Unit 10: Personality Flashcards
Personality
An individual’s characteristic pattern of thinking, feeling, and acting.
In psychoanalysis, a method of exploring the unconscious in which the person relaxes and says whatever comes to mind, no matter how trivial or embarrassing.
Free Association
Frued’s theory of personality that attributes thoughts and actions to unconscious motives and conflicts; the techniques used in treating psychological disorders by seeking to expose and interpret unconscious tensions.
Psychoanalysis
According to Freud, a reservoir of mostly unacceptable thoughts, wishes, feelings, and memories. According to contemporary psychologists, information processing of which we are unaware.
Unconscious
A reservoir of unconscious psychic energy that, according to Freud, strives to satisfy basic sexual and aggressive drives. Demands immediate gratification.
id
The largely conscious, “executive” part of personality that, according to Freud, mediates among the demands of the id, superego, and reality. Satisfied the id’s desires in ways that will realistically bring pleasure rather than pain.
ego
The part of personality that, according to Freud, represents internalized ideals and provides standards for judgement (the conscience) and for future aspirations.
superego
The childhood stages of development (oral, anal, phallic, latency, genital) during which, according to Freud, the id’s pleasure-seeking energies focus on distinct erogenous zones.
Psychosexual Stages
According to Freud, a boy’s sexual desires towards his mother and feelings of jealousy and hatred for the rival father.
Oedipus Complex
The process by which, according to Freud, children incorporate their parents’ values into their developing superegos.
Identification
According to Freud, a lingering focus of pleasure-seeking energies at an earlier psychosexual stage, in which conflicts were unresolved.
Fixation
In psycho-analytic theory, the ego’s protective methods of reducing anxiety by unconsciously distorting reality.
Defense Mechanisms
In psychoanalytic theory, the basic defense mechanism that banishes from consciousness anxiety-arousing thoughts, feelings, and memories.
Repression
Modern-day approaches that view personality with a focus on the unconscious and the importance of childhood experiences.
Psychodynamic Theories
Carl Jung’s concept of a shared, inherited reservoir of memory traces from our species’ history.
Collective Unconscious
A personality test, such as the Rorschach, that provides ambiguous stimuli designed to trigger projection of one’s inner dynamics.
Projective Test
A projective test in which people express their inner feelings and interests through the stories they make up about ambiguous scenes.
Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)
The most widely used projective test, a set of 10 inkblots, designed by Hermann Rorschach; seeks to identify people’s inner feelings by analyzing their interpretations of the blots.
Rorschach Inkblot Test
The tendency to overestimate the extent to which others share our beliefs and our behaviors.
False Consensus Effect
A theory of death-related anxiety; explores people’s emotional and behavioral responses to reminders of their impending death.
Terror-Management Theory
View personality with a focus on the potential for healthy personal growth.
Humanistic Theories
According to Maslow, one of the ultimate psychological needs that arises after basic physical and psychological needs are met and self-esteem is achieved; the motivation to fulfill one’s potential.
Self-Actualization
According to Rogers, an attitude of total acceptance toward another person.
Unconditional Positive Regard
All our thoughts and feelings about ourselves, in answer to the question, “Who am I?”
Self-concept
A characteristic pattern of behavior or a disposition to feel and act, as assessed by self-report inventories and peer reports.
Trait
a questionnaire (often with true-false or agree-disagree items) on which people respond to items designed to gauge a wide range of feelings and behaviors; used to assess selected personality traits.
Personality Inventory
the most widely researched and clinically used of all personality tests. Originally developed to identify emotional disorders (still considered its most appropriate use), this test is now used for many other screening purposes.
Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI)
A test (such as the MMPI) developed by testing a pool items and then selecting those that discriminate between groups.
Empirically Derived Test
Views behavior as influenced by the interaction between people’s traits (including their thinking) and their social context.
social-cognitive perspective
In personality theory, this perspective focuses on the effects of learning on our personality development.
behavioral approach
The interacting influences of behavior, internal cognition, and environment
Reciprocal Determinism
The scientific study of optimal human functioning; aims to discover and promote strengths and virtues that enable individuals and communities to thrive.
Positive Psychology
In contemporary psychology, assumed to be the center of personality, the organizer of our thoughts, feelings, and actions.
Self
Overestimating others’ noticing and evaluating our appearance, performance, and blunders (as if we presume a spotlight shines on us).
Spotlight Effect
One’s feelings of high or low self-worth
Self-esteem
One’s sense of competence and effectiveness
Self-efficacy
A readiness to perceive oneself favorably
Self-serving Bias
Excessive self-love and self-absorption
Narcissism
Giving priority to one’s own goals over groups goals and defining one’s identity in terms or personal attributes rather than group identifications
Individualism
Giving priority to the goals of one’s group (often one’s extended family or work group) and defining one’s identity accordingly.
Collectivism
