Trait Theories: Allport, Eysenck, & Cattell

Question 1

Traits

Answer 1

words that describe people’s typical styles of experience (personality) and action (behavior)

Question 2

Personality trait

Answer 2

consistent patterns in the way people behave, feel and think

Question 3

Two features of traits:

Answer 3

Consistency: doesn’t mean always; a predisposition
Distinctive: people can differ on the trait

Question 4

Three scientific aspects of trait theory

Answer 4

Description
Prediction
Explanation

Question 5

Descriptive aspect of trait theory

Answer 5

 Trait constructs are descriptive – they describe people and their typical behaviour
 Trait words (descriptors) can form a taxonomy (e.g. a classification system)

Question 6

Predictive aspect of trait theory

Answer 6

 Personality traits may predict types of (observable/objective) behaviour
 Can we predict a “good employee?” – conscientious, agreeable, trustful?
 How do we predict/label an individual’s traits?
 How do we predict/label an individual’s behaviour?

Question 7

Explanative aspect of trait theory

Answer 7

 Do traits also ‘explain’ behaviour?
 What is the intent of the behaviour?

 Traits can explain but its easy to be biased, inaccurate, unknowing and uncertain
 More of a “Gestalt” (holistic impression) “…an organized whole that is perceived as more than the sum of its parts”

Question 8

Shared assumptions of traits

Answer 8

 Enduring predispositions, consistent and distinctive
 Continuum: People can be high or low on a trait
 Validity: However, it can still lack certainty (phenomenological: limited knowledge; e.g., intent)
 We only truly know our own intent (…or do we?)
e.g., Acting extroverted to repress or compensate for feelings of anxiety/shyness
 Hierarchy: Human behaviour can be organised in a hierarchy (with a bi-directional process)
 Example: Eysenck’s P-E-N model

Question 9

Gordon Allport

Answer 9

• Rejected both psychoanalytic and behavioral approaches
• Accepted idiographic approach
• Emphasized the uniqueness of each individual
• Present > past
• Situation influences expression of trait
• In-depth analysis of individuals
• Opposite of nomothetic approach

Question 10

Traits vs States vs Activities

Answer 10

Traits: frequent, intense and seen across a wide variety of situations (stable)
States (e.g., emotional) and Activities (e.g., situational) are temporary, brief and caused by
situational (often external) and internal states and circumstances

Question 11

Lexical Approach

Answer 11

 Allport went through the entire dictionary (+150k words) and located every term that he thought
could describe a person
 He developed a list of 4500 descriptive (trait-like) words (i.e., adjectives – describe person/thing)
 He organized these into three levels of traits: cardinal, general and secondary

Question 12

Cardinal traits

Answer 12

 A trait that is so pervasive it dominates a person’s behavior and character
 They are rare, a person may have no clear cardinal trait at all
 e.g., Narcissistic (Narcissisus), Libidinal/Seductive (Don Juan; Quagmire, family guy),
Sadistic (Marquis de Sade), Benevolent (Nelson Mandela; Mother Theresa)

Question 13

General traits

Answer 13

 A trait found to varying degrees in most people
 honesty, kindness, assertiveness, etc. (i.e., the “normal” traits)

Question 14

Secondary traits

Answer 14

Trait x situation
 Traits related to attitudes or preferences that often appear only in certain situations or under
specific circumstances
 nervous when speaking to large groups
 getting impatient waiting in a line
 fearful of the dentist

Question 15

Factor analysis

Answer 15

Factor Analysis is a statistical technique that summarizes the way in which a large number of
variables correlate or co-occur together
 Remember if a variable is highly (pos.) correlated with another they behave in very similar
ways, e.g. if one goes up, the other goes up, or if one occurs the other occurs
 (Fictional) Facebook Friends Survey N=10,000 people (Correlation Matrix results)

Question 16

Factor Analysis Method

Answer 16

 The analysis investigates the correlation (or co-occurrence) of a large number of variables and
identifies which ones co-occur with each other
 Variables that are highly correlated with each other will cluster together and form a “factor”
 Thus, factors are made up of co-occuring variables…
 We can reduce a large number of variables into a small number of meaningful factors
 Factors are overarching (latent) representations of many traits

 Factors are then subjectively labelled (i.e., described) as to what variables it possesses/represents
 In other words, our “labelling” defines the factor

Question 17

Latent traits

Answer 17

 Latent traits describe traits that cannot be directly measured, such as neuroticism, happiness, etc.

Question 18

Benefits of factor analysis

Answer 18

 Parsimonious (simplifies the “data”)
 Organising a large set of information into a simpler form
 Factors can be used to describe, predict and explain almost anything

Question 19

Limitations of factor analysis

Answer 19

 atheoretical
 Completely mathematical solution (apart from the subjective labelling)
 Not lead by theory – completely data driven!
 So, other data sets – can result in different correlations and factors
 Does not answer why – why do they co-vary in this way?

Question 20

Raymond Cattell

Answer 20

Wanted to create the ‘basic elements’ of the
human mind like the periodic table of elements
has for chemistry
Created the famous 16 Personality Factor Model
 aka 16PF model

Question 21

Source traits

Answer 21

(Factors)
Correlations of surface traits
- Cattell identified 16 of them

Question 22

Surface traits

Answer 22

Superficial traits
- can be observed
- Cattell identified 100s of the them

Question 23

16PF Questionnaire

Answer 23

3 different types of Source Traits (e.g. Factors)
 Ability Traits: Skills and abilities that allow the individual to function effectively
e.g. REASONING (High – indicative of Intelligence; Low – indicative of Concrete Thinking)

 Temperament Traits: Involve emotional life and stylistic qualities of behaviour
e.g. WARMTH (High – Kind; Low – Detached)

 Dynamic Traits: Concern the striving, motivational life of the individual
e.g. DOMINANCE (High – Forceful; Low – Submissive

Question 24

Evidence for 16PF Model

Answer 24

 L-data: Life record data (15PF)
 S or Q-data: Questionnaire data; self-report (16PF)
 OT-data: Observational / experimental data
- Behavioural mini-situations; extraversion with confederates (21PF)

Cattell tried to relate the outcomes using these different data’s to each other (Construct validity)

 L and S-Q similar (the combined results are what makes up the Cattell 16PF model)
 OT data; very little direct relationship initially found… fail
But is acclaimed in his attempt to investigate construct validity…
 That was a novel idea/process at the time

Question 25

Cattell: Traits vs States vs Roles

Answer 25

Roles: Certain behaviours are more closely linked to social roles than to personality traits
 I may behave more “professional” in class, than I do in other situations/roles
 It depends on my perceived “role” in the situation (e.g., professor)
 – notice the similarity to Jungian ideas of the persona and archetypes again

 Traits are stable behaviours that may be affected by mood/situation (state) and social roles
of the situation

Question 26

Raymond Cattell Limitations

Answer 26

 Approach
 Data → Factor Analysis → Theory
 Should be… Theory → Data → Factor Analysis
 Every data sample is different – dangerous to use data to create theory
 Can have problems replicating results (a scientific necessity!)

 Conceptual
 Even if we can identify what a person’s traits are, how can we use this therapeutically?
 Early trait theorist didn’t offer much explanation, but Hans Eysenck took things a little
further with more construct validity of the trait approach itself (introduces biology)

Question 27

Hans Eysenck

Answer 27

Superfactors: Analyzed substantial questionnaire data to reveal various factors.
-Factors may be related to each other; Eysenck factor-analyzed factors to create super factors

Question 28

Hans Eysenck Superfactors

Answer 28

Two statistically independent superfactors:
Extraversion: introversion vs extraversion
Neuroticism: emotional stability vs instability

Question 29

Third dimension to superfactors

Answer 29

Psychoticism: organized largely negative and abnormal social traits and attitude.

Question 30

Hans Eysenck: Factor Measurement

Answer 30

Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ)
Based on PEN model
- Psychoticism, Extraversion, Neuroticism

EPQ-R (1985)
 Full version
- 100 yes/no questions
 Short version
- 48 yes/no questions in its short scale version

Scales of P-E-N found to be reliable under criterion analysis, but, limited due to yes/no only

Question 31

Biological basis of Extraversion/Introversion

Answer 31

 Linked to neurophysiological functioning; Arousal

Introverts – High cortical arousal
 Highly intense stimuli (parties, skydiving, loud music, etc.) make them OVER-aroused

Extroverts – Low cortical arousal
 Low intense calming stimuli will make them UNDER-aroused (they’ll seek arousal)

 Green (1997) brain activity shows support
 Krueger & Johnson (2008) Twin studies also support (a Hereditary link)

Question 32

Biological basis of neuroticism

Answer 32

 Eysenck theorised that individual differences would be found in the autonomic nervous system (ANS)
 Highly attuned to negative and/or emotional experience (overly Anxious)
 High neuroticism should be linked to a quick responding ANS that is slow to decrease
 These individuals will seem “jumpy” and “stressed out”
 Benefits of being Neurotic?
 Link between neuroticism and biology not consistently supported (Eysenck, 1990)
 Individual differences based on perceived threat/worry
 … but temperament (20-60% may be genetic; predisposed to being neurotic)

Question 33

Biological basis of psychoticism

Answer 33

 Some ‘societal’ links between psychoticism traits and male aggressiveness
 Particularly in relation to increased testosterone levels (“roid rage” – although disputed) but
evident gender differences seen in antisocial personality disorder
 But very little empirical support for the neurophysiological basis of psychoticism

Question 34

Psychological difficulties arrive from…

Answer 34

(1) personality traits and
(2) the (biological) nervous system functioning related to those traits

 For example: a person develops neurotic symptoms due to biological systems and
environmental experiences

Question 35

Can we change?

Answer 35

 Genetic and biological determinants are only predispositions
 If a patient has psychopathological symptoms (high neuroticism for example) they can learn
to change their behaviour by changing the way they think about their thoughts