Psych of Personality Mid Term Flashcards
Interactionism
The principle that aspects of personality and of situations work together to determine behavior; neither has an effect by itself nor is one more important than the other.
Constructivism
The philosophical view that reality, as a concrete entity, does not exist and that only ideas of reality exist
critical realism
The philosophical view that the absence of perfect. infallible criteria for determining the truth does not imply that all interpretations of reality are equally valid; instead, one an use empirical evidence to determine which views of reality are more or less likely to be valid
convergent validation
The process of assembling diverse pieces of information that converge on a common conclusion
interjudge agreement
The degree to which two or more people making judgments about the same person provide the same description of that person’s personality
behavioral prediction
The degree to which a judgment or measurement can predict the behavior of the person in questions
predictive validity
The degree wo which one measure can be used to predict another
moderator variable
A variable that affects the relationship between tow other variables
judgability
The extent to which an individual’s personality can be judged accurtley by others
single-trait approach
The research strategy of focusing on one particular trait of interest and learning as much as possible about its behavioral correlates, developmental antecedents, and life consequences
many-trait approach
The research strategy that focuses on a particular behavior and investigates its correlates with as many different personality traits as possible in order to explain the basis of the behavior and to illuminate the workings of personality
essential-trait approach
The research strategy that attempts to narrow the list of thousands of trait terms into a shorter list of the ones that really matter
typological approach
The research strategy that focuses on identifying types of individuals. Each type is characterized by a particular pattern of traits.
California Q-set
A set of 100 descriptive items that comprehensively covers the personality domain
lexical hypothesis
The idea that, if people find something is important, they will develop a word for it, and therefore the major personality traits will have synonymous terms in many different languages
rank order consistency
The maintenance of individual differences in behavior or personality over time or across situations
temperament
The term often used for the personality of very young, pre-verbal children. Aspects of temperament include basic attributes such as activity level, emotional reactivity, cheerfulness
heterotypic continuity
the reflection of the consistency of fundamental differences in personality that change with age: e.g. the emotionally fragile child will act differently than the emotionally fragile adult, but the underlying trait is still the same.
person-environment transaction
The processes by which people respond to, seek out, and create environment that are compatible with, and may magnify, their personality
active person-environment transaction
The process of social influence by which people seek out situations that are compatible with their personalities, or avoid situations that they perceive as incompatible.
reactive person-environment transaction
The process by which people with different personalities may react differently to the same situation
evocative person-environment transaction
The process by which a people may change situations they encounter through behaviors that express their personality
comuluative continuity principle
The idea that personality becomes more stabile and unchanging as a person gets older
personality developmet
Change in personality over time, including the development of adult personality from its origins in infancy and childhood, and changes in personality over the life span
cross-sectional study
A study of personality development in which people of different ages are assessed at the same time
