Personality: Dev and Change

Question 1

what did Mischel et al 1972 and 2011 study find?

Answer 1

that how long the 4 year olds were able to wait did indicate things like SAT scores, aggression, educational achievement, drug use and health
that wait times did predict something, and that something in the personality persisted
(delayed gratification)

Question 2

what do psychologists mean by stability? what 3 types of stability are there?

Answer 2

rank order (everyone could change but rank order stays the same) 
mean level (individuals or the order could change but the mean level stays the same)  
individual stability (changes at an individual level or not

Question 3

what is rank order stability?

Answer 3

correlation between the trait at time 1 v time 2

related to test - re rest reliability

Question 4

what were the findings of roberts and delvecchio regarding rank order findings and test re-testability?

Answer 4

1. rank order stability is relatively high
2. rank order stability increases with age
3. rank order stability decreases as the interval between test increases
4. rank order stability seems to be trait general and don;t vary across big 5 traits, assessment method and gender

Question 5

what influences stability?

Answer 5

genetic influences
environmental channeling
environmental selection

Question 6

what is environmental channeling?

Answer 6

“settling down” increased stability… where we fall into the grooves or certain tracks that exist in our environment like having a stable job etc… don’t have a completely unpredictable environment from one day to the next

Question 7

what is environmental selection?

Answer 7

we actively construct our environments to fall in line with our interests and our traits… seek our agreeable environments that suit us

Question 8

what study demonstrated environmental channeling?

Answer 8

caspi and herbener where they studied married couples and found rank order stability to be higher for couples with more similar personalities

Question 9

what are some examples of environmental selection with a focus of rank order stability?

Answer 9

assortive mating (birds of a feather flock together) 
migration (people prefer to live among people with similar personalities, values and interests) 
vocational choice (people gravitate towards education and career pathways that fit their personality)

Question 10

rank order stability of personality is quite ____, while mean level stability in personality is quite ____

Answer 10

high; low

Question 11

according to costa and mcrae how do the big 5 traits change into adulthood in regards to mean level personality?

Answer 11

O, E and N tend to decline, while A and C tend to rise

Question 12

what influences mean level change?

Answer 12

• genetic influences (maturation processes need to kick in at certain points)
• environmental effects (major life transitions, role shifts and historical events change the personality)

Question 13

what is the support for genetic infleunces on mean level change in the personality

Answer 13

there is some ev that mean level changes in personality are more similar for people who are more biologically related (loehlin 1993), eg high correlation for MZ twins v DZ twins

Question 14

what did mccrea et al 1999 find in regards to mean level change of personality?

Answer 14

E, A, O and C very similar to US Studies, while N was a little bit more inconsistent. as such data is suggestive of universal maturation

Question 15

what did king et al 2008 find regarding mean level change and chimpanzees?

Answer 15

that too like humans, O, N and E tended to drop… A rose and so did C but not as significantly

Question 16

what is the premise of the idea behind mean level change in personality using environmental factors to describe transitions? give eg

Answer 16

there we go through major life transitions that shape personality…. eg roberts 1997, the women who entered the workforce and seeing an increase in extraversion

Question 17

what are cohort effects?

Answer 17

the potential that generations can be influenced by broad historical/generational effects, hence why we can’t simply compare age of two different people and their personality to determine if it changes throughout the lifespan

Question 18

what are some problems with Twenge’s “generation me’” theory?

Answer 18

1. her sample wasn’t really representative (just selecting uni students years apart, as opposed to getting representative date of the population)
2. over estimation of effect sizes (she used aggregated scores which remove alot of the variation and give potentially false beta score)

Question 19

True or false?

Robust effects for cohort effects on personality has proven elusive?

Answer 19

True

Question 20

how might people’s implicit beliefs about personality change (implicit personality theory) influence actual personality change?

Answer 20

may impact decision making and may be influenced by how much we expect to change

Question 21

what is the end of history illusion?

Answer 21

the tendency to believe we are complete when we are always works in progress…. people tend to recognise that they have changed but do not foresee or predict future change… as such we seem to make decisions about our life going forward as if our values etc won’t change

Question 22

how did quoidbach 2013 analyse the end of history illusion?

Answer 22

participants were assigned into 2 groups, reporter or predictor… also the band example…. you are more likely to pay more to see your current fave band in 10 years than see your fave band from 10 years ago this week

Question 23

what is the main idea behind individual change of personality?

Answer 23

the role of unique experiences

Question 24

what some important consequences of changing personality?

Answer 24

changes in N predict mortality as high and increasing N predict earlier death
while changes in increasing C predict healthier life style

Question 25

what results did zimmerman and nyer find regarding individual personality change and studying abroad?

Answer 25

selection effects: 
Short term: higher on E and C 
Long Term: Higher on E and O 
Effects of Travel: 
Increase in O and A 
Decrease in N

Question 26

what are the main findings of Roberts et al 2017 find regarding personality change in clincal interventions

Answer 26

lasting changes especially for decreased N

minimal effects for less than 1 month, not much different effect after 8 months

Question 27

is the main theory that we anticipate or react to life events?

Answer 27

generally reaction, but denissen et al found it was in anticipation to the event
eg people were becoming more C in the lead up to entering the work force, as opposed to reacting

Question 28

T or F? people sort of act out of character (personality change) when they have a momentary goal?

Answer 28

True

Question 29

what are the 3 Q’s that Hudson and fraley 2015 asked in their study re volitional personality change? what did they find?

Answer 29

1. Do people want to change? (yes, around 90% do - wish to increase OCEA and decrease N)
2. do people change as desired? (yes, people tended to change in the direction they wish, but was small (0.2 SD’s per month - this is big over 20 years!)
3. how do they change?

Question 30

how did people change? in hudson and Fraley’s 2015 study? re volitional personality change

Answer 30

1. counter dispositional behaviour

2. personal identity

Question 31

what is counter dispositional behaviour ?

Answer 31

goals predicted engaging in diff. personality states, as such producing a change in the actual trait over time

Question 32

what is personal identity re volitional personality change (Hudson and Fraley)

Answer 32

people set goal to behave in certain way then start describing themselves in alignment with that goal, befre engaging in that behaviour… then starts to alter their personality states