Test 1 (Chapter 1-3) Flashcards
What is personality?
An internal dynamic organization of psychophysical systems that lead to characteristic pattern of behavior, thoughts, and emotions
Does personality remain consistent over situations and time?
yes
What is the Person-Situation interaction?
The person and situation work together to determine behavior
What are the building blocks of personality?
Traits, Genetics, Neuroscience, Evolutionary Forces, Self and Identity, Intrapsychic Foundations, Regulation and Motivation, Cognitive Foundations, Learning Processes
What is traits?
Characteristics developed based on physiological tendencies, socialization and experiences
What is genetics
What you have inherited, the way you were born, predispositions
Neuroscience is
what is going on in your brain, how your brain is reacting
Evolutionary forces and personality:
some possibility that some of our personality characteristics are there for evolutionary benefit
Self and identity and personality:
Who you are, your beliefs, values, etc
Intrapsychic foundations of personailty:
unconscious motivations and how they influence. Defense mechanisms, how you cope with anxieties, attachments, how relationships affect you
Regulation and Motivation and personality:
What is motivating you, your goals, self regulation, delay of gratification
Cognitive functions and personality:
Process information. When something happens in your life, what do you tell yourself. What you tell yourself affects your personality
Learning Processes and personality:
What you have been rewarded for, varies across cultures
What is a theory in personality psych?
A summary statement about a set of events, meant to explain
Theories should be:
Falsifiable and parsimonious while still explaining the complexity of behavior
What can happen to theories over time?
They can stop showing true. Can modify or it will stay false
What are the three methods for developing theories?
Deductive method, Inductive method, Analogy
What is the deductive method of developing theories?
Broad psychological perspectives, ideas, principals, and try to use to develop a theory about particular behaviors
What is the inductive method of developing theories?
Specific observed behavior, based on observations will try to develop a theory
What is the analogy method of developing a theory?
Behaviors or from other disciplines and try to apply them to personality
What can personality tests be used for?
Anything, like; matchmaking, diagnosis, job placements, treatment programs
How do we understand personality?
Subjective methods: short answers, requires psychologist interpretation
Objective methods: Choose A or B
What are the methods of determining personality?
Case study, observations, experience sampling, informant reports, clinical interviews, archival or life outcomes data, projective tests, physiological measures, self report tests
What is a case study?
studying one or two people in a lot of depth, determines influences on personality over a lifetime
What are the three things to look for when observing someone’s space?
Identity claims: things that are intended for other people
Feeling regulators: things intended for themselves, makes you feel good
Behavioral residues: the leftovers
What is experience sampling
Sampling of behavior
Capture thoughts, feelings, and behaviors immediately
What are informant reports?
Others provide information on the person
What are clinical interviews?
Used to assess personality characteristics associated with abnormal behavior
Structured or unstructured interviews
Examine responses and behaviors
What is archival or life outcome data?
examining official records, speeches, journals, personal websites, social media posts
What are projective tests?
Intended to reveal unconscious motivations
5 categories:
- association techniques: what do you see
- Construction techniques: draw a person
- Completion techniques: I am happiest when
- Arrangement or selection of stimuli: pick fav
- Expression techniques
What are physiological measures?
Autonomic arousal, neuroimaging, brain responses and areas of activity, repressive copers
What are self report tests?
People answer questions about their own behavior or themselves
Likert scales
Checklists
Forced choice
Qsorts
Not always reliable
What factors do we have to watch for when evaluating personality assessments?
Reliability, validity, generalizability, culture bias, gender bias, responses sets
What is an acquiescence response set?
tendency to agree with everything
What is a reactant response set
tendency to disagree with everything
What extreme responding?
Avoiding the middle of the scale, extreme answers only
What is moderate responding?
only responding in the middle of the scale
What is the social-desirability bias?
people lying to present themselves in a certain way
How do you test for social desirability?
Lie scales, like the Marlowe-Crowne scale
things that address social desirability but are so extreme that they are never true and are integrated in the test
What is the Barnum Effect?
When people believe that general descriptions fit their personality and thus believe in astrology, psychics, palm readers, etc.
So general that it fits everyone
What are the two approaches to studying personality?
nomothetic (personality characteristics of groups of people), ideographic (individuals)
What are the positives are negatives of correlational studies?
Allow you to predict behavior in one area by knowing a persons score on a related variable
Third variable problem
Pros and cons of experiments?
Allow discussions of causation
Sometimes unclear what part of manipulation changed the dependent variable, cannot always be done ethically
What is psychoanalysis?
the study of the dynamics of the mind
Emphasizes unconscious mind and its influence on behavior
Symbolism
Great influence on common culture
What are the 3 parts of Freud’s topographical model?
the unconscious
the conscious
the preconscious
What is the unconscious revealed through?
Hypnosis, dream analysis and free association
What is a drive?
a biological need and its psychological state
psychological craving
What are the 2 classes of drives?
Eros: life or sexual drives or instincts
Thanatos: death drives or instincts (tendency to retreat)
What is catharsis?
the tension of a drive that is released after build up
What is mood congruent recall?
when you’re angry, likely to think of all the other times you were angry
Catharsis not being reached because getting angrier and angrier
What are the three parts of Freud’s Structural Model of the Mind?
Id, ego, superego
What is the Id?
Very biological
Pleasure principle: seek pleasure, avoid pain
Reflex action: immediate physical action without thought
Wish fulfillment: forming a mental image of an object or event that would satisfy a drive
Primary processes: illogical and unconscious
What is the Ego?
Logical and reasoning to satisfy needs, no sense of morality
Waits until it is appropriate to discharge id’s tension
What is the Superego?
Monitors the morality or social desirability of behavior
Introjection: incorporating the values of parents and society
What are the 2 subsystems of the superego?
The Ego Ideal: rules for good behavior or standard of excellence, pride
The Conscious: rules about what behaviors the parents punish/disapprove of, shame
What are the 3 goals of the superego?
- To prevent the Id impulses that would be disapproved of
- To get the ego to act morally instead of rationally
- To guide the person to perfection
What is cathexis?
libido becomes attached to or obsessed with an object
What is erogenous zone?
libido becomes attached to a part of the body
What is fixation?
being stuck at a particular stage
Resolving drive moves you on
Can become fixated if you have too much fun, gratification and pleasure in the stage
Energy will stay there
What are the five stages of Freud’s Theory of Psychosexual Development?
The oral stage
Anal stage
Phallic stage
The latency period
The genital stage
What is the oral stage?
0-18 months
Libidinal energy attached to mouth
Substages:
1. Oral incorporative phase:
- 1st 6 months
- child is taking in
2. Oral sadistic phase:
- teeth
- pleasure is biting
What is the Anal Stage?
18 months-3 years
Libidinal attached to anal area
First time putting limits on biological process
Two patterns when focus is on punishment:
1. Anal expulsive
- going wherever, whenever, retaliation
- messy, destructive
2. Anal Retentive:
- rebelling through not going at all, withholding
- neat, tidy
What is the Phallic Stage?
3-5 years old
Libido is attached to genitals and focus on parent of opposite sex instead of self
Oedipus Complex
Castration anxiety
Penis envy
daughters in love with fathers
sons in love with mothers
What is the Latency Period?
6-12 years old
Intellectual and social pursuits dominate
Libido becomes more dormant
What is the genital stage?
Adolescence to adulthood
Sexuality focused on partner
desires are less egocentric and more focused on mutual sexual gratification with partner
What are the 2 types of content in dreams?
Latent Content: real meaning of dream, information from unconscious
Manifest Content: symbolic meaning
Are the content of dreams linked with personality?
yes
people high in neuroticism have more
nightmares
highly agreeable people see what in their dreams?
people
What does thought suppression during waking hours affect?
Dream content
What is parapraxes?
memory lapses, slips of speech, accidents, lost of mislaid objects, forgetting
What is symbolic behavior?
Seemingly innocent behaviors that reveal unconscious desires
What is free association?
Speaking in an uncensored way
Look at hesitations, nonresponses, and trying to explain responses as a sign of anxiety
What are the 3 types of anxiety?
Reality anxiety: arises from danger in world
Neurotic anxiety: unconscious fear the id impulses will be seen and result in punishment
Moral anxiety: fear resulting from a violation of a moral code, shame or guilt
What is a defensive mechanism?
Used to deal with neurotic or moral anxiety
Operates unconsciously
Distorts or transforms reality
Anna Freud
