Personality Flashcards
What is personality?
It is a dynamic organisation of psychological systems that create a person’s characteristics, behaviours, thoughts and feelings
What are the key features of the personality definition?
- Adaptive and organised internal system
- Interaction of body and mind
- A relatively stable part of a person
- Influences a wide range of human experiences
What are the two methods of measuring personality?
1) Data provided by individuals (e.g projective tests, implicit measures and self-report questionnaires)
2) Reports from others (e.g known others, behavioural observations, face perception from unknown others)
Data provided by individuals: What are projective tests?
- They involve presenting the participant with ambiguous stimuli and record their responses to it. These responses reveal underling emotions, thoughts and inner conflicts.
Data provided by individuals: What are two examples of projective tests?
1) Rorschach Inkblot Test:
- Participants interpret inkblots
- Responses reflect underlying personality structures
2) Thematic Apperception Test (TAT):
- Developed by Henry Murray
- Participants are presented with 30 grayscale pictures that depict dramatic events of situations. They are asked to describe what is happening in each photo, focusing on:
- The relationship between the people
- Feelings of people in the picture
- Stories that reflect individual personalities and experiences
Data provided by individuals: What are the criticisms of projective tests?
- Lack of reliability
- Lack of validity
- Poor convergence with psychometrically sound tests
- However, they can act as useful icebreakers in therapy
Data provided by individuals: What are two examples of implicit tests?
1) Implicit Association Test (IAT):
- These tests measure automatic associations. They aim to determine if the participant responds quicker to certain category pairings
-A key advantage is that it is difficult for participants to fake responses
2) Emotional Stroop Test:
- Requires participants to state the colour of ink used to print emotionally charged words
- It assumes that emotional or anxiety-inducing words increase response time
Mogg et al (1993): Research support for Stroop Test
- 20 participants with anxiety disorders, with 18 controls completed the Stroop Test
- They found that anxiety patients took longer to respond to negative words compared to controls
Data provided by individuals: What are Self-Report Questionnaires?
- They were designed to be used with factor analysis to identify clusters that represent personality traits
What are the 4 examples of Classic Inventories?
1) MMPI-2-RF (Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory)
2) 16 PF
3) EPQ-R (Eysenck Personality Questionnaire)
4) NEO-PI-R
Oosterhoof and Todorov (2008): Using faces to identify traits
- Participants freely described 66 faces (lexical hypothesis)
- There were 10 traits that came up more than any other
- From this two models were created: Two-factor model, which measured traits from faces across trustworthiness and dominance. The Three-factor model added youthful-attractiveness
Culture and Personality: What is culture?
It is a shared framework that influences how groups make sense of reality and adapt
Culture and Personality: Collectivist vs Individualistic views on personality
Collectivist: Personality is perceived as malleable
Individualistic: Personality is perceived as fixed
Culture and Personality: Etic vs Emic approach to research
Etic approach: Compared universal traits across cultures
Emic approach: Focuses on culture-specific traits
What are the Issues with Cross-Cultural research?
- Translation issues
- Responses bias (stronger in some cultures)
- Social desirability
- Assumes literacy
Personality Types vs Traits
- Types: Discrete categories (e.g melancholic)
- Traits: Continuum reflecting how much of a trait a person possesses
Traits are fundamental units of personality, assumed to be stable across time and situations
Allport’s contribution
- Used the lexical approach: identified 18,000 words, reduced to 4500 traits
- Advocated the idiographic approach for unique personality understanding
- Trait categories:
> Cardinal Traits: Single dominant traits shaping behaviour
> Central Traits: 5-10 traits that broadly describe personality
> Secondary Traits: Preferences, not core to personality
Cattell’s Approach
- Used factor analysis to identify clusters of traits
- Interested in how personality can predict behaviour
- Interested in the role of genetics and experience in personality
Cattell’s traits
- Source trait e.g Extraversion
- Surface trait e.g sociable, easy-going, assertive
Furnham et al (2013): research into Cattell’s 16PF
- Looked at differences between students who chose arts and science subjects
- Art students: Higher in warmth
- Science students high in conscientiousness and perfectionism
Eysenck’s Theory of Personality
- He proposed that fundamental traits are biologically based but environment can impact on how how traits are expressed
Eysenck’s Three Supertraits:
- Extraversion: Sociable, active vs introverted
- Neuroticism: Emotional, tense vs stable
- Psychoticism: Impulsive, cold, antisocial
These were measured using EPQ e.g Do you prefer reading to meeting new people? (Extraversion)
Uses of the EPQ: Empirical findings
- Criminals score high in all three traits
- Creative people score high in Psychoticism
- Extroverts more willing to have sexual contact without commitment and report more sexual experience
Eysenck’s theory and mental health
- Eysenck suggested that neuroticism was related to autonomic nervous system reactivity
- Those with highly reactive system are more likely to develop neurotic disorder
- The tendency to respond very emotionally to stimuli is seen as a predisposing condition to the development of a psychological disorder
Five factor model
- Lewis Goldberg carried out research in the area of the existence of 5 factors of personality
- He concluded that trait descriptors relate to 5 features of personality:
1) Love
2) Work
3) Affect
4) Power
5) Intellect - Etic approach: personality terms found in native languages (universal, not tailored to the unique culture)
- Emic approach: translated personality questionnaires (terms are converted to more suitable terms specific to that culture)
Big five model
- Large samples complete personality questionnaires
- Factor analysis carried out to identify clusters
- Data driven hypothesis
1) Openness
2) Conscientiousness
3) Extraversion
4) Agreeableness
5) Neuroticism
Geographical differences in personality: Rentfrow et al (2015)
- Examined geographical differences in personality traits across British isles. The traits analysed correlated to the big 5 traits
1) Extraversion: higher scores in economic and urban areas. Lower scores in rural areas
2 Agreeableness: higher scores in rural, less industrialised areas. Lower scores in densely populated, competitive areas
3) Conscientiousness: higher scores in areas with strong work ethics. Lower scores in areas with leisure-oriented lifestyles
4) Neuroticism: higher scores in economically deprived or stressful areas. Lower scores in more affluent, stable areas
5) Openness: higher scores in urban and culturally diverse regions. Lower scores in rural, less diverse areas - Social norms affect attitudes and behaviours. Ecological influences, such as physicality of place affects attitudes and behaviours. Selective migration (certain groups of people are more likely to migrate)
The Dark Triad traits
- Narcissism: entitlement, superiority, lack of empathy
- Machiavellianism: cold, manipulative, exploitative
- Psychopathy: low empathy, low anxiety, thrill-seeking, lack of remorse
The Dark Triad and degree subject (Vedel and Thomson, 2017)
- DT traits have been linked to a high desire for power and manipulate behaviour in the workplace. This study looks at whether individuals high in DT traits are drawn to specific subjects
- It was hypothesised that those studying law and economics/business will score higher in DT traits compared to students studying psychology and political science
- Participants enrolled in four different degrees programs completed standardised questionnaires to assess DT traits and Big Five traits
1) Law and economic/business: scored higher on machiavellianism and narcissism. These traits align with the competitive and power-oriented nature of these careers
2) Psychology and political science: psychology students scored lower on all DT traits, reflecting a focus on empathy and understanding. Political students were mixed
Emotional manipulation and DT
- Emotional manipulation: influencing other’s feelings and behaviours for the purpose of one’s own benefit
- Correlational evidence that people high in DT rate themselves as more able to emotionally manipulate
Emotional manipulation in the workplace and the DT (Hyde et al, 2020)
- Investigated the relationship between DT traits and willingness to emotionally manipulate in workplace
- Focused on two types of manipulation: disingenuous manipulation (softer tactics e.g flattery) and malicious manipulation (harder tactics e.g punishment)
- 765 Australian employees took various scales: trait emotional manipulation scale, emotional intelligence scale, dirty dozen scale (DT test)
- Machiavellianism: related to both types of manipulation as the workplace is another context where others are used to ‘get ahead’
- Psychopathy: related only to malicious emotional manipulation
- Narcissism: related to both types of emotional manipulation
Dark tetrad
- This refers to the DT plus sadism
- Sadism can be defined as the dispositional tendency to take pleasure in others’ suffering
DT and sadism (Chabrol et al, 2015)
- Sample of 600 high school students
- Found all four traits correlate with each other
- There were four main clusters of students:
1) Low on all traits: 28%
2) High on M and S: 29%
3) High on N and P: 28%
4) High on all traits: 15%
Basics of learning theory: classical conditioning (CC)
- Pavlov’s dogs
- UNS > UNR
- NS
- UNS + NS = CS
- CS > CR
Basics of learning theory: operant conditions (OC)
- Based on reinforcement
- Positive reinforcement: a positive experience after a behaviour encourages repetition of behaviour
- Negative reinforcement: a negative experience after a behaviour deters repetition of behaviour
Learning theory and personality
- Personality is a result of a response to an experience and can explain maladaptive parts of personality e.g Little Albert
- Personality is learned so can be unlearned e.g extinction
Social learning theory: Bandura
- Personality development occurs through an interaction between inner stimuli, external environment and the way an individual reacts to these two factors
Bandura and agency
- Personal agency: believing one can change things to make them better for self and others
- Proxy agency: others helping you to change things about your life
- Collective agency: group of people working together to change things to benefit all
Observational learning
- We learn from observing and imitating others’ behaviours e.g bobo doll experiment
Observational learning: likelihood to copy
1) Characteristics of the model (similarity, complexity of behaviour, type of behaviour)
2) Attributes of the observer (confidence, self-esteem, dependence, how often they are rewarded for conforming to behaviours)
3) Consequences of copying the behaviour (more likely to copy if leads to positive results)
Social learning theory and personality
- Role models provide children with experiences where they can learn through observation
- Child experiences different situations, environments and cultures which actively shapes them
- Goals and feedback are central to the process and feed into motivation levels
- Internal self-regulatory processes are central to achieving one’s goals
The structure of internal self-regulatory processes
- These processes operate through psychological functions:
1) Self-monitoring (evaluating performance)
2) Self-diagnostic (identifying patterns in thoughts, behaviours and emotions across different situations)
3) Self-motivation (instinctively setting step-like goals)
Bandura’s self-efficacy
- Self-efficacy: confidence in your own ability
- It affects choices we make, effort we apply to achieving goals, level of perseverance, thought patterns, ability to cope
- People high in self-efficacy are more likely to set more challenging goals for themselves
- High self-efficacy increases likelihood for achieving success
- Failure has different explanations dependent on level of self-efficacy
Types of self-efficacy
- Emotional self-efficacy (controlling anxiety when facing a problem)
- Social self-efficacy (being able to ask lecturers to help when you need it)
- Self-regulated learning self-efficacy (being able to work when there are other things to do)
- Higher self-efficacy is correlated with more positive wellbeing
Rotter’s Locus of Control
- Rotter was interested in being able to predict people’s behaviours in different situations: behaviour potential
- Behaviour potential = reinforcement value x expectancy
- Expectancy: our own subjective prediction of the outcome of a particular behaviour
- Reinforcement value: preferences for the different possible reinforcement that occur as a result of the behaviour
External vs Internal LOC
- External LOC: people who believe reinforcement depends on external forces e.g luck, God
- Internal LOC: people who believe reinforcement is linked to their own behaviour
Predictors of LOC in adolescence (Furnham and Cheng, 2016)
- Participants had data collected at birth, age 10 and age 16
- Measures:
1) Family social background
2) Childhood intelligence (10)
3) Personality traits (10)
4) Behavioural problems (10)
5) Self-esteem (10)
6) LOC (16)
Findings:
1) higher social class and education associated with internal LOC
2) higher intelligence associated with internal LOC
3) Extraversion associated with internal LOC. Neuroticism negatively associated with internal LOC
4) behavioural problems linked to external LOC
5) higher self-esteem linked to internal LOC
LOC and behaviour
- Internals:
Feel more in control
Higher expectations
Feel they can change things
Better academic performance
Cope better with physical illness - Externals:
Often feel powerless
Dependent on others
Correlated with anxiety and other mental health issues
More likely to be passive patients in recovery of illness
The health belief model (HBM)
- This is a psychological framework developed to understand and predict health-related behaviours
- It explains why individuals engage (or fail to) in preventive health behaviours based on their perceptions and beliefs about health
Multidimensional LOC
- Internal LOC: outcomes are under one’s control
- Powerful others LOC: health condition is the result of others
- Chance LOC: health conditions is out of anyone’s control
Morowatisharifabad et al (2009): HLOC related to diabetes regime
- The HLOC scale was specifically related to diabetes
- Results showed that participants with internal HLOC positively correlated with sticking to the diabetes regime
Cheung et al (2016): HLOC and health outcomes and behaviours meta analysis
- Internal HLOC: associated with greater degree of exercise and healthy diet, higher levels of mental health and quality of life, lower levels of mental health issues
- Powerful others HLOC: associated with lower levels of alcohol consumption, higher levels of physical quality of life, higher levels of depression and anxiety
- Chance HLOC: associated with poor diet, smoking, lower mental and physical quality of life, higher levels of anxiety and depression
Jacobs-Lawson et al (2011): associations between other factors and HLOC later on in life
- Data collection through questionnaires to assess demographic information, health condition and psychological variables
- Internal HLOC: linked to higher confidence in health management and positive self-perception of health, emphasising personal agency
- Powerful others HLOC: more prevalent in older people with greater health issues, suggesting reliance on external support
- Chance HLOC: associated with lower willingness to plan for future health and fewer health ailments
- Education plays a role, with higher education associated with reduced reliance on external or internal beliefs
Self-efficacy in terms of health
- This refers to the belief in one’s ability to accomplish a goal or carry out an action
- High levels generally associated with positive outcomes
- It can impact behaviour change relating to health, as well as impact self-care or self-management
- Peters et al (2019): self-efficacy predicted general health status, overall health on the day, living well with long-term condition
Zhang et al (2019): modifying self-efficacy
- This study explore methods to improve health self-efficacy among patients with chronic heart failure
- Participants were allocated to control group (received standard information about their condition) or observation group (received an individualised intervention that included guidance from trained staff, self-management programme, all of which tailored to each individual)
- Patients in the observation group showed significant improvements in:
1) Higher levels of self-efficacy
2) Improved self-management abilities
3) Enhanced quality of life
4) Greater patient satisfaction
Dyadic approach to personality-health relationship
- Based on effect of social environment
- Romantic partners mutually affect each others’ mental and physical health, and health-related behaviours
- Personality of partner has been found to predict health outcomes for individual:
1) Conscientiousness predicts spouses’ health outcomes
2) Neuroticism predicts partners’ poorer health
3) Openness and Extraversion predict better health
Hudek-Knezevic et al (2021): the DT and health-protective behaviours
- Use of dyadic approach
- Participants were couples from Croatia. They completed the DT scale and HPB scale
Women: - Psychopathy: only an actor effect, meaning women high in psychopathy were less likely to engage in HPBs (no impact on partner)
Men: - Psychopathy: men high in psychopathy were less likely to engage in HPBs, as well as negatively impact partner’s HPBs (partner and actor effects)
- Machiavellianism: partner and actor effects
- Narcissism: partner and actor effects
- This shows DT are associated with reduced engagement in HPBs. Men’s traits exert a stronger and broader influence, including both individual (actor) and partner effects
- Both men and women who are high in psychopathy are less likely to engage in HPBs (self-reported data for women)
- Men who are high in Machiavellianism are less likely to engage in HPBs (both partner and self-reported data)
- Men who are high in narcissism are less likely to engage in HPBs (partner-reported data)
- This provides evidence that social context and relationships with others can have an effect on our own health
Health psychology and personality
- Targeting: target the traits that are linked to different health outcomes
- Tailoring: design tailored materials for patients
- Training: modifying personality
- Treatment: some medications can change personality
- Transformation: track changes in personality throughout course of disease or illness
Trait vs state anxiety
- Trait anxiety is an underlying characteristic that affects behaviours, thought and emotions
- State anxiety is anxiety evoked by a specific situation or event. Transient in nature
- People high in trait anxiety are more likely to experience state anxiety and to a higher level than those with low trait anxiety
Models that explain poor performance in high pressure settings
- Distraction model: increase in arousal leads to attention to irrelevant cues, and thus distraction
- Self-focus model: conscious monitoring of a skill that has become automated leads to poor performance
Horikawa and Yagi (2012): anxiety influencing performance in sport
- Japanese soccer players
- Measured years of experience, kicking legs and skill levels
- There were two conditions (day 1 and day 2). Day 1: participants took 10 penalties. Day 2: participants told to shoot more successfully than control condition and be more competitive. Anxiety scores were taken before penalties
- High trait anxiety group had higher state anxiety scores in both conditions compared to low anxiety group
- State anxiety was higher in pressure condition but only for the high trait anxiety
- Key finding: higher levels of trait anxiety tends to have higher state anxiety which interferes with performance
Geukes et al (2017): anxiety and performance in basketball
- Variables of interest:
1) Fear of negative evaluation (those higher in FNE may experience greater state anxiety, so play worse)
2) Movement-specific reinvestment (the tendency to consciously control automatic skills can lead to poor performance)
3) Athletic tendency (those with stronger identity may feel greater pressure to perform)
4) Pre-competitive state anxiety (cognitive anxiety, somatic anxiety, confidence)
5) Performance measures (low pressure or high pressure) - High pressure group higher in importance, somatic and cognitive state anxiety
- Low pressure group higher in confidence and performance
- Shows that both state and trait anxiety can impede performance
Emotional intelligence (EI)
- The ability to understand your own emotions and those of people around you
- Accurately perceiving emotions
- Using emotions to facilitate thinking
- Understanding emotional meanings
- Managing emotions
EI and coaching sports
- Coaching staff require leadership skills including EI
- Disappointment in sports are common and the coach needs to handle them appropriately to ensure future success
EI and athletes
- Deal with stressors
- Understand how their emotions affect performance particularly when setting long term goals
- Interact with others effectively
Crombie et al (2009): EI and sport performance
- Explore relationship between EI and team performance in cricket
- Member of the team were measured for EI across 4 sub scales (perceiving emotions, facilitating thoughts, understanding emotions, managing emotions). An average for the team was then calculated
- Performance was then measured via points scored during matches
- Team total EI positively predicted number of points
- Perceiving and facilitating facets of EI did not significantly predict number of points
- Understanding and managing positively predicted number of points
- Crombie et al (2011): used interventions to improve EI though workshops and use of experimental case studies. This resulted in EI scores improving by 14.5% compared to control groups
The role of sports and exercise psychologists
- Provide counselling to referees to deal with the stressful and demanding aspects of their role
- Advise coaches on how to build cohesion within their squad of athletes
- Help athletes with personal development and psychological consequences of sustaining an injury
- Help implement goal-setting strategies
