Lecture 1 - Introduction Flashcards
What is the trait paradigm?
Consistencies in how people differ psychologically
What are the 5 different paradigms and perspectives of personality?
Traits, biology, psychoanalytic, phenomenological and learning
What is the biology paradigm?
Explanations based on the brain and physiology
What is the psychoanalytic paradigm?
unconscious and internal conflicts
What is the phenomenological paradigm?
Individual and cultural differences
What is the learning paradigm?
Cognitive processes and social learning
What are the pros and cons of personality psychology?
- Aims to describe the whole person: Inclusive and interesting but can be unfocused.
- Focus is upon individual differences: Respect for individuality but can box people.
What is Funder’s First Law?
Great strengths are usually great weaknesses and often the opposite is true as well.
What are the three faces of personality?
1) All people are the same
2) Some people are the same
3) No one is the same
What are the 4 kinds of clues in understanding personality?
1) You simply ask the person for their own evaluation of their personality (S Data)
2) You ask their acquaintances (I Data)
3) You see how the person is faring in life (L Data)
4) you watch, as directly as you can, what the person actually does (B Data)
What is another word for error?
Noise
Which factors reduce reliability?
1) Poor measure
2) extraneous factors (e.g. state of participant, assessor, environment).
Which factors enhance reliability?
1) Care in constructing measures
2) Standardised procedures
3) Motivate participants
4) Aggregation
What is the Spearman-Brown formula?
Aggregation, i.e. the more items, the more reliable the test
What is validity?
The extent of which a test measures what it claims to measure
