McAdam's Three-Level Theory of Personality Flashcards
McAdam’s critique of trait theories
Big Five may not be comprehensive enough - makes the whole of personality to be synonymous with traits - McAdams 1996
Traits do not explain individuality
Traits are not grounded in cultural or sociohistorical context - personality shaped by environment
Trait theories not enough - decontextualised descriptions of a person
What about goals, motivations, contextual behaviour?
Historical background of McAdam’s theory
Not born with preprogrammed identities, constantly developing and changing - selfhood is made
People seek temporal coherence in their self
Self develops over time
William James (1892) - Duplex Self
I and Me
I - process of building identity out of our experiences
Me - outcomes or products of the I-ing process - conclusions about self from reflections on experiences
Development of the Me can change over time
McAdams’ Integrative Theory of Personality
Trait level theory of personality
Social approach to personality
Individual differences in life narratives
What are the levels in McAdams theory?
Level 1 - Traits e.g. FFM
Level 2 - Personal concerns = motivations and values
Level 3 - Life Stories = coherent narrative of our lives, connection between past, present and future
Level 1: Traits
FFM - OCEAN Dispositional signatures of personality Decontextualised - stable Traits do not reveal information on conditional patterns of personality Act differently in different situations
Level 2: Personal Concerns
Motives, values, goals, beliefs, skills, coping styles….
Broadest level of personality
Contextualised within time, place and role
Reflects what a person wants/doesn’t want
Evidence drawn from other areas in psychology
What is Erikson’s model (1968)?
A developmental model - motivations change as we develop
Why are personal concerns not the whole picture?
Do not present a unified identity sense of the person across time, place, and role
Do not provide a sense of what the life experiences mean to a person
Specific at certain times of life
Level 3: Life Stories
Who you were, who you are now and who you will be
Formtion of narrative identity
Based on facts and experiences - psychosocial constructs
What is a narrative identity?
Occurs in late adolescence/young adulthood - before this time presented by facts not constructed as a narrative
Integrates experiences into coherent and meaningful identity
‘Internalised and evolving narrative of the self that incorporates the reconstructed past, perceived present, and anticipated future.’ (McAdams, 1996)
What is the life story interview?
Method used to collect data on narrative identity
What is the structure of the life story interview?
Positions participant as storyteller
In-depth, 2-3 hours - rich, qualitative data
Divides life story into distinct chapters
Describes key scenes, characters and plots
Which dimensions do researchers code for in life stories?
Agency - how in control, ablitiy to handle challenges
Communion - loving relationships, connections
Personal growth - positive change from experience
Meaning making - understanding why something happened (can be positive or negative)
What do McAdams & McLean (2013) say about narrative identity?
Life story that is constructed from autobiographical memory
An evolving, integrative account which provides temporal coherence and meaning
Answer to ‘Who Am I?’ question
According to McAdams & McLean (2013), what are developmental facilitated by?
Parent-child conversations
Social interactions
Meaning-making is critical
Occurs in adolescence due to age-related increases in meaning-making skills
What is the importance of narrative identity?
Life stories have a predictive value
What is redemption in narrative identity?
When the person describes how a negative event led to a positive outcome - McAdams 2013
How is qualitative data encoded?
Given scores - rated on different variables - whether or not present and to what extent
What needs to be considered when coding data?
Coding can be subjective - more than one person coding - need inter-rate reliability
Coders need to interpret stories in same way
What is a contamination story?
Negative change with no redemption
What is the relation between redemption and well-being?
More enhanced well-being than those who don’t use redemption
Redemption in the US - McAdams 2013
Master narrative - American dream
Ingrained in the culture and internalised by people to a certain extent
Redemption is a socially desirable script for US
McAdams et al. 2001
74 mid-life adults completed life story interview and 125 UG students completed written version
Redemption and contamination sequences coded + self-report questionnaires on well-being
Redemption - positive correlation with life satisfaction and negative with depression
Vice versa for contamination stories
Correlations don’t control for other factors and can’t imply causation
Alder et al. 2015 - Study 1
89 late/mid-life adults recruited from longitudinal study that included life story interview
Mental and physical health assessed 5 times
4 life scenes selected: high point, low point, greatest health challenge and turning point
Each scene coded for agency, communion, redemption and contamination
Do individual differences in narrative identity predict change in mental and physical health over 4 years
Averaging across the 4 life scenes:
Agency - positive trajectory with mentla helth
Communion no significance
Redemption - positive trajectory with mental health
Contamination - negative trajectory with mental health
Narrative identity is important particularly during difficult experiences
Alder et al. 2015 - Study 2
54 participants from existing longitudinal study: 27 had major illness diagnosis between baseline and T2, 27 matched with no diagnosis Abbreviated life story interview Illness group: Agency = postive MH Communion = positive MH Redemption = positive MH Contamination = negative MH Control group: No significant changes in MH or PH
Dunlop & Tracy 2013
44 participants - recovering alcoholics
T1 - narrative on last drink + questionnaires on health, personality, months of sobriety
T2 - 4 months later, repeat questionnaire
Redemption narrative significantly predicted sobriety
Health of redemption group significantly improved from T1 to T2
Findings hold when controlling for personality, mental health, AA involvement and narrative features
McLean, Pasupathi, Greenhoot & Fivush 2016
Are there differences within a person across their narration of similar types of events
2 studies: Participants provide narratives on either low point, self-defining memory, high point, trauma or transgression
Narrtives coded for coherence, autobiographical reasoning, emotional expression and resolution
Most within person variability from resolution, lower for coherence and meaning-making
Relationships to well-being depended on type and context of the narrative:
- Greater variability in contextual coherence of self-defining memories was related to lower well-being.
- Greater variability in resolution in low points was not related to well-being.
Issues with McAdams Theory
Unique stories - difficult to generalise
Small effects (but meaningful)
Narratives usually ssessed at only one time point
Evidence to show narrative identity predicts mental health but less evidence predicted behaviour
