Lecture 2

Question 1

List three ways of studying the heritability of personality

Answer 1

Family studies
Twin studies
Adoption studies

Question 2

Describe Reimann’s study

Answer 2

He found that there was more concordance between Mz twins as opposed to Dz twins when measuring personality variables.

Question 3

What is the main disadvantage of quantitative models?

Answer 3

It doesn’t tell you about the traits of an individual.

Question 4

What did the human genome project discover?

Answer 4

That there are many genes which affect your personality. For example, anxiety and neuroticism have been linked to genetics.

Question 5

How is there genetic mutations across individuals?

Answer 5

Because of genetic mutations.

Question 6

What are the three types of genetic influences?

Answer 6

Additive genetic variance; the total genes inherited
Dominant genetic variance; the dominant genes that are expressed
Epistatic genetic variance; the interaction between genes resulting in some being suppressed or expressed.
All of these cover the total genetic variance.

Question 7

What is the passive model?

What is the parents-effects model?

Answer 7

The passive model explains a child’s behaviour because of its shared genes with his/her parents.
This is a branch of the passive model. Its when a child responds to the parents actions and their genetic make-up triggers their response.

Question 8

What is the reinforcement sensitivity theory?

Answer 8

When basic behaviours in animals are personality traits. It consists of two systems; behavioural approach system (an animals sensitivity to reward and whether they are impulsive and approach the potential reward), the behavioural inhibition system (an animals sensitivity to punishment and whether they’re anxious and move away from potential reward). This can be tested in humans via questionnaires.

Question 9

How can we characterise brain processes?

Answer 9

We can characterise them by means of a simplified conceptual nervous system that’s relevant to personality and behaviour.

Question 10

Describe Eysenk’s 1967 study

Answer 10

He created a model of personality. It explains how neural processes explain human traits. It also involves excitation and inhibition. There are two neural circuits; the reticulo-cortical circuit which controls arousal from incoming stimuli. If you have a lot of control then you’re usually an introvert. The reticulo-limbic circuit which controls emotional arousal level. If you have a lot of control then you’re usually unstable and neurotic.

Question 11

Describe Cloninger’s model

Give 2 examples of neurotransmitters affecting temperament

Answer 11

He created a pschobiological model of temperament and character. Your temperament can be explained via neurotransmitter activities, this has 4 domains, and your character develops later in life, this has 3 domains.
Examples: High levels of dopamine correlates with novelty seeking behaviours.
High levels of serotonin correlates with harm avoidance.

Question 12

Discuss what causes individual advantages from an evolutionary perspective

Answer 12

Mutations, inheritance, genetic variation, behavioural variation and competition.

Question 13

What do personalities reflect according to Bell (2007).

Answer 13

They reflect the adaptations to one’s environment.

Question 14

Personalities consist of a set of contrasts. Give two examples of contrasts

Answer 14

Extroverts and introverts.

Playful and not playful

Question 15

What did Smith and Blumstein’s study find?

List an issue with this study

Answer 15

They found that in animals, curiosity is advantageous and boldness isn’t.
However, this can’t be generalised across species because boldness can be advantageous for humans in some situations.

Question 16

From an evolutionary perspective, why is it advantageous for animals to have individual differences?

Answer 16

It’s advantageous because they need to behave differently in order to make different decisions that could potentially be more advantageous than the rest.

Question 17

How does Rand’s study support the idea that evolutionary psychology explains differences in personality?

Answer 17

Because he found that when rabbits forage on their own, there’s a higher risk of a predator attacking them. However, when they forage together, the risk is lowered. Therefore, the fatter rabbit with more reserves waits until the thinner rabbit has a drive for food. The one who waits is the follower, the one who forages first is the leader.

Question 18

When researchers are researching animal personalities they need to…

Answer 18

… not use anthropomorphic words and understand that their personalities differ to humans.

Question 19

How did Gosling define human personality?

Add a bit more to this definition

Answer 19

Temporally stable patterns of affect, cognition and behaviour.
They must stay the same across a variety of contexts and they must persist over time. This can be measured via questionnaires as coding behaviour would be too lengthy.

Question 20

What are the most common methods to research animal personality?

Answer 20

Firstly, you rate the animals via recording how many times they perform a particular behaviour. Then you use lexical trait descriptors which are consistent and accurate. However, this is very subjective.
Objective methods: The ethological approach which has more EV and is less subjective. The endocrinology method, the experimental approach and non-invasive methods, e.g. observation.

Question 21

Briefly describe Stevenson-Hinde’s study

Answer 21

Confident individuals spent more time away from parents.

Question 22

What is good about human-personality psychologists compared to animal psychologists

Answer 22

They have a much more broad approach as they explore traits, goals, abilities, attitudes, moods etc.

Question 23

Do animals have personalities?

Answer 23

Yes, they kind of do, except the term temperament woks better. Temperament means the behaviour is inherited and appears early in life and it’s the foundation of personality. However, many animal researchers disagree on the definition of temperament.

Question 24

What affect has group living had on human personalities?

Answer 24

It has an adaptive value and has increased our fitness but it has also created conflicts. It has increased sophistication and cooperation.

Question 25

Describe Buss’ 5 factor model of personality

Answer 25

He believes that human personality consists of 5 variables. Different people have different levels of these variables. The five factors are openness, conscientiousness, extroversion, aggressiveness and neuroticism. This supports the idea that human personality emerged from group living and cooperation.

Question 26

How can you test for curiosity?

Answer 26

There are two ways. You can either do a novel food test or a novel object test.