unit I

Question 1

What is personality?

Answer 1

Personality refers to relatively permanent traits and unique characteristics that provide consistency and individuality to a person’s behavior.

Question 2

What is the origin of the word “personality”?

Answer 2

It originates from the Latin word “persona,” meaning the mask used by actors in a play.

Question 3

Name the four temperaments identified by Hippocrates.

Answer 3

Choleric, melancholic, phlegmatic, and sanguine.

Question 4

What was Plato’s view of personality?

Answer 4

Plato considered the soul as the seat of personality, guided by reason, emotion, and appetite.

Question 5

Who systematized the study of personality in American psychology?

Answer 5

Gordon Allport in 1930.

Question 6

Define personality according to psychology.

Answer 6

Personality is the dynamic organization within the individual of those psychophysical systems that determine unique adjustments to the environment.

Question 7

What are the key perspectives in personality psychology?

Answer 7

Psychodynamic, humanistic, dispositional, biological-evolutionary, and learning (social) cognitive perspectives.

Question 8

What are projective tests, and can you name two types?

Answer 8

Projective tests reveal aspects of an individual’s personality by interpreting ambiguous stimuli. Examples include association tests (e.g., word association) and completion tests (e.g., sentence completion).