics and chemistry.
He graduated with high honours.
What was Cattell’s concern during his undergraduate years?
Social problems and was aware that his background in the natural sciences had not prepared him to deal with those problems.
What did Cattell’s realizations cause him to do?
Enter graduate school in psychology at the University of London, where he earned his PhD degree.
What did the University of London grant Cattell?
An honorary doctorate in science in recognition of his many accomplishments.
Who did Cattell work with while in graduate school?
The famous psychologist-statistician Charles E. Spearman.
Who is Charles E. Spearman?
He invented the technique to factor analysis and applied it to the study of intelligence.
Did Cattell utilize factor analysis?
Yes: Factor analysis was used extensively in his study of personality.
True or False: Cattell had great difficulty finding work in his profession.
True: He accepted a number of “fringe” jobs.
True or False: Cattell was a lecturer at the University of Exeter in England.
True: he was the founder and director of a psychology clinic in the school system in the city of Leicester, England.
Who invited Cattell to come to America to become a research associate at Columbia University?
Edward L. Thorndlike.
True or False: Cattell was the G. Stanley Hall Professor of Genetic Psychology at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts.
True.
Why did Goldon Allport invite Cattell at Harvard University?
To join the faculty. Cattell expanded the application of factor analysis from the study of intelligence to the more diverse problems of personality theory.
Where was Hans Jurgen Eysenck born?
Berlin.
Who Was Eysenck’s parents?
His father, Eduard, was a celebrated actor and singer, and his mother, Ruth (Werner) Eysenck acted in silent films using her stage name, Helga Molander.
Divorced when he was 2 years old.
True or False: Eduard wanted Hans to carry on the family tradition in the theatre.
True: at “the tender age of five or six” Eysenck played a minor role in a film in which is mother starred, but he was not allowed to see his own performance.
What did Eysenck do in the film?
He helped to reconcile his estranged parents, but that role was not played out in his real life.
True or False: Eysenck believed that socialism could solve many of Germany’s problems.
True.
Why did Eysenck leave Germany?
He found out that he could not attend college without joining the Nazi secret police. Therefore, he left Germany permanently as he did not embrace Hitler’s Nazi party.
Where did Eysenck leave too?
To France where he studied literature and history for approximately one year at the University of Dijoin.
He then moved to England, where he took college prerequisite courses at Pitman College and then enrolled at the University of London.
True or False: France convinced Eysenck that he did not want to pursue a career in the arts.
True: he states, “art was for fun, for emotional experiences, for enjoyment, and that my life’s work would lie in science, physics, and astronomy.”
What did Eysenck do during the visit to the United States at the University of Pennsylvania.
Eysenck studied training programs in clinical psychology and the roles of clinical psychologist in general.
What did Eysenck do upon his return to England?
He campaigned for a more scientific psychological training for clinical psychologist, for more applications of scientific psychological principles in therapy, and for independence from psychiatrists.
What did Eysenck become dissatisfied with?
Freud’s theory: both in psychiatry and clinical psychology.
Eysenck became to develop a new approach in clinical training at Maudsley Hospital.
What did Eysenck assess?
The effectiveness of Freudian psychotherapy and published evidence that patients experiencing psychoanalytic therapy improved no more than patients who had received no therapy at all.
Was Eysenck a severe critic of Freud?
Yes: Eysenck tested methods throughout his life.
Cause of Eysenck’s death?
Cancer.
True or False: Eysenck received the APA’s Aware for Distinguished Contribution to Science.
True: he additionally received the APA’s Presidential Citation for Outstanding Contributions to Psychology award.
Factor Analysis
Complex statistical technique based on the concept of correlation, which Cattell and Eysenck used to discover and investigate personality traits.
P-Technique.
Type of factor analysis that studies how a single individual’s traits change overtime.
R-Technique.
Type of factor analysis that studies many things about many people.
What is the cornerstone of factor analysis?
The concept of correlation.
Correlation.
Condition that exists when values on two variables vary together in some systematic way.
What is an example of correlation?
A correlation exists between height and weight because when one increases, the other will also tend to increase.
True or False: The stronger the tendency is for two variables to vary together, the strong is the correlation between them.
True.
How is the strength of the relationship between two variables expressed mathematically?
By a correlation coefficient.
Correlation Coefficient.
Mathematical expression indicating the extent which two variables are correlated. Correlation coefficients can vary from +1.00, indicating a perfect positive correlation, to -1.00, indicating a perfect negative correlation.
Positive Correlation.
Correlation that exists when values on two variables tend to increase or decrease together.
Negative Correlation.
Condition that exists when, as values on one variable tend to increase, values on a second variable tend to decrease, and vice versa.
Examples of a correlation.
A correlation coefficient of +.80 indicates a strong positive correlation between two variables.
A coefficient of -.56 indicates a moderate negative correlation.
How does a factor analysis begin?
With a large number of measurements taken from a large sample of people.
What data would a factor analysis include?
Many different types of dependent variables.
Such as, one might record biographical information (birth order, number of siblings, ages of parents, etc) or results of different tests and questionnaires (IQ scores, scores on various personality inventories, etc).
How do you intercorrelate all of the data?
By creating a correlation matrix.
Correlation Matrix.
Display of the many correlation coefficients that result when many sources of information are intercorrelated.
Cluster Analysis.
Systematic search of a correlation matrix in order to discover factors.
Factor.
Ability or characteristic that is thought to be responsible for consistent behaviour. In Cattell’s system, a factor is also called a “trait.”
Trait.
Refers either to a group of interrelated overt behaviours (surface trait) or to the deeper determinant of such interrelated behaviour (source traits). The main usefulness of surface traits is that they provide information about source traits.
What is the procedures of factor analysis?
- Measure many people in a variety of ways.
- Correlate performance on each measure with performance on every other measure. This create a correlation matrix.
- Determine how many factors (traits) need to be postulated in order to account for the various intercorrelations (clusters) found in the correlation matrix.
What technique does factor analysis have?
The technique is based on the methods of correlation that attempt to account for the interrelationships found among other measures.
What did Charles Spearman (Cattell’s mentor) use factor analysis for?
To study intelligence.
What did Cattell use factor analysis for?
To study personality, the characteristics of groups, institutions, and even nations.
What’s Cattell’s early work an example of?
Inductive reasoning.
Inductive Reasoning.
A method that begins with collection of data, which then leads to hypotheses.
Cattell’s approach to research.
How did Cattell measure many people as many ways as possible?
He recorded the everyday behaviour of various persons such as how many accidents they had, the number of organizations to which they belonged, and the number of social contacts they had.
L-data.
Information about a person’s everyday life.
The L stands for “life record.”
Q-data.
Information provided when people fill out a questionnaire on which they rate themselves on various characteristics. The Q stands for questionnaire.
True or False: Q-data has limitations.
True: Some people may not know much about themselves and therefore their responses to questionnaires, inventories, and scales, may not reflect their true personalities.
Some subjects falsify or distort their responses to create a desirable image of themselves.
T-data.
Information obtained about a person from performance on an objective test. The T stands for test.
Examples of T-data.
Performance on word-association tests, the Rorschach inkblot test, or the thematic apperception test.
Hypothetico-Deductive Reasoning.
A method that begins with a hypothesis that guides data collection.
Eysenck’s approach to research.
How did Eysenck utilize hypothetico-deductive reasoning.
He began with an experimental hypothesis, derived from an existing theory, logically deduced testable predictions from the hypothesis, and then gathered data to determine whether the predictions were accurate.
What happened if the predictions were accurate?
The hypothesis was supported and subjected to additional tests.
What happened if the predictions were inaccurate?
The hypothesis was refuted and either abandoned or modified.
What is important to note in Eysenck’s research?
That he used factor analysis at the beginning of his research process.
Why did Eysenck use factor analysis?
To identify and verify the fundamental components of personality.
Cattell’s Analysis of Traits.
Cattell considered traits the building blocks of personality.
Most of his factor-analytic research was a search for personality traits, and that search uncovered several categories of traits.
