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Understanding Individuality And Abnormality > Week 12 - Trait Theories > Flashcards

Week 12 - Trait Theories Flashcards

1
Q

What are traits?

A

A fundamental concept in personality

Psychometricians were first to introduce the concept of traits
-used factor analysis to reduce diversity of personality descriptors to underlying traits

Allport suggests a trait is two things:

  1. An observed tendency to behave in a certain way
  2. An inferred underlying disposition that results in this behavioural tendency
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2
Q

Traits and trait theories

A

Emotional, cognitive and behavioural tendencies constituting underlying personality dimensions

Descriptive approach-
- according to individuals underlying attributes and tendencies the structure of personality

Some consensus exists re number of traits
-but not all theorists agree

Extroversion- introversion is the most famous of the trait dimensions

  • first discussed by Jung
  • takes up by Hans Eysenck
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3
Q

Trait theories are not new

A

Hippocrates - Greek physician proposed the 4 humors (temperaments), based on excess of specific bodily fluids:

  • sanguine (blood)
  • choleric (Yellow bile)
  • melancholic (black bike)
  • phlegmatic (phlegm)
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4
Q

Greek trait theories explained

A

Sanguine: good natured, sociable, easy going

Chloeric: quick tempered, decisive, fast thinking

Melancholic: intellectual, pragmatic, contemplative

Phlegmatic: calm, stable, rational

The humor balance has been disproven, but the terms still are used today. And the trait descriptions are similar to some modern theory traits

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5
Q

What is the lexical approach to personality

A

Guiding to scientific theory in personality psychology (2 assumptions)

  1. Important personality characteristics become part of the language
  2. More important personality characteristics will be defined by a single word

Major foundation for:

  • McCrae & Costa & the Big 5
  • HEXACO
  • Cattell & 16PF
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6
Q

Gordon Allport and Henry Odbert

A

Influential trait theorists throughout 1900’s

People have some fundamental traits that influence most aspects of their behaviour

  • Cardinal traits
  • central traits
  • secondary traits
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7
Q

Raymond Cattell

A

Reduced Allports list from 4500+ to 171

Argued for three types of data

  • life data
  • experimental data
  • questionnaire data
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8
Q

Cattell and the 16PF

A

Distinguished traits in a number of ways

Common vs. unique traits

Surface traits - obvious individual characteristics easily identifiable

Source traits - deep, less obvious mental structures which give rise to surface traits

Identified 16 source traits using factor analysis

Measured these using a self report survey called the 16PF

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9
Q

The Big 5 personality factors

A

The five factor model (FFM) comprises 5 personality dimensions

The factors are dimensions. Not ‘types’ of personality. They do not describe an overall personality, but represent the highest level of a hierarchy

Factors are stable during adulthood

Factors are culturally universal

Specific facets are believed to be heritable, at least in part

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10
Q

What are McCrae and Costas personality types (big 5)

Hint: OCEAN

A

Openness of experience
-curious, creative, independent, intellect

Conscientiousness
- reliable, careful, hard working, well organised

Extraversion

  • sociable, talkative and open with others
  • introverts are withdrawn discrete

Agreeableness
-friendly, understanding, caring, empathetic

Neuroticism
-nervous, sad, hostile, insecure

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11
Q

Big 5 by culture

A

Factors are generally culturally universal
-May be universal for four of five traits
•surgency (extraversion)
•agreeableness
•emotional stability (neuroticism)
•conscientiousness
-but openness to experience is not supported in some Asian countries

Also, some variation in means between cultures (but cf individual differences within a given country)

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12
Q

Big 5 by gender

A

Women tended to be somewhat higher than men in neuroticism, extraversion, agreeableness and conscientiousness

Most consistent difference throughout a number of countries was increased neuroticism

Differences are larger in more developed countries

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13
Q

Personality and applications

A

Some personality tests are designed to determine presence of psychopathology

Minnesota multiphasic personality inventory (MMPI 2), 567 items, designed to test clinical disorder symptoms

Provides score on 10 clinical scales against 3 validity scales

Combinations of their scales can be used for specific disorders

Individual performance across scales can detect abnormally strong characteristics, which may be associated with specific psychopathologies

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14
Q

Beliefs about the personality characteristics of men and women

A

Worldwide, people tend to regard men as having personalities that are more active, loud, adventurous, obnoxious, aggressive, opinionated, arrogant, coarse and conceited

Women, in contrast, are regarded as having personalities that are more affectionate, modest, nervous, appreciative, patient, changeable and fearful

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15
Q

HEXACO - Ashton and Lee

A

Six dimensional model

Honesty - humility 
Emotionality 
eXtraversion 
Agreeableness 
Conscientiousness 
Openness to experience
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16
Q

What are cultural universals

A

This approach to culture and personality attempts to identify features of personality that appear to be universal, or present in all cultures

17
Q

Cultural differences in self concept (Markus and Kitayama)

A

• Markus & Kitayama: each person has two fundamental “cultural tasks” that have to be confronted:

  1. Communion or interdependence: Concerns how you are affiliated with, attached to, or engaged in the large group of which you are a member
  2. Agency or independence: How you differentiate yourself from the larger group

• Cultures appear to differ in how they balance these two tasks
– Non-Western, Asian cultures focused more on interdependence
– Western cultures focused more on independence
• Independence is similar to individualism and interdependence similar to collectivism

18
Q

The dark triad/ tetrad

A

A constellation of socially undesirable traits - they are maladaptive but not psycho pathological

  1. Narcissism
    - entitled, superiority, dominance
  2. Machiavellianism
    - cynical, unprincipled, manipulative
  3. Psychopathy
    - impulsivity, thrill seeking, low empathy

And

  1. Sadism
    - gaining pleasure or satisfaction from others misfortune/ suffering, and I’d engaging in behaviour that harms others
19
Q

Culture and personality

A

Personality psychologists believe it is useful to explore personality across cultures:
– Are concepts of personality that are prevalent in one culture applicable in other cultures?
– Do cultures differ in the levels of particular personality traits?

20
Q

Behavioural genetics method

A
  1. Selective Breeding—Studies of Humans’ Best Friend
    – Can only occur if a desired trait is heritable
    – Selective breeding studies of dogs
    • Can you make a breed aggressive,friendly or loyal?
    • Cannot be ethically conducted with humans
  2. Family Studies
  3. Twin Studies
  4. Adoption Studies
21
Q

What is the dark tetrad?

A

Scoring high on these traits is associated with a range of antisocial behaviour:

  • reduces empathy
  • sexual harassment
  • bullying/cyberbullying
  • prejudice
  • aggression

However, each contributes differently.

22
Q

Why does the dark tetrad exist if assocated with negative behaviours?

A

Life history theory (Wilson 1975), an evolutionary theory which suggests individuals might make trade offs to improve survival and mating chances. Social isolation

23
Q

Psychopathy and the workplace

A

Eg – those high in psychopathy often engage in behaviours that will promote their own success at the expense of others in the workplace
• Claimcreditforotherswork
• Takeadvantageofothers
• Superficiallypleasant–dowellatinterview • Don’tmindfiring/makingruthlessdecisions

24
Q

Evaluating trait theory

A

• Trait theory, especially the Big 5 model, is able to describe personality
– Cross-cultural human studies find good agreement for the Big 5 model in many cultures
– Appear to be highly correlated in adulthood, childhood and even late preschoolers
– Three dimensions (extraversion, neuroticism and agreeableness) have cross-species generality
30
Evaluating Trait Theory
• Mischel’s argument concerning behavioral inconsistency
• Traits are predictors of aggregate, not isolated behaviors

25
Q

Contributions and limitations of trait theory

A

• Easily measured and testable
• Allows for individuality in trait expression
• Provides a categorisation tool for personality attributes – The most widely accepted being the ‘Big 5’
• Heavy reliance on self-report, – Potential Barnum effect
• Analyses may govern outcome
– Heavy reliance on Factor Analysis
• Does not examine the process of personality

26
Q

Controversy about genes and personality

A

• Behavioural geneticists attempt to determine the degree to which individual differences in constructs such as personality are caused by genetic and environmental differences

• Highly controversial
– Ideological concerns
– Concerns about renewed interest in eugenics

Modern behavioral geneticists who study personality are typically very careful about addressing implications of work and are sensitive to ideological concerns
– Knowledge is better than ignorance
– Finding that a personality trait has a genetic component does not mean the environment is powerless to modify trait

27
Q

Goals of behavioural genetics

A
  • Determine the percentage of individual differences in a trait that can be attributed to genetic or environmental differences
  • Determine how which genes and environment interact to produce individual differences

• Determine where in the “environment” environmental effects exist
– parental socialisation
– different teachers

28
Q

Misconceptions about heritability

A
  • Heritability CANNOT be applied to single individual
  • Heritability is NOT constant or immutable
  • Heritability is NOT a precise statistic
29
Q

Summaries of behavioral genetic data yield heritability estimates for major personality traits of about

A

20-45%

Understanding Individuality And Abnormality (11 decks)

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