lesson 10 personality Flashcards
personality individual differences
how would we describe the differences between snowflakes
personality
an individual’s characteristic style of thought, feeling, and action
type based personality measure
you can put people in personality buckets, and the people in the bucket with you act just like you
-harry potter quiz
-myers briggs personality quiz
-astrology
-type a vs type b
taking a shit ton of things and trying to reduce it to only a small amount of buckets
problems with typing
enormous reduction in dimensionality and variability
little scientific support (no validity
validity
the degree to which a study or questionnaire accurately reflects or assesses the specific concept that the researcher is attempting to measure
theme based personality measure
what goes on in your unconscious mind? (freud)
rorschach ink blot (what do these ink blots tell you)
thematic apperception test (what do you see in this ambiguous picture)
problems with themes
lack of validity (a kid draws a picture without hands, doesnt mean they were assaulted)
not reliable- if i take it on different days with different people i may get different results
more about who is interpreting than who is taking the test
reliability
how consistently does a method measure whatever it measures
trait based personality measure
theory down instead of data up
-personality as a 5 dimensional object (the big 5 traits)
Conscientiousness
Agreeableness
Negative emotionality
Openness
Extraversion
theory down
briggs and myers used jung’s theory of true types of people and created a bunch of questions based on how they interpreted jung’s theory
theory that if youre good at 100, youll be good at 400 meters
CANOE
Conscientiousness
-focused, organized, persistent in pursuit of goals
Agreeableness
-orientation toward and style of interacting with others
Negative emotionality
-propensity to experience negative emotions like anger, pessimism, anxiety
Openness
-orientation to novelty, change, uncertainty
Extraversion
-level of arousal and preference for stimulation
-instead of thinking of different buckets, where are you on a slider scale with these traits (so better than type based)
why are trait measures the best
high reliability- if you take the measure more than once, you’ll score similarly
high validity- the measure predicts related behavior
serotonin
linked to negative emotionality (if you have low serotonin, you’ll have more negative emotions)
dopamine
linked to extraversion (if you have high dopamine you dont need a lot of external stimulation)
problems of measuring traits
lack of insight
-person cant really answer about themselves truthfully (wont say theyre a jerk)
-self presentation bias
most people will lie because they want to present a certain way
-dont know how people come up with answers for these questions
what makes someone anxious/conscientious/smart etc
some strong genetic contribution (twins tend to have similar personalities, even if raised apart)
birth order (oldest or only kids tend to be disproportionately represented in ivy leagues, maybe because they get more attention or social pressure)—- environmental factors
Personality
an individual’s characteristic style of behaving, thinking, and feeling
self-report
a method in which people provide subjective information about their own thoughts, feelings, or behaviors, typically via questionnaire or interview
Rorschach Inkblot Test
a projective technique in which
respondents’ inner thoughts and feelings are believed to be revealed by analysis of their responses to a set of unstructured inkblots
Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)
is a projective technique in which respondents’ underlying
motives and concerns and the way they see the social world are believed to be revealed through analysis of the stories they make up about ambiguous pictures of people
trait
a relatively stable disposition to
behave in a particular and consistent way
id
is the part of the mind containing the drives present at birth; it is the source of our bodily needs, wants, desires, and impulses, particularly our sexual and aggressive drives. The id operates according to the pleasure principle
superego
the mental system that reflects the internalization of cultural rules, mainly learned as parents exercise their authority
consists of a set of guidelines, internal standards, and other codes of conduct that regulate and control our behaviors, thoughts, and fantasies. It acts as a kind of conscience, punishing us when it finds we are doing or thinking something wrong (by producing guilt or other painful feelings) and rewarding us (with feelings of pride or self-congratulation) for living up
to ideal standards
ego
the component of personality,
developed through contact with the external world, that enables us to deal with life’s practical demands
freud and the structures of the mind
Freud believed that the dynamics among the id, superego, and
ego are largely governed by anxiety, an unpleasant feeling that arises when unwanted thoughts or feelings occur, such as when the id seeks a gratification that the ego thinks will lead to real-world dangers or that the superego sees as leading to punishment
defense mechanisms
unconscious coping mechanisms that reduce the anxiety generated by threats from unacceptable impulses
