Kelly

Question 1

● it is a “___________”, or a theory about theories

Answer 1

metatheory

Question 2

● all people anticipate events by the meanings or interpretations they place on those events
➔ these meanings or interpretations are called_________

Answer 2

constructs

Question 3

the view that people are not victims of circumstances because alternative constructions are always available

Answer 3

constructive alternativism

Question 4

believed that human behavior is based both on reality and on people’s perception of reality
● he holds that the universe is real, but different people construe it in different ways

Answer 4

George Kelly

Question 5

➔ people’s __________ __________hold the key
to predicting their behavior

Answer 5

personal constructs

Question 6

ways of interpreting and explaining events

●___________ theory does not try to explain nature, but rather is a theory of people’s construction of events: their

Answer 6

personal constructs

Question 7

acting in the same manner as a scientist
➔ asking questions, formulating
hypotheses, testing them, drawing conclusions, and trying to predict future events

Answer 7

Person as scientist

Question 8

● if people can be seen as scientists, then scientists can also be seen as people
•the pronouncement of scientists should be regarded with the same skepticism with which we view any behavior
➔ every scientific observation can be looked at from a different perspective
➔ every theory can be slightly tilted and viewed from a new angle

Answer 8

Scientist as person

Question 9

different people construe reality in different ways, and the same person is capable of changing his view of the world
➔ people always have alternative ways of looking at things

Answer 9

Constructive alternativism

Question 10

• assumes that the piece-by-piece accumulation of facts does not add up to truth; rather, it assumes that facts can be looked at from different perspectives •agreed with Adler that a person’s interpretation of events is more important than the events themselves
➔ interpretations have meaning in the dimension of time
➔ what is valid at one time becomes false when construed differently at a later time

Answer 10

Constructive alternativism

Question 11

________ & __________ do not dictate conclusions; rather, they carry meanings for us to discover

Answer 11

facts and events

Question 12

● one’s way of seeing how things (or people) are alike yet different from other things
● the ways in which people make sense of the world
● personal constructs shape human behavior, whether they are clearly perceived or dimly felt

Answer 12

Personal Constructs

Question 13

●assumes that “a person’s processes are psychologically channelized by the ways in which that person anticipates events”

Answer 13

Basic postulate

Question 14

refers to a living, changing, moving human being; he did not recognize motives, drives, needs, or instincts as forces underlying motivation

Answer 14

person’s processes

Question 15

the term____________ suggests that people move with a direction through a network of pathways or channels

Answer 15

channelized

Question 16

this suggests that people guide their actions according to their predictions of the future; our present view of the future shapes our actions

Answer 16

ways of anticipating events

Question 17

people’s behaviors (thoughts and actions) are directed by the way they see the future

this postulate is not intended as an absolute statement of truth but is a tentative assumption open to question and scientific testing

Answer 17

Basic postulate

Question 18

11 supporting corollaries that can be inferred from the basic postulate

Answer 18

1) Similarities among events

2) Differences among people

3) Relationships among constructs

4)Dichotomy of constructs

5) Choice between dichotomies

6) Range of convenience

7) Experience and Learning

8) Adaptation to experience

9) Incompatible constructs

10) Similarities among people

11) Social processes

Question 19

~ construction corollary
~ states that “a person anticipates events by
construing their replications”
• no two events are exactly alike, yet we construe similar events so that they are perceived as being the same
• emphasizes the notion that people interpret future events according to recurrent themes or replications

Answer 19

Similarities among events

Question 20

● individuality corollary
● “persons differ from each other in their
construction of events”
● because people have different collections of
experiences, they construe the same event
in different ways
➔ no two people put an experience together
in exactly the same way
● although individual differences was
emphasized, Kelly pointed out that experiences can be shared and that people can find a common ground for construing experiences

Answer 20

Differences among people

Question 21

~ organization corollary
~ states that people “characteristically evolve–for their convenience in anticipating events–a construction system embracing ordinal relationships between constructs” emphasizes that different people organize similar events in a manner that minimizes incompatibilities and inconsistencies
➔ we arrange our constructs so we may move from one to another in an orderly fashion
➔ this allows a person to anticipate events in ways that avoid contradictions and conflicts
assumes an ordinal relationship of constructs so that one construct may be subsumed under another

Answer 21

Relationships among constructs

Question 22

● dichotomy corollary
● “a person’s construction system is
composed of a finite number of
dichotomous constructs”
● a construct is an either-or proposition; black
or white, with no shades of gray
● to form a construct, people must be able to
see similarities between events, but they must also contrast those events with their opposite pole

Answer 22

Dichotomy of constructs

Question 23

● choice corollary
● people have some choice in following
alternative courses of action
● “people choose for themselves that
alternative in a dichotomized construct through which they anticipate the greater possibility for extension and definition of future constructs”
● people make choices on the basis of how they anticipate events, and those choices are between dichotomous alternatives
● assumes that people choose those actions that are most likely to extend their future range of choices

Answer 23

Choice between dichotomies

Question 24

range corollary
assumes that personal constructs are finite and not relevant to everything
“a construct is convenient for the anticipation of a finite range of events only”
➔ a construct is limited to a particular range of convenience
allowed Kelly to distinguish between a
concept and a construct

Answer 24

Range of convenience

Question 25

● experience corollary
● “a person’s construction system varies as he successivelyconstruesthereplicationsof
events”
➔ the term “successively” was used to point
out that we pay attention to only one
thing at a time
restructuring of events allow us to learn from our experiences
experience is made up from the successive construing of events
➔ the events themselves do not constitute experience; it is the meaning we attach to them that changes our lives

Answer 25

Experience and Learning

Question 26

●modulation corollary
“the variation in a person’s construction system is limited by the permeability of the constructs within whose range of convenience the variants lie”
follows from and expands the experience corollary
assumes that the extent to which people revise their constructs is related to the permeability of their existing constructs
➔ a construct is permeable if new elements can be added to it
➔ impermeable or concrete constructs do not admit new elements
a change in events means a change in constructs ONLY if those constructs are permeable

Answer 26

Adaptation to experience

Question 27

● fragmentation corollary
● “a person may successively employ a variety
of constructive subsystems which are
inferentially incompatible with each other”
● allows for the incompatibility of specific
elements
● at first it may seem as if personal constructs
must be compatible, but if we look to our own behavior, we can easily see some inconsistencies
➔ example: protection and independence may be incompatible with each other on one level, but on a larger level, both are subsumed under the construct of love

Answer 27

Incompatible constructs

Question 28

● commonality corollary
● “to the extent that one person employs a
construction of experience which is similar to that employed by another, that person’s processes are psychologically similar to those of the other person”
● two people don’t have to experience the same event or even similar events for their processes to be psychologically similar; they must merely construe their experiences in a similar fashion
● although people of different backgrounds can have similar constructs, people with similar experiences are more likely to construe events along similar lines

Answer 28

Similarities among people

Question 29

● sociality corollary
● “to the extent that people accurately
construe the belief system of others, they may play a role in a social process involving those other people”
● people do not communicate with one another simply on the basis of common experiences or even similar constructions
➔ they communicate because they construe the constructions of one another
● people are actively involved in interpersonal relations and realize that they are part of the other person’s construction system

Answer 29

Social processes

Question 30

Kelly introduced the notion of________ in his sociality corollary

Answer 30

role

Question 31

it refers to a pattern of behavior that results from a person’s understanding of the constructs of others with whom that person is engaged in a task

Answer 31

Role

Question 32

the role central to one’s existence; our definition of ourselves in terms of who we really are

Answer 32

core role

Question 33

➔ other roles such as being a student, a daughter, and an employee are called_______ _______

Answer 33

peripheral roles

Question 34

Application of personal construct theory:

Answer 34

Abnormal development
Threat
Fear
Anxiety
Guilt

Question 35

● psychologically healthy people validate their personal constructs against their experiences with the real world
● unhealthy people stubbornly cling to outdated personal constructs, fearing validation of any new constructs that would upset their present comfortable view of the world

➔ their personal constructs often fail the
test of permeability in one of two ways
● they may be too impermeable
● or they may be too flexible

Answer 35

Abnormal development

Question 36

● people experience threat when they perceive that the stability of their basic constructs is likely to be shaken
● “the awareness of imminent comprehensive change in one’s core structures”
● one can be threatened by people or by events

Answer 36

Threat

Question 37

● more specific and incidental than threat
● Kelly demonstrated the difference between
fear and threat with the following example: a man may drive his car dangerously as the result of anger.

Answer 37

Fear

Question 38

➔ these impulses become ____________ when the man realizes that he may run over a child or be arrested for reckless driving
➔ however, if he is suddenly confronted with the probability of crashing his car, he will experience _________

Answer 38

threatening & fear

Question 39

● “the recognition that the events with which one is confronted lie outside the range of convenience of one’s construct system’
● people are likely to feel anxious when they are experiencing a new event
● pathological anxiety exists when a person’s incompatible constructs can no longer be tolerated and the person’s construction system breaks down

Answer 39

Anxiety

Question 40

● develops if a person’s core role is weakened or dissolved
● “the sense of having lost one’s core role structure”
● people feel guilty when they behave in ways that are inconsistent with their sense of who they are
➔ people who have never developed a core role do not feel

Answer 40

Guilt