Individual Differences Key Terms Flashcards
Equality Act
2010
Key piece of legislation in the UK designed to preotect people from discrimination in various areas of life, including work, eduaction etc. It covers a range of protected characteristics
Protected Characteristics
Religion
Belief
Disability
Age
Gender Reassignment
Marriage or Civil Partnership
Race
Sex
Sexual Orientation
Pregnancy
Maternity
Religion
An organised system of beliefs, practices and symbols, designed to enable closeness to God
Religiosity
Intensity and depth of a person’s religious beliefs, practices and involvement.
Degree to which religion influences a person’s behaviour, thoughts, and identity
Intrinsic Religiosity
Someone viewing their religion as the framework for their lives and part of their internal identity.
Those who have high intrinsic religiosity negatively correlate with anxiety, depression and obsessions and compulsions.
They positively correlate with higher self-esteem, active coping and self-control.
Extrinsic Religiosity
When religion allows us to be part of an in-group. Important for our external environment. I.e. I go to church because my friends are going.
Identified Religiosity
Personal convictions deeply valued, positive effects on mental health.
How strongly a person considers themselves a part of a religion or spiritual group, even if their level of practice or belief varies.
Introjected Religiosity
Socially pressured beliefs.
Type of religious commitment that is motivated by external pressures or internalised expectations, rather than genuine personal desire or conviction.
Negative effects on MH, psychological adjustment and self-esteem.
Could cause guilt and anxiety- not living up to expectations. Lack of authenticity. Conflict with personal beliefs.
Dimensions of Religiousness
Koenig et al. (1988)
Faith, Rituals, Experiences, Religious Knowledge, Community
Self-Determination Theory
How we endorse our religious values affects our behaviours. Identidied Religiosity and Introjected Religiosity are part of this theory.
Attitudes and Behaviours in the context of religiosity and cults
Belief in God significantly positively correlates with prosocial behaviour.
If someone’s beliefs don’t align with them, religious people are more likely to display active aggression.
Religion gives people a sense of meaning and purpose of life, social support, healthier lifestyles, care and concern for others, private coping.
Religion negatively correlates with vulnerability to hopelessness and suicidal thinking.
New Religious Movements = Cults
Show a sense of community and belonging.
Socially deviant norms.
Members of cults have pleaded NGRI for violent crimes carried out under beliefs.
Example;
1978: mass-murder-suicide in Jonestown, Guyana that resulted in 900+ deaths with a 1/3 being children.
Deviation from religious norms
Backsliding, doubt, feelings of abandonment
Poorer mental health due to guilt, shame, anger
Often linked to extrinsic religiosity- motivated by the wrong factors
Scrupulosity
A subtype of OCD where religion and OCD intersect. Involves excessive worry or anxiety about moral or religious issues. They often feel intense fear that they are doing something wrong in the eyes of a higher power or violating moral or religious rules, even when their behaviour is not actually problematic. Includes obsessions and compulsive behaviours.
CBT could help.
Medication like SSRIs may be prescribed also.
Cognitive Aspects;
- pathological obsessions
-extreme tunnel vision
-moral rumination- repetitive, often uncontrollable, thinking about moral issues, ethical dilemmas or past actions that may have been perceived as morally wrong. Getting stuck in thoughts. Negative cycle of critiquing.
Behavioural Aspects:
- compulsive confessions
- compulsive rituals
Social Aspects;
-isolation
Mental Contamination
Obsessive thought can arise without coming into contact with physical contamination.
i.e. feeling spiritually contaminated by something they believe is sinful, impure or morally wrong even if they have not physically or behaviourally done anything wrong.
Five Factor Model
Openness- openness to experience, open-mindedness, curious, imaginative, willing to explore new ideas and experiences
Conscientiousness- degree of self-discipline, responsibility, organisation, goal directed behaviour a person exhibits.
Extraversion- degree to which a person is outgoing, energetic, and sociable
Agreeableness- degree of warmth, kindness and cooperativeness a person shows towards others
Emotional Stability/Neuroticism- tendency to experience negative emotions such as anxiety, depression, anger, and vulnerability
Framework for understanding personality.
Describes personality traits in terms of 5 broad dimensions that capture the variety of human behaviour.
Scientifically supported way to understand and explore the complexity of human personality.
Has practical applications.
Everyone has a unique blend of these 5 traits.
Can change over time based on life experiences and personal growth.
Holisitic framework.
Ellis and Irrational Beliefs
Key concept in Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy
Type of cognitive behavioural therapy.
Focuses on identifying and challenging irrational beliefs that lead to emotional distress and unhealthy behaviours.
ABC Model
A= Activating Event- the event or situation that triggers an emotional reaction.
B= Beliefs- thoughts or beliefs a person holds about the event. Can be rational or irrational.
C= Consequences- emotional or behavioural response to the belief. irrational beliefs tend to lead to negative emotional consequences like anxiety, anger, or depression.
By replacing irrational beliefs with more realistic and flexible thinking, Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy helps people live healthier, more balanced lives with less emotional decline.
Non-Clinical Anxiety
State and Trait Anxiety
State Anxiety
Usually measured with trait anxiety.
An emotional, temporary state in response to the presence of threatening stimuli.
Trait Anxiety
Usually measured with state anxiety.
General tendency to feel anxious or nervous across various situations, regardless of specific circumstances. Stable part of personality.
Generalised Anxiety Disorder
DSM-5
- Excessive or persistent worry for over 6 months about events/activities
- Trouble controlling said worry
- 3 or more of: restlessness, fatigue, irritability, muscle tension, sleep disturbance, significant impairment in daily life
2x as many females experienced this.
High commorbity with depression.
Phobic Disorder
DSM-5
Persistent fear of an object that is excessive/unreasonable lasting more than 6 months.
Immediate anxiety when faced with object.
Recognition that fear is excessive.
Simple Phobia
Irrational fear triggered by specific situations.
Social Anxiety
Type of phobia
Fear of 1 or more social situations when scrutiny is plausible.
Exposure to situation provokes anxiety.
SAD positively correlated with neuroticism and negatively correlates with extraversion (5 factor model!)
Physical Symptoms: increased heart rate, nausea
Cognitive symptoms: negative thoughts pertaining to self-appraisal
Behavioural symptoms: avoidance or indirect avoidance (i.e. substance abuse)
Five Factor Model in context of disability, illness and health
These personality traits influence how individuals cope with health challenges and how they perceive their disability or illness. As well as how they manage recovery and overall well-being.
Cognitive Factors of Anxiety
Attentional Bias- we selectively allocate our attentional resources towards or away from specific stimulus. Useful for avoiding threat.
Shyness
Not a disorder on its own
State shyness- situation/state-dependent.
Trait shyness- relatively stable persistent trait
Can be:
Publicly shy
Privately shy
Socially anxious shy
Dyslexia
A learning difficulty/reading disability involving reading/writing/spelling.
7% prevalence.
More prominent in men.
There are risks of developing depression.
No bearing on intelligence.
Some genetic evidence.
Can be acquired later in life through brain damage.
Subtypes
- Surface= difficulties reading irregular words i.e. through
- Phonological= difficulties reading pronounceable non-words i.e. could read shirt but not chirt.
Phonological Deficits of Dyslexia
Dyslexia is caused by phonological representation deficits. Difficulties representing, storing, and retrieving speech sounds. Language processing is impaired at the phoneme level.
Rapid Automatised Naming Deficits
How easily one can retrieve and name a familiar visual stimulus. Naming speed is measured. There may be a visual-verbal disconnection reflected in difficulties reading in dyslexic people.
Reading Fluency Deficits
Dyslexics spend effort decoding words.
Dyscalculia
Learning difficulty relating to maths.
Often occurs with dyslexia.
Difficulties include: backwards counting, slower maths calculations, poorer mental arithmetic, uncertainty when answers are correct.
It is heterogeneous, as it varies widely from person to person. People experience different challenges.
3-6% of children.
Type A Personality
Time urgency, hurried, competitive, dislike time wasting, anger, hostility
Type B
Laid back, relaxed, hard workers when necessary, less compulsive, unhurried.
Type D personality
Distressed, consistent with coronary heart disease, worrisome, low mood, pessimistic, easily irritated, lack of hope.
Pessimism
Seeing challenges as their own fault and out of their control.
Negative outlook, fearful of the future, helplessness.
Increased stress
Mental Health risks
Avoidance- may avoid challenging situations or give up more easily because they expect failure.
Optimism
See challenges as a setback. Hopefulness and confidence about the future or success of something.
Expect positive outcomes and believe that things will work out in the end, even in the face of adversity. See setbacks as temporary, specific to a situation and within their control.
Resilience!
Better mental health
Better health- stronger immune system, lower stress levels etc.
More motivation.
Sex Definition
The biological and physiological factors that define male, female or intersex people.
Gender Definition
Socially constructed roles, behaviours and attributes that a given society considers appropriate for men, women and non-binary people.
Why do Sex Differences matter?
There is still a lot of discrimination and prejudice in many sectors of society.
Women are much less likely to major in STEM subjects.
More women than men leave their faculty jobs and less likely to be promoted.
Even though the majority of psychology undergraduates are females, the board of staff is dominated by males.
Trends are improving, however there are still 10 differences affecting women:
1) Career Advancements
2) Financial Compensation
3) Service Assignment and Practices
4) Lifestyle Roles and Work-Family Conflict
5) Gender Biases
6) Holding Positions of Power
7) Intersectionality
8) Harassment
9) Agency, self-esteem, self-promotion
10) Lack of belonging
General Intelligence
It is difficult to measure sex differences in general intelligence, as tests are designed to not take into account sex differences and items that show sex differences are removed.
Research has shown that men and women tend to perform equally on intelligence tests. There are some differences though: Males perform better on tasks involving spatial reasoning, while women tend to perform better in tasks involving verbal ability or empathy.
Historically, early IQ tests were criticised for being culturally biased and referencing gender stereotypes. Tests like the Stanford-Binet test have been altered to remove any overt biases, in order for the test to focus on ability and individual, ideographic differences rather than nomothetic differences.
Spatial Abilities
Skills that allow a person to understand, remember and manipulate shapes, objects and spaces.
Includes: spatial perception, mental rotation, spatial visualisation, spatio-temporal ability, general and maintenance of a spatial image.
Men may have a slight advantage on spatial reasoning tasks. But not much of a difference.
Verbal Abilities
Young girls are more proficient in language skills than boys including vocabulary growth and reading proficiency.
Women tend to do better than men in verbal reasoning and writing ability.
Memory and Attention
There is limited evidence for attentional differences, but some studies show that men have greater vigilance while women have enhanced inhibitory control associated with the dorsolateral and anterior cingulate cortex areas of the prefrontal cortex.
A study showed that variability of the short term memory and attention switching in women was identified. But this was associated with lower cognitive abilities.
For memory differences, females appear to have am advantage in episodic memory but this does depend on the nature of the task.
Explanation of sex differences in cognition
Baroncohen suggests that men are on average biologically predisposed to systematise and women are predisposed to empathise.
This could link to biological essentialism and the evolutionary theory.
Does not touch on socio-cultural explanations.
Hemispheric Asymmetry
The concept that the hemispheres in the brain act independent to each other and have specific abilities.
Some research shows that men appear to have more pronounced hemispheric asymmetry. More bilateral improves cognitive abilities such as resilience to damage, problem solving etc.
Male brain superior for spatial skills, meanwhile women brain more superior for verbal skills.
Stereotype Threat
Individuals perform worse on tasks when they are aware of negative stereotypes about their social group.
- Activation of stereotypes- individuals are reminded of a stereotype and so they may feel subconscious pressure to prove or disprove this stereotype.
- Performance Anxiety- stress/anxiety impairs cognitive function
- Confirmation Bias- Individuals begin to doubt their abilities and so may underperform.
Negative stereotypes affect female mathematical performance and women are more strongly affected by negative stereotypes than men.
Hormone Treatment and Trans People
Many studies suggest that trans individuals are more similar to their preferred gender with respect to cerebral and grey matter volume and performance on gender-biased cognitive tasks.
Impact of Hormone Treatment=
Trans men:
Increase in-
- visual memory performance
- 3D Spatial Memory performance
- Aggression
- Sexual arousal
- Positive Mental health
Decrease in-
- Verbal fluency
- Arithmetic answering strategies
Trans women:
Increase in-
- Verbal fluency
- Positive mental health
Decrease in-
- Anger and aggression
- sexual arousal
- spatial ability
Age Differences- Five Factor Model
Openness- highest in young adulthood and decreases with age/goes flat.
Conscientiousness- tends to increase with age, peaking in the middle of adulthood- planning.
Extraversion- decreases with age
Agreeableness- tends to increase with age
Neuroticism/Emotional Stability- decrease with age due to more emotional stability and resilience
The way these traits change and manifest is influenced by age.
Personality Stability
The degree to which an individual’s personality traits remain consistent over time as they age.
BUT
Not everyone experiences the same patterns of stability and change.
Stability does not mean that personality does not change with age. While personality traits remain consistent over time, they may evolve and manifest in response to life experiences.
Homotypic Stability
Personality traits remain expressed in the same way.
Heterotypic Stability
Underlying traits remains the same but manifestation/expression changes and evolves.
Rank Order Stability
Relative consistency of individual’s positions on a particular trait. Whether someone’s standing on a specific trait compared to others remains the same.
Mean Level Stability
Average level of a trait within a population. Looks at whether the overall amount of a specific trait increases, decreases or stays the same across a group of people as they age.
How is personality stability studied?
Cross-sectional design- can study mean level stability, but is confounded by cohort effects (having being born in a different time or region or having different life experiences can alter the outcomes of studies)
Longitudinal design- can study rank order and mean level stability. Based on a single cohort.
Cumulative Continuity Principle
Personality traits become stable as people age.
The experiences, choices and roles that individuals take on reinforce their personality traits, making them more consistent and less likely to change. Makes them more predictable.
Why do we change as we age?
Holistic combination of factors.
We are genetically predisposed to change and develop.
Twin studies show personality development is largely genetic in childhood, but in adulthood it only plays a small role.
Life experiences are arguably more important and closely related to age.
Maturity principle- as people age, they become more emotionally stable, more agreeable and more conscientious.
How do we change and why do we stay the same as we age?
Transformation is possible.
Environment can change personality through reward or punishment.
Corresponsive Principle of Personality= the environment and personality interact to promote personality continuity. Personality traits are not static. Key components:
- Attraction- people are drawn to certain environments that align with their personality traits. This can reinforce existing personality traits.
- Selection- people choose environments that fit their personality traits. Can happen passively or actively. Reinforce original personality characteristics. can be good and bad- no stepping out of comfort zone could perpetuate mental illness.
-Attrition- people gradually remove themselves from environments or relationships that do not align with their personality traits. Reinforce traits, as filtering out negative vibes.
- Manipulation- people actively influence and shape their environments to better fit their personality. Solidifies personality.
These four components work together to develop a continuous feedback loop that reinforces an individual’s personality.
Caveats of looking at how personality changes over age
A lot of research ignores cultural factors.
Queer temporality- what happens when your life stages don’t follow a typical timeline. Does not account for these ideographic differences.
Flynn Effect
Average IQ scores have been rising over time across generations in many parts of the world even though tests are adjusted to account for age and time differences.
Fluid intelligence- 15 points per generation
Crystallised intelligence- 9 points per generation
Environmental influences- schooling (probably not), test-taking sophistication, parental styles, visual and technical environment, nutrition.
Explanations:
Cognitive Stimulation Hypothesis: Interaction of genetics and environment higher IQ. Individuals seek out stimulating environments.
Nutrition Hypothesis
Crystallised Intelligence
Used experience and knowledge, vocab, recognition, comprehension, problem-solving
Fluid Intelligence
Information processing, reasoning, working memory, reaction time/processing speed
Evolution theory for gender difference
Men and women have developed different psychological traits and behaviours because their role in reproduction and survival were fundamentally different.
It is shaped by natural selection. Traits that increase an individual’s chance of survival and reproduction are more likely to be passed on to future generations.
A key concept of this theory: Parental Investment- amount of time, energy and resources invested in offspring differs between men and women which leads to different reproductive strategies.
Another key concept is: Sexual Selection- subset of natural selection that focuses on traits that increase an individual’s chance of attracting a mate and reproducing. Intra-sexual selection- competition within the same sex.
Cognitive Social Learning Theory of Gender Difference
Behaviour is shaped by principles of behaviourism: punishment, reinforcement and imitation. These contribute to the development of gender-specific behaviours and identities. These gender roles are learnt through social interaction and cognitive processing of experiences.
Internalised gender norms acquired through observing and imitating role models shapes behaviour.
E.g. Bandura- boys more likely to demonstrate aggression towards a BoBo Doll after observing a same sex model demonstrate aggression.
Sociocultural Theory of Gender Difference
Gender differences are determined by external factors like culture and other people. They stem from social norms and restrictions. Gender socialisation is a major influence of behaviours.
Gender differences in personality
Differences in agreeableness and neuroticism. Women tend to score higher on agreeableness on average i.e. due to internalised gender norms, gender socialisation, evolutionary perspective. Women tend to also score higher on neuroticism- ingrained values that men should not expose their emotions and are supposed to be emotionally neutral. Could be due to hormones, social and cultural factors and social norms.
Impact of Equality on gender differences
Larger differences in personality in most egalitarian societies. Could be due to biological factors- egalitarian culture means men and women are freer to express evolved dispositions. Social explanation- egalitarian culture changes frame of reference from group to population and so exacerbates differences. Increased gender role flexibility, also. Increased self-expression. Shift in traditional gender roles.
Trans and Non-Binary Research in Gender Differences
There is limited research. But, personality traits of trans men change with testosterone administration. Decreased neuroticism and depression, but harder to disentangle relationship with mental health though.
Male Mental Health
Men self-report lower neuroticism and mental health issues than women. But, men experience significantly higher rates of suicide and substance abuse than women i.e. 12 men commit suicide every day. Links to evolutionary theory and social cultural theory.
BUT
Male Psychology section of BPS helps to improve mental health of men and raises awareness, advocates for interventions and challenges gender stereotypes.
APA 2019 issued guidelines on working with men and boys with negative effects of traditional masculinity.
These are criticised for being disparaging towards men and dissuading men and traditional families from seeking counselling.
Social predictors of mental health
Interest-based= intrinsically motivated. How personal characteristics affect the types of interest a person pursues.
Exposure based= rooted in behavioural and cognitive theories. Examines how repeated exposure to certain stimuli and environments shape mental health.
Biological Essentialism
Members of a category share fundamental or essential qualities that make them what they are. Sex Differences Hypothesis- Men and Women exhibit inherent biologically based differences in their cognitive abilities, behaviours and psychological traits.
Gender Essentialism
Belief that gender differences are rooted in biological factors. People are inherently predisposed to certain behaviours or roles based on their gender.
Transprejudice
2018-2023= 138% increase in reported hate crimes against trans people
111% increase in reported hate crimes on basis of sexual orientation.
British Social Attitudes Survey
- 2023= 64% describve themselves as not prejudiced which is a decline of 18% since 2019- 82%
- in 2024 only 24% think someone should be able to have the sex on their birth certificate change- down from 58% in 2016
Gender Shift Hypothesis
Some evidence that patterns of cognition are reversed for gay/bisexual/lesbian men and women. Explains how gender roles and gender identity evolve over the course of an individual’s life.
2D:4D Ratio
Relative length of index finger and ring finger.
Males typically have a lower 2D:4D ratio than women.
Due to effects of prenatal testosterone and oestrogen exposure. Higher levels of prenatal testosterone exposure are associated with a lower 2D:4D ratio which is correlated with masculine traits.
Pre natal oestrogen exposure correlates with higher 2D:4D ratio.
Higher levels of prenatal testosterone exposure associated with greater likelihood of same sex attraction. Lower levels of testosterone or higher oestrogen exposure may be associated with heterosexual.
If women have a lower 2D:4D ratio this typically predicts lesbian.
If a man has lower 2D:4D ratio this predicts heterosexual.
OCEAN differences in sexual orientation
Higher neuroticism among homosexuals than heterosexuals.
Lower neuroticism among homo women than hetero women.
Higher openness in homosexuals than heterosexuals.
No differences in consicentiousness, extraversion and agreeableness.
Bisexuals are more open than homosexuals. And hetereosexuals are less open than homosexuals.
Bisexuals are less conscientious than hetero and homo.
Age has an effect. All effects decrease as sample age increases.
Sexual Configurations Theory
Used to understand the complexity of sex orientation and behaviours.
it challenges traditional, binary concepts of sexuality.
Focuses on fluidity and multidimensionality. Sexuality is fluid and context-dependent. Sexual attraction, identity and behaviour are distinct but are interconnected. They vary independently and can change over time. Sexuality is a social construct and is not just biological.
Impact of attitudes on sexual orientation
112% increase in hate crimes on the basis of sexual orientation across England and Wales over last 5 years.
Police Scotland report that 67% increase in hate crimes on the basis of sexual orientation.
Attitudes regarding same-sex relationships
British Social Attitudes Survey- 67% says same sex relationships are not wrong. Hate crimes rising.
Attitudes towards bisexuality
Very negative attitudes. More negative than attitudes towards gay men and lesbians. Double stigma- from both communities. Lots of unfair and inaccurate myths. Less positive attitudes. 32% say that they would not date people who are bisexual due to perception as unstable or unsure of themselves.
Bilingualism, race and decision making
Biliguals have a unique competitive advantage regarding decision making. They often exhibit better executive control. They can better ignore distractions and focus on important information. Being bilingual improves working memory.
Framing effects are important- people make different choices based on how information is presented. Bilinguals are less susceptible to framing effects when making decisions in their non-native language i.e. L2. Non-native language creates a psychological distance from emotional content of decision.
Bilingualism and loss aversion
L2 promotes psychological distance meaning less emotional stress. Less affected by loss aversion.
Bilingualism and personality
Learn new language and get new soul.
Higher extraversion, agreeableness and conscientiousness in English (L2).
Lower agreeableness in Spanish.
Higher extraversion and neuroticism in Spanish.
Not new soul but instead a different way of displaying and perceiving personality.
Biculturalism
Linguistic and cultural multiplicity are independent. I.e. you can be monolingual and bicultural.
Not a shift in personality, just a shift in context- cultural frame shifting.
Complementary Principle
bilinguals acquire and use language for different purposes, in different domains of use with different people
What is race?
A social construct
Genetic isopoint
A concept that refers to the point in the past at which al individuals in a population had a common ancestor. Highlights how all humans are related at some level. Reflects how genetic diversity in a population get reshaped over time due to migrations, population bottlenecks etc.
What is heritability?
Proportion of variability in a phenotype that is accounted for by variation in genotype.
