Communication, Personality Flashcards
Personality
Refers to an individuals unique constellation of consistent behavioural traits
Characteristic ways of thinking, feeling and acting, making the person an individual.
Stability in ones behaviour over time and situations
Used to explain why not everyone acts the same way
Traits
Are stable forms of behaviours that people display in any and every situation
Trait Theory: Five Factor Model
Robert McCrae and Paul Costa (1987, 1997, 1999, 2003)
Extraversion: outgoing, sociable, positive
Neuroticism: Anxious, hostile, negative
Openness to Experience: Curiosity, artistic, imaginative
Agreeable: Trusting, sympathetic
Conscientiousness: Diligent, disciplined, honest
Research shows that Big Five traits are predictive of specific aspects of behaviour
Extraversion correlates positively with popularity
Conscientiousness correlates with greater honesty, high marks at uni and higher job performance
Psychodynamic Theory:
- Theories founded on the work of Sigmund Freud, which focus on unconscious mental forces
- Explains personality, motivation and psych disorders
Focuses on early childhood experiences, unconscious motives to explain personality - Individuals are not masters of their own minds / destinies
Personality is divided into three unconscious components:
ID: instinctive component, raw biological urges
EGO: decision making component, considers social norms and etiquettes
SUPEREGO: moral component, incorporates social standards about what represents right or wrong
Psychoanalytic Theory:
Proposed three levels of awareness:
Conscious
Current awareness
e.g. beginning to get hungry
Pre-conscious
material just below the surface of awareness
e.g. argument you had yesterday w/ friend
Unconscious
Thoughts, memories, desires below surfaces
e.g. forgotten traumas from childhood
FREUD AGAIN
Psychosexual Theory:
Freud’s psychosexual theory of development
Characteristic sexual focus that leave their mark on adult personality
How children develop into adulthood and how they deal with their powerful sexual urges
Humanistic theories:
People are born good and try to reach potential throughout their lives
According to humanistic theories -> personality results from people striving to achieve their potential
BY ROGERS AND MASLOW
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Need
Abraham Maslow (1908-1970) Human motives are organised into a “Hierarchy of needs” Basic needs must be met before less basic needs are aroused Top= need for self actualisation, needed to fulfil one’s potential
developed ideas through studying healthy, creative people
e.g. many figures in American history
Considered that they shared characteristics
Open and self aware, secure in who they were, able to enjoy deep relationships = ‘self actualised’ person
Person Centered Theory
Carl Rogers (1902-1967)
Believed that people are born good and with the potential for enormous growth
Important people in our lives help us to grow by providing genuineness, acceptance and empathy
We needed to experience these conditions from significant people in our lives in order to feel free to make any changes we want to make in ourselves
TO GROW AND SELF ACTUALISE
If we are to have a well adjusted personality, there needs to be a good match b/w our:
ideal self: person we would like to be
self image: the person we think we are
true self: the person we actually are
Greater the gap between our ideal self, self image and behaviour, the more likely we are to feel anxious and stressed
Recent research= students whose ideal and self images weren’t matched were anxious and depressed compared w/ students whose idea; and self images were better matched
Humanistic theories has big impact on counselling and education areas
CRITICISM:
Vagueness of some concepts (self actualisation)
Description of characteristics for self actualised person are simply a list of Maslow’s values
Theory is overly optimistic and fails to take into account human capacity for evil
Learning Theories
Behaviourists believe personality is no more nor less than learned behaviour patterns
Skinner (1904-1991)
Behaviour that people think reflects personality is simply behaviour that has been learnt from our past experiences
Behaviour can be unlearned through punishment
Therefore no long lasting personality characteristics
Our behaviour can be changed by other people or rewarding desired behaviour & punishing unwanted behaviour
CRITICISM:
too simplistic, treating people as robots
Most psychologists today would consider that our through processes, believe and motivation affect what we learn
Contemporary Issues:
Personality + Health
Holland
Approaches personality by grouping characteristics that individuals have in common
Meyer Freidman
Proposed two personality types
Type A: Ambitious, competitive, highly motivated, busy
Type B: Easy going, low levels of time urgency, competitiveness and hostility
People can be a mix
Personality and Sport
All people have distinctive personalities
Tests the different sports and personality factors in sport performance
Hans Eyesenck
1917-1919
Combined clinical psych and experimental psych to determine personality types
Developed dimensions:
neuroticism - emotional instability
Extraversion/introversion- active/quiet, outgoing/reserved
psychoticism - recklessness . disregard for common sense
dimensions = regularities in the traits observed in people
high scores = evidence of different personality types
Cattell (1946)
Developed model to describe surface source and global traits
Basic personality dimensions proposed = tender mindedness, neuroticism
Personality in Sport
High performers = calm, confident, fearless, top physical shape, technical ability
Most research is cross sectional
Emotional stability, conscientiousness = high level performance
Anxiety = negative effect, affects performance, choking
Aidman & Schofield
2004
Discuss influence of personality on sport performance
Personality plays part in successful competitive sport
Emotional stability= control stress and impulses
levels of arousal necessary for high performance
Low levels of arousal = no motivation = poor performance
Sport Psychologists
Study behavioural, cognitive and effective components of sports performance
Study effects of crowd + choking
Develop programs to encourage motor performance and plans of skilled activities
Use mental imagery to aid learning whereby successful performance is imagined
Achieving peak performance = complex process - motivation, self confidence, attention regulation and stress management
Personality and Sport
Compared to non-sport playing controls, national competitors are: Higher emotional stability Greater mental toughness More self assured More trusting
Mood States and performance
Morgan and Hammer (1979) Terry (2000) Better performing athletes display: more positive mental states less anxious Less depressed less fatigued less confused less vigorous
Communication objectives
Role of language in initiating, maintaining and regulating interpersonal relationships
Communication
The ability to physically or verbally interact with others through speech or behaviour
Bad communication = aggressive, no eye contact, use of monotone, one sided
Good communication = calm, listens, eye contact, clear info.
Can be defined as conveying a message from one person to another
Can be verbal or non-verbal
The role of relationships in communication
Sender and receiver
Meaning of message to be understood = context to be understood
Relationship between sender + receiver determines how they will react
Bonnie and Brinton
1998
8-1 years children
Found- disagreements arose in play situations
Bethany Gertner
1994
Children with SLI interact less, fewer friends, less popular
Children point to photo of who they want to play with
Assertive Communication
Involves honestly expressing opinion Is not aggressive 3 steps: Say something that proves you understand State the problem Make a statement about what you want to change
Effective / active listening
Active= when the listener attends to the speaker fully, tries to understand what is important for the speaker and asks questions when they don’t understand Full attention No distractions Empathy Barriers; conversation is only one sided
Communication Issues
complications for impaired communications, hearing impairment and autism
Senses deteriorate as you grow older
Autism - ability to socialise with others is affected
Types of hearing loss
- conductive: prevents sound from going through the nerves & into the brain. Messages cannot be decoded. Problems to the outer or middle ear
Sensorineural: main sections of the ear damaged / hearing nerve.
Autism
Autism is characterized by social and communication difficulties and restricted, stereotyped and repetitive behaviours Main difficulties: Social interaction Verbal / non-verbal communication Repetitive behaviour and interests
