Lecture 3 Flashcards
What do the big 5 focus on
Consistencies in social and emotional behaviors and on things where we notice their are individual differences
What is the best was to organise our impressions or judgments about personality?
The big 5
90% of good personality research does this
According to macadams
Big 5 capture our public reputation
Is there a gender bias in B5
no
Is it a universal syatem
It works in other languages and cultures
And species
Pam from the office
Kind, quiet, courteous, bashful, steady
Taxonomy
Extraversion - tendency to be outgoing, sociable and assertive
Neuroticism - tendency to experience negative emotions
Openness to experience - tendency to be receptive to new ideas, approaches and experiences
Agreeableness - tendency to have concern for others, to have warm and trusting sentiments
Pam is exemplar
Conscientiousness - tendency towards organisation, persistence and motivation on goal directed behaviour
McAdams on agreeableness
Agreeable people are more than nice. Agreeableness incorporates expressive qualities of love and empathy. friendliness, cooperation and care. Indeed the term agreeable may be too meek for it.
Includes altruism, affection and many of the best human traits
Evidence for big 5: languages
Has been shown to emerge in lexical analysis in other languages
HEXECO model
Proposed by Ashton & Lee For some Asian countries Humility/Honesty Emotionaliity Xtraversion Agreeableness Conscientiousness Openness
BUT many big 5 trait studies done in those countries
Evidence mostly supports big 5
Country differences in big 5
All other cultures organised their personality evaluations in ways compatible with the big 5
BUT does not mean they all rate the same
There are cross national differences in ratings
Just that they organised their evaluations in the same way
Big 5 geographic E
Varied region to region
E Europe and NA are highest
Could be because E is culturally preferred in those regions whilst not liked in east Asia which has low E scores (cultural differences).
Because you are starting with natural languages
you can be confident you are dealing with the full scope of personality
personality differences are important in getting along with others in work and play. Every culture must have evolved words to represent these differences and over time, every important attribute or trait will have been noticed
Evidence in other species
Author
Gosling, 1999
Dogs, cats and pigs
You always find E, N & A
Often find O in terms of curiosity and play
C only appears in chimpanzees - recent evolutionary hx as a result of social-cognitive functions like norms, goals and impulse control
Freemen et al (2013) found evidence for 6 characteristics in chimps
E divided into sociability and dominance/drive to go up hierarchy
Does the big 5 predict behavior? unethical experiment
Rate ppl for C
tell TAs to make observations
one observation wont tell you anything
But if you aggregate alll behaviour, big correlation
If you take the est and retake a few weeks late, probably similar scores
If you get 5 ppl who know you to do it about you, they will say similar things both about you and their scores will be similar
it gets at something real
E brain systems
BAS seeking reward (dopamine)
Opiod system
A clinicians experience with the Big 5
Miller, 1991
Experienced clinician in a mid sized city
120 clients, 63% female
Diverse SES
Eclectic treatment approach
M=50 sd=10 standardization for big 5
Only N was high
Well replicated finding
Miller’s argument
Trait theories such as the five factor model can be useful to clinicians, as they provide a detailed, accurate portrait of the clients needs, proximate motives and interpersonal style.
Helpful in 3 ways
Can anticipate and understand the clients private experience
Can anticipate the problems presented in treatment
Helps you formulate a practical treatment plan and anticipates the opportunities and pitfalls of it
Influences on therapy practices
O: reactions to therapy interventions
Plan how experimental to be such as the empty chair
C: Willingness to do the work
Homework. If you know the are low C, it might not be psychological resistance when they do not do it
E: energy and enthusiasm for therapy
Talking is hard for low E people. More structure and therapist talking for them
A: subjective reaction to the person of the therapist
Makes therapeutic alliance easy/hard. Can anticipate this id low A, explain they might be suspicious and you can work though this with the client
N: intensity/duration of the client’s distress
May motivate investment in therapy if high
Orthogonal nature of the big 5
Designed to be independent
McAdams says we naturally group desirable traits together
as good vs evil
Traits do not group and are independent
You can easily be high E and high N
So you CANNOT predict other traits from knowing one
Concern about where you are in traits
If you are high in an undesirable trait, start by knowing it. You can change some and learn to live with others/ work around the issues
High N people are
more likely to be anxious
less likely to have accidents
Evolutionary adaptations of both ends of the traits
All people are needed for societies
Even high N, we need suspicious people! FBI, competing with other groups
ntroverts
Susan Cain, quiet
Rehabilitating quarrelsomeness papers show
High n or low A people are needed
Promotes a diversity of approaches
Discourages group-think
Willingness to fight for what is right (such as injustice)
Adaptive in COMPETITIVE contexts
