Download Personality traits - Okemos Public Schools

PSYCHOLOGY:
Personality Testing & Theory
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Personality Testing:
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Assess
attributes/characteristics
Identify
problems/disorders
Predict future behavior
2 Types:
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1. Objective
2. Projective
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Objective Tests for Personality:
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Forced choice tests
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Must select one or all of
possible responses
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Strengths/Weaknesses?
Projective Tests for Personality:
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Encourage free response
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Provide interpretation of
test stimuli
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Invite people to tell stories
about pictures, diagrams or
objects
Objective Personality Tests
The MMPI, The CPI and The
Meyers-Briggs Personality Tests
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Objective:
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No right/wrong answers
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567 statements
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Possible Responses
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False
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Cannot Say
Reveals habits, fears, delusions,
sexual attitudes and disorders
10 “Clinical Scales”
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True
Purpose of the Test:
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The MMPI
Drawn from questions within the
test
Best for diagnosing extreme psychological
disorders
CPI: California Psychological
Inventory
Purpose: “Assess the
Normal Person”
Not intended to reveal
psychological illnesses
Meant to predict
adjustment to stress,
leadership and job success
(prediction = test
validity)
Measures responsibility,
self-control and
tolerance (reliability)
Myers-Briggs Personality
Inventory
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Focus of the Test:
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How individual takes in
information & makes
decisions
Basic day-to-day lifestyle
Characterizes Personality
on 4 Scales:
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Introvert vs. Extrovert
Intuitive vs. Sensing
Feeling vs. thinking
Judging vs. Perceptive
Goal of Test: Understand
better how you relate to
others based on your
personality traits (above)
Projective Tests
Encourage people to “project” their personality
characteristics onto ambiguous stimuli
Strategy: to encourage people to reveal more
than they normally would under more
concrete terms
Advantages/Disadvantages…What do you
think?
Rorschach Inkblots
It’s illegal to show you the real ones!
Projective Technique created by a Swiss Psychiatrist
Based on interpretation of 10 ambiguous inkblots
Most famous & widely used projective personality test
Administration:
10 cards: 5 in black & white and 5 in color
Psychiatrist asks “What might this be?”
Hand inkblots to patient….records movements and interpretations
Evaluation:
Theory: Personality impacts someone more in vaguely defined circumstances
& ambiguous situations
Different psychologists drew different conclusions from same answers
(depending on their expectations)
James Exner (1986) = found ways to standardize the interpretations of the test
Thematic Apperception Test
Person is asked to make up a story for each picture
What is happening?
What events led up to the scene?
What will happen in the future?
Designed by Christina Morgan & Henry Murray
Wanted to measure people’s needs
Includes 31 pictures in all (Psychologists use up to 20 of their choice)
Some show men, some show women, some show both, some show neither,
one is totally blank
Theory: “When you tell a story about a person in the drawing, you probably
identify with the person and so the story is really about yourself.”
Likely to describe things you would not discuss openly
RELIABILITY vs. VALIDITY
Reliability: Test consistency; its ability to yield the same
result under a variety of similar circumstances.
Validity: Test measures what it is intended to measure.
Figuring someone out involves exploring
PERSONALITY
Researchers have developed many ways
of assessing personality, but even if we do
gain an understanding of how we are
(personality), the question of why we are
that way (theories of personality) remains.
Personality theories help us understand the differences among people
PERSONALITY DEFINED
Personality is the consistent, enduring, and unique
characteristics of a person
Personality traits are characteristic behaviors and feelings
that are consistent
and long lasting
Personality States are temporary
patterns of
behavior and feelings that may arise in a specific situation
PSYCHOANALYTIC THEORIES
• Emphasize the unconscious (part of the mind that contains material
we are unaware of but that strongly influences behavior)
• Unconscious feelings as children = impact
adulthood
• Main ideas developed by Sigmund Freud
Freud Described the following:
FREUD’S ID, EGO, SUPEREGO
Freud used the Id, Ego, and Superego to try to explain how
the mind functions and personality is shaped
Id
• instinctual & biological urges
• lustful, impulsive, fun – pleasure principle
• completely unconscious
• Seeks immediate gratification of impulses (what
feels good)
• Ignores consequences
Following the pleasure principle (ID) leads to conflict with
others (parents) and results in the development of the EGO in the
2nd and 3rd year of life.
Ego
• Rational & thoughtful
• Based on the reality principle, the awareness that
gratification of impulses has to be delayed in order
to accommodate the demands of the real world.
Superego
• Responsible for society’s rules of behavior
(moral standards). Feels guilty if rules are
disobeyed.
• Based on morality principle, must follow
moral standards and rules and breaking them
causes guilt.
Freud’s techniques for exploring the Unconscious
• Freud believed that information in the unconscious
emerges in slips of the tongue, jokes, dreams, illness
symptoms, etc. These are called Freudian Slips.
• Dream interpretation, or analyzing
dreams
• Psychoanalysis
ID – What you WANT TO DO
EGO – What you CAN DO
SUPEREGO – What you SHOULD
DO
ID & SUPEREGO are
frequently in conflict. Ego must
satisfy both.
Rather than feel conflict or frustration when the ID’s desires &
SUPEREGO’s rules cannot be satisfied, humans distort reality
using DEFENSE MECHANISMS
Freud’s Theory of
Psychosexual Development
Freud believed that all children
are born with powerful sexual
and aggressive urges. In learning
to control these impulses,
children acquire their personality.
Freud divided this development
into stages.
“Monkey see monkey do/ I don’t know why I’d
rather be dead than cool” - Stay Away
“Everything is my fault/I’ll take all the blame” All Apologies
Freud had trouble proving there was an
unconscious, but he might have looked at these
lyrics and said that Cobain was hiding some of
his Unconscious feelings in his lyrics.
FREUD’S LEGACY
• 1ST Person to propose unified theory to understand and
explain human behavior
• No theory more complete, complex, or controversial
• Some criticize his theory for being impossible to test
• Freud’s psychoanalytic theory was the predecessor of all later
personality theories
IN FREUD’S FOOTSTEPS….
OTHER PSYCHOANALYTIC THEORIES
Carl Jung
• Freud’s personal successor before relationship ended because
Jung disagreed with Freud’s emphasis on sexual urges
• The Collective unconscious (part of the mind that contains
inherited instincts, urges, and memories common to all people)
holds Archetypes (an inherited idea based on experiences of
one’s ancestors, which shapes one’s personality)
• Jung believed we fit our personalities to our Archetypes
ALFRED ADLER
• Believed people are driven to overcome feelings of inferiority
• Inferiority Complex – when a person continually tries to
compensate for his weakness and avoid feelings of inadequacy.
LEARNING THEORIES
• Group of theorists known as Behaviorists
• Main belief is that the environment and reinforcement shape
personality
• As individuals differ in their learning experiences, they acquire
different behaviors and, hence, different personalities
•Focus on observable behaviors (not thoughts)
B.F. SKINNER
• Personality arises from
Operant conditioning
(specifically reinforcement)
• What is the behavior and
what causes (reinforces) it?
ALBERT BANDURA
• Personality acquired through reinforcement AND observational
learning, or imitation
• People direct behavior by choice of models
• Called Social Cognitive Theory
• Behavior influenced by self-efficacy, or your view of your ability
to succeed at a given behavior. (believing in yourself)
HUMANISTIC THEORIES
• Believe all humans strive for self-actualization, or the realization
of their potential
• Becoming true to oneself and having an ability to grow
ABRAHAM MASLOW
• Hierarchy of Needs – emphasis on
self actualization
CARL ROGERS
• Two sides to each person (What they value and what they believe
others value in them)
• Self – one’s image of oneself (who they are) developed through
interaction with others
• Everyone wants Positive regard – viewing oneself in favorable
light due to supportive feedback from others
• People may reject parts of their person if they don’t receive
positive regard
• The self and the person are often different but accepting your
person results in becoming a fully functioning individual
TRAIT THEORIES
• Try to explain consistency and normal, healthy
behavior in different situations
• Trait - relatively stable and enduring tendency to
behave in a particular way
• Traits apply to all people.
• Can quantify traits (scale 1-10 how nice are you)
BIG FIVE TRAIT THEORY
Current popular belief; all personality traits derive from five
basic personality traits
EXTRAVERSION
AGREEABLENESS
CONSCIENTIOUSNESS
OPENNESS TO EXPERIENCE
NEUROTICISM
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How/When do personality traits change?
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Longitudinal studies show that…
• Many consistencies in traits between ages 3 and 18
• Major changes to emotional traits during adolescence
• Between 20 & 30 – become less emotional, less
likely to seek thrills….. More mature
• Most changes to personality occur before age 30