Important Concepts Flashcards
What does MAB stand for?
Multidimensional Aptitude Battery
What does the MAB consist of?
Measures in:
- Vocabulary
- Arithmetic
- Spatial
- Picture Arrangement
People with high IQ don’t have larger or more connected brains, but they have more … brains.
Efficient - Requiring less glucose for mental activity
What is the heritability factor of IQ and how does it change throughout life?
~ 0,5
Low in childhood, high in adulthood
How is EQ related to different Big5 traits?
Negatively related to Neuroticism
Positively related to Extraversion and Conscientiousness
Describe the Flynn effect
More recent generations have much higher IQ scores than past generations. (Even measured on the same test)
-> Effect is much stronger on tasks that involve fluid intelligence whereas it was very small on learnt knowledge domains.
What is fluid intelligence?
General intelligence and the ability to apply concepts broadly to different scenarios.
How do you define Spearman’s G-Factor?
An intelligence task, that correlates highly with other measurements has a high g-loading -> related to construct validity
What is a point of criticism against Spearman’s G-Factor?
Thurstone: There is more than one g-factor
How many kinds of intelligence are there in Gardener’s Multiple Intelligence Theory?
8
How does Gardener criticise general intelligence tests?
He says, they give an advantage to people with high verbal ability.
What are core aspects of Sternberg’s Triarchic theory of intelligence?
Proposes 3 fundamental aspects of intelligence:
- Analytic
- Creative
- Practical
- > Evidence shows that these are not independent from another.
What is a 19th Century precursor to modern personality assessment?
Gall & Spurzheim - Phrenology
What is Projective Assessment of Personality and what are examples?
- Using an ambiguous stimuli and analyzing the subjects response
- TAT - Thematic Apperception Test: Series of pictures and the participant has to make up a story around them
- Rohrschach: Interpreting ambiguous images (inkblot)
What are criticised aspects of projective assessment?
- Low reliability and validity (highly subjective)
Name the different approaches of constructing a personality inventory. (4)
- Factor-Analytic Approach
- Lexical Approach
- Rational Method
- Empirically Derived Measures
Explain the procedure of the Factor-Analytic approach.
- Start with large, diverse pool that is tested on a large sample
- Analyte the results and find groups of items, that correlate with another and measure different traits.
What are important remarks about the Factor-Analytic Approach?
- Resulting scales tend to be narrowly defined
- The trait that is being assessed is not pre-defined
- Pool of items is important
Describe the Lexical Procedure
Use dictionary as source for items
- > People will want to talk about personality, so there should be words describing them.
- Apply factor analysis to determine which terms correlate with another
What is an advantage of the lexical approach?
Has a more objective way of finding items for the test as they are not made up by the scientist.
Describe the procedure of Empirically Derived personality measures.
- An indicator for the desired personality trait is found
- correlation between this arbitrary indicator and the items on the test is calculated
- Highly correlated items are chosen for the test
What are weaknesses of the empirical procedure?
- Indicator might be poorly chosen, confining the entire test
- content of the items can be unrelated, as only statistical correlation is regarded (-> Face validity)
Name one advantage of the empirical procedure
Hard to fake on tests that used this approach.
Explain the rational strategy for constructing PIs
- Items are written specifically for the trait they are supposed to measure
- Administer all items to a pool of test-subjects and find the set of items that is most strongly correlated to the set of items overall
What are limitations of the rational strategy?
- Quality depends on the items that the researchers came up with
- Subject might easily fake results
What was the core of Eysenck’s Theory?
- 3 major domains of personality:
1. Extraversion
2. Neuroticism
3. Psychoticism - Sensitivity in different systems of the brain: If the system is sensitive, it gets overloaded easily, thus sensitivity and the trait are typically negatively correlated.
Gray’s Reinforcement Sensitivity Hypothesis:
- About Structure-Personality interaction
- Modification of Eysenck’s Theory
- Parts:
1. Behavioral Activation System - > The more active, the more reward-driven the person
2. Behavioral Inhibition System - > The more sensitive/active, the more risk-avoiding the person will be.
3. Fight or Flight System
Name the neurotransmitters associated with the Big5
- Extraversion: Dopamine - fMRI - OFC, NAc, Amygdala, Striatum
- Neuroticism: More Cortisol, lower serotonin
- Conscientiousness: More Serotonin (in PFC)
- Agreeableness: More Serotonin
According to Cloninger, what effect does Dopamine have on personality?
Facilitates response to rewarding stimuli -> Is positively correlated with personality traits that belong to “novelty-seeking”
According to Cloninger, what effect does Serotonin have on personality?
Inhibits response to unpleasant stimuli -> Negatively correlated with neurotic/harm-avoidant personality characteristics
According to Cloninger, what effect does Norepinephrine have on personality?
Negatively correlated with traits like sentimentalism / dependence
- This correlation postulated by Cloninger has the most scientific support
What are main hormones contributing to personality?
Testosterone and Cortisol
What is the effect of testosterone?
Positively correlated with dominance and aggression
As the difference in testosterone levels between men and women is much larger than their difference in behavior, we can’t attribute changing behavior to a single hormone.
What are characteristics of cortisol?
- Released by adrenal cortex (above the kidneys)
- Triggered by stress -> Prepares the body (Higher levels of blood pressure, blood sugar, suppression of immune system)
- Cortisol is related to personality characteristics, but never for both genders.
What is the effect of Oxytocin(Neuropeptide)?
Facilitates emotional bonding and trust
Has large effects on the brain due to long half-life time and the ability to be distributed in extracellular space
What is the difference between additive and non-additive genetic effects?
Additive Effects: When the level of a trait is determined linearly by the amount of genes present
Non-Additive Effects: When genes interact and moderate each other
What is the genetic influence on Big5 traits?
The genetic influence is between 40 and 50 % and non-additive effects are present.
What are limitations of twin-adoption studies?
- Difficult to find subjects
- Assumption of representativeness: Assumption that adopted children reflect the population
- Selective Placement: Usually, children aren’t adopted by random families - the adopting family might be similar to the biological family, confounding the results.
Which traits tend to correlate positively with being happy in a marriage?
Agreeableness and Emotional Stability
What are two characteristics of personality traits among friends?
- Their honesty and openness tends to be similar
2. they overestimate their similarity
How does your environment change your IQ?
- Children that are adopted by high SES families tend to show an increase in IQ
- Immigration has been associated with a drift of your IQ towards the new population mean
Neo-Socioanalytic Model:
- Personality Changes can occur at any age
- personality changes due to investment in social roles
Transactional Paradigm:
Clear-cut life transitions change personality
personality changes life experiences for less “large” events
What is paradoxical about the “Paradoxical Theory of Coherence”?
It states that personality is especially stable in the face of major life events due to the “Accentuation Hypothesis”: If a major life event brings insecurity, the individual will uphold pre-existing traits.
What is the effect of events in the occupational domain on personality traits?
- Graduation: increases conscientiousness and emotional stability, decreases extraversion
- Promotion: Increases Conscientiousness, Emotional Stability and Openness
- Unemployment: Decreases Conscientiousness, Openness and Agreeableness
What are events in a partnership, that effect personality traits?
- Starting a relationship: Increases Emotional Stability and Extraversion, decreases Agreeableness
- Marriage: Increases Emotional Stability, decreases Extraversion, Openness and Agreeableness
- Divorce: Increases Agreeableness and Openness
What is the rough development of the Big5 over the lifespan?
Overall, the traits become more stable (plateau)
- Extraversion decreases
- Most change happens between 15 and 30
What does the state-artefact position say?
Changes in personality during therapy might be attributed to “state-content contamination” (change in mood/personality state)
How is the cause-correction position related to the state-artefact position?
It opposes it. It says that changes resulting from therapy are enduring
What does Roberts say about the development of personality traits across lifespan?
Rank order consistency: Compared to peers, your ranking in different levels of personality traits doesn’t change a lot, although the absolute values do change.
Agreeableness negatively correlates with next-day …
interpersonal conflict
Describe the person-situation debate
Person-view/Trait-Theorists: People have a specific level of a trait
Situation-view/Situationists: Trait levels differ across situations
-> Interactionists approach seems to be logical
What can be said about intra vs interpersonal differences of personality trait levels?
Typically, an individual differs more within himself than how people in general differ from each other.
What are the traits making up the dark triad?
- Machiavellianism
- Narcissism
- Psychopathy
What does having the trait Machiavellianism mean for being manipulative?
It means that you are willing to manipulate people for your own advantage, but not necessarily that you have the ability to do so.
How is Psychopathy related to the Big5?
Negatively related with conscientiousness and neuroticism
Positively related with extraversion ang openness
How can the dark triad be related to motivation?
Especially Narcissism leads to a greater motivation to outperform others, in oder to make a good impression. Additionally, Machiavellianism can contribute to motivation since high-scorers don’t shy away from drastic measures to achieve their goal. Psychoticism serves as an inhibiting factor to act on one’s motivations.
What is the effect of the dark triad on leadership?
- Dark triad traits can help getting someone in a leadership position, but not necessarily keep him/her there.
- In specific circumstances, dark traits might be an advantage as a leader
- dark triad traits increases likelihood of destructive leadership
Does dark triad relate to outcomes or intent?
Intent
What are common issues that researchers run into when measuring the dark triad?
- Faking a “good” personality is easy, especially for people who score high on the dark triad
- Some scales are too short
What kind of assessment can be used to detect dark traits?
Subtle Assessment
What are three kinds of subtle assessment of dark traits?
- Other reports
- Measuring dark personality with normal-range measurements: Conducting a normal personality test, that doesn’t make it obvious, what is being tested for, but then statistically analyzing it for correlations with the dark triad
- Conditional Reasoning Tasks: Reasoning problems with multiple correct answers. Based on the answer choice, an assumption about the participant can be made.
The DSM-V classifies personality disorders in three clusters. What are they?
- Cluster A: Odd
Includes Schizotypal, Paranoid; Lack of interest in relationships; unconventional views - Cluster B: Antisocial
Includes Borderline, Narcissistic - Cluster C: Anxious/Fearful
Includes Avoidant, Dependent and Obsessive-Compulsive
Leads to lack of social contact and avoidant behavior
The ICD-11 classifies PDs a little different from the DSM-V. How?
It distinguishes between “self-problems” (identity, self-regulation/direction) and “interpersonal problems” (empathy, intimacy etc)
Employs a scale from 0 to 4 (3 & 4 are clinical)
Name 4 types of treatment for personality disorders and key aspects of each.
- Psychodynamic Psychotherapy: Helping to experience emotions through discussion and reflecting
- Cognitive behavioral therapy: Trying to explain to the patient, how his/her beliefs are maladaptive. For antisocial PD, it makes sense to reduce distance between self-interest and social norms (-> Seeing social behavior as a personal gain)
- Dialectic Behavioral Therapy: Goal is mindfulness
- Psychobiological Treatment: Drug therapy
What is the role of Conscientiousness in job performance?
It positively predicts overall job performance (r~.16)
Describe the bandwidth-fidelity dilemma
Broad Bandwidth: Global traits like Big5
Narrow Bandwidth: More specific attributes like proactiveness
Narrow bandwidth traits are able to explain increased performance better and are more directly related to the job at hand (face validity). Broad bandwidth measures however, are more theoretically valid and reliable. But they include facet traits, that might be unwanted
This trade-off is called the bandwidth-fidelity dilemma
What is one of Jenkin’s propositions for personality assessment in organizations?
- Include job context/content
What is an additional factor predicting job performance, which is not part of the Big5?
CSE - Core Self-Evaluation
-> refers to characteristics associated with self-esteem, emotional stability, self-efficacy and self-control
What are Big5 traits positively related with team effectiveness?
Conscientiousness, Agreeableness
There are three heuristics about personality and team efficiency. What are they? (Judge et al)
- Team effectiveness increases as average level of Conscientiousness increases.
- Team effectiveness increases as lowest level of agreeableness in the group increases
- Team effectiveness increases the more similar the group scores on openness
Two general methods of countering faking:
Proactive and Reactive Methods
What are proactive methods to prevent faking?
- Incorporating features in the test, which make faking less possible
- > Forced Choice: Multiple choice questions with equal correctness but different characteristics (like Conditional reasoning task)
- > Asking participants to elaborate on their responses
What are reactive methods to correct faking?
- Including social desirability and lie scales
- looking at response latency (it typically takes more time to give a faked answer)
What are options for personality assessment at the workplace according to Furnham?
- Self-questionnaires
- Observer-reports
- Interviews
- Performance tests on personality (Maximum/Behavioral/Typical)
- Physiological evidence
- Biodata
- Intelligence / Mental Ability tests
What is meant with predictor-criterion correspondence?
Choice of predictor should match the nature of the criterion. -> When measuring something indirectly, you should choose an indicator that actually predicts the criterion.
What does the factor analytic approach maximize?
Construct Validity
What does the rational approach maximize?
Internal Consistency
What does the empirical approach maximize?
Criterion Validity
Name two examples of PIs using the empirical method
MMPI
Binet’s IQ test
Name two examples of PIs using the rational Method
MBTI
Name an example of a PI using the factor-analytic method
16 PF
What exactly is the Accentuation Hypothesis?
If information is lacking on which personality trait levels are adaptive after a major life event occurred, then individuals will accentuate preexisting personality traits
What is the view of hierarchical theories of intelligence?
General intelligence is at the top of the hierarchy while verbal and numerical abilities are lower in the hierarchy
The rational approach has the limitation that it is…
vulnerable to faking
The Behavioral Inhibition System is associated with the Big5 trait:
Neuroticism
What did Cattell come up with regarding intelligence theories?
Hierarchical Model, fluid and crystallized intelligence
What is one of the backgrounds of why raven matrices were developed?
A non-verbal intelligence test that is culturally neutral was needed.
What are the two factors in Spearman’s two factor theory?
general intelligence - g
specific ability - s
Relate JP Guildford to Thurstone and Spearman and name what he is best known for.
Guildford rejected Spearman’s view, that intelligence can be quantified by one parameter and he developed the views of Thurstone, developing his own “Structure of Intelligence Theory” containing about 180 different intellectual abilities.
Name the parts of the “four branches of emotional intelligence model”.
Ability to use emotions to facilitate (clear) thinking
Managing emotions (and react appropriately)
Understanding Emotions (and interpreting accurately)
Perceiving Emotions (Body Language, tone, etc.)
-> Puma
What is the Ascending Reticular Activation System? (ARAS)
- A brain mechanism named by Eysenck
- located in the brain stem, at the point where spinal chord and brain meet
- works as filter that regulates the amount of stimulation that is transmitted to the brain by the peripheral nervous system
How can the ARAS be related to different personalities?
If the filter is very active, admitting only little amount of excitation to the brain, we are understimulated and seek out of excitement, producing an extraverted personality. (Vice Versa)
Describe Eysenck’s Lemon Juice Test
- researchers dropped small amounts of lemon juice onto the tongues of participants
- measured the amounts of saliva that each participant produced
- According to Eysenck’s theory, the lemon juice would be perceived more strongly by introverted participants, and elicit more salivation from these people than from the extraverts.
- Confirmed
What is the core idea of the costly signaling theory?
It says that sending a signal that is of high cost (owning expensive clothes, having a large tail) shows that you have the background to afford this kind of signal. (in terms of money, energy, genetics, etc.)
VP = Ga + G x G + Ec + rGE + G x E + Ee
Explain the subparts of this equation.
- VP = Variation in the Phenotype
- Ga + G x G = Genetic Variance
- rGE + G x E = Gene-Environment Interplay
- Ec + rGE + E x E + Ee = Malleability
How is Gene-Environment Correlation (Interaction) written mathematically?
rGE ( G x E)
