Lecture 9: Personality

Question 1

Personality

Answer 1

Blend of characteristics that make a person unique

Question 2

Personality in psychology

Answer 2

• Classic topic (popular in 70s & 80s)
• Traditional approach is trait focus = ‘differential psychology’
  = important focus in psychotherapy
• Risks of trait focus = fundamental attribution error (disregarding influence of situation)
  = interpreting between-person differences as un-changeable characteristic (rather than learned behaviour)

Question 3

Personality & sport behaviour

Answer 3

• IV: personality -> sport behaviour
• DV: SB -> P
  Moderator: env -> (P) -> SB

Question 4

Contemporary perspectives on personality

Answer 4

• General traits = no systematic differences in general traits between athletes/non-athletes
  = Idem: between elite & lower level athletes
  = Idem: between men & women (elite)

Question 5

Parts of personality

Answer 5

• Psychological core (internal, general traits)
• Typical responses
• Role-related behaviour (external, specific traits)

Question 6

Specific traits

Answer 6

• Some predictive value of sport-specific traits e.g. action control, sensation seeking
• Note: proportion of explained variance usually small

Question 7

Trait approach (MBTI)

Answer 7

• Myer-Briggs Type Indicator
• Extraversion-intraversion
• Thinking-feeling
• Sensing-intuition
• Judgement-perception
• MBTI: validity? = face validity?
• Factor structure: 4 non-correlating factors?
• Bi-modal distribution? -> no, normal distribution

Question 8

Scientific evaluation of MBTI

Answer 8

• Low levels of construct & criterion-related validity
• Not useful in organisational settings
• Why so popular then? = provides a clear & simple picture
  = positive and easy to indentify with

Question 9

Main focus on specific trait

Answer 9

• Anxiety -> attention -> skill focus or distraction
• Self-consciousness & performance under pressure = people aware of others (decrease performance)
  = low self-consciousness + high pressure = low performance
  = high self-consciousness + high pressure = used to pressure, do better

Question 10

Chokers

Answer 10

• Fear of negative evaluation
• Public self-consciousness
• FNE & choking in sport = high & low FNE people
  = high FNE -> increased state anxiety (especially in high pressure) & reduced performance (mediated by cognitive anxiety)
  = 11.4% of performance under high-pressure was explained by FNE (personality doesn’t explain all)

Question 11

Self-consciousness & reinvestment

Answer 11

• Pressure = increase self-awareness, increases reinvestment (about movement)
• Reinvestment correlation to choking susceptibility

Question 12

Action-state orientation (study by Nieuwenhuys & Oudejans)

Answer 12

• Action control = ability to downregulate anxiety & enforce goal-directed control in demanding situations
• Threat manipulation to change anxiety levels
• Action orientation predicts shooting accuracy under high-anxiety
• Under HA, action-oriented officers = experience less anxiety
  = take more time for shots
  = shoot more accurately