McAdam's 3 level theory of personality Flashcards
How is McAdam’s 3 level theory different to other approaches to personality?
McAdam’stheory is a social approach whereas the other approaches (e.g Eysenck’s PEN model, Gray’s RST model and Costa & McCrae’s 5 factor model) are all trait approaches.
What is McAdam’s critique of trait approaches?
He thought trait approaches weren’t comprehensive enough as it makes the whole of personality to be synonymous with traits. In other words trait approaches are incomplete as traits don’t explain individuality and aren’t grounded in a cultural or sociohistorical context.
What are McAdam’s three assumptions?
- Self-hood is made, not given
- Self-hood develops over time
- People seek temporal coherence in their self
William James duplex self- the “I” and “ME”. What are these?
The “I” is a reflective process of building identity out of our experiences and the “ME” is the outcome of the “I” process.
McAdam’s integrative theory of personality consists of…
Level 1- traits e.g FFM. decontextualised generalised descriptions that are stable across situations
Level 2- Personal concerns
Level 3- Life stories
Describe Level 2: Personal concerns.
They reflect what a persons goals, beliefs and attitudes are. These personal concerns are contextualised within time or place. For example Erikson’s model 1968 looks at how our motivations change through developmental.
Describe Level 3: Life stories.
Occurs in late adolescence which corroborates with Eriksons 1968 model, where experiences are integrated into experiences in coherent and meaningful identity. Considers past , present and anticipated future. Life stories have predictive value!
Alder et al 2015 study selected 89 mid life ppts from McAdams study who all had what in common?
A personal health challenge.
What did Alder et al 2015 results show?
Agency, communion and redemption had a positive trajectory with Mental health. Contamination had a negative relationship to mental health.
Dunlop & Tracy (2013) investigated redemption in narrative identity in recovering alcoholics and found that…
redemption significantly predicted sobriety and even the health of redemption group significantly improved.
