Personality Theories and Debate

Slides from University about Personality: Theories and Debate. The Pdf explores personality theories and related debates, structured with bullet points and clear titles. This Pdf is suitable for university-level Psychology students.

18 Pages

Personality -

Theories…

Personality -

Theories…

Personality could be an individuals characteristic traits,

which they use to carve their own path

Allport can be considered the 'Father of Personality Research'

Humanistic psychologists will be interested in the

psychological parts, rather than any characteristics or

cognitive elements

Red - Allport suggests that certain

experiences moulds our personality (this

came from a trait perspective)

Green - others think that it is susceptible to

change, but once you get to a certain point, it

will become more or less stable

Purple - examples of human

experiences/activities are our cognition and

the attitudes we hold, for example

Motivational basis --> Why do people do what they do?

What is driving our collective/individual behaviour

Human nature --> Are we driven by hedonism, or personal

gain at the expense of others? Or are we driven to be the

best person we can be?

Describe/categorise --> We can label what drives our

behaviour if we understand it, for example, extraversion. But

measurement varies depending on the theory or approach

What people are like and how --> Are we innately good or

bad? How do children develop motivations?

Range of normal behaviour --> examining in variation the

individual differences that people possess

This can change with context and history, but

sometimes there are established norms, so

Psychologists look at the people who deviate from this

Comprehensiveness = we must adequately

describe personality and how it is perceived first

Parsimony = doesn't use too many extra

terms or theories to explain behaviour

Heuristic value = the research encourages

people to discuss and debate the theory, or

motivates people to research to disprove the

theory instead

Psychodynamic psychologists believe that humans are

innately bad, and we are driven by selfish desires to feel

immediate gratification, which is not always appropriate

We experience internal struggles about whether to

behave in an appropriate manner

This manifest into personality and behaviour

'Personality is not fixed' emphasises that people can adapt

their internal unique traits/personality, leading to different

behaviour

The environment has a bigger influence on

personality

When someone is in an unhealthy environment,

they develop different drives other than self-

actualisation

When a child is being reared, they initially go through primary

association of learning the likes/desires of their immediate

primary caregivers, and adopt these attitudes/beliefs

Secondary socialisation occurs when children go to school /

media / distant family exposes them to different attitudes and

beliefs

These are the underlying motives behind human behaviour

Deficiency needs

To gather these traits, Maslow conducted case studies of

people (who all happened to be in positions of in social power)

who he believed to have 'self-actualised' and looked at the

common traits

Description = all humans are positive and motivated only by

hierarchical needs and psychopathology stems from

defence mechanists is simplistic

People only focus on the positive side, suggesting

people only act in a positive manner

Explanation = there can be other, unexplained motivators

beyond what Maslow said ,e.g., ignores the fact that

behaviour can be driven by multiple things

Applied value = employees need to feel like they belong,

and need development opportunities to reach their full

potential

Too parsimonious = how personality actually develops from

the process of meeting needs is underdeveloped

Needs to be more concepts within his theory, as it's

too narrow

'Dimensions' refers to scales, along which every person sits at a

different level

For example, introversion at one end and extraversion at

the other end

Factor analysis is a type of statistical analysis which examines

responses to questionnaire items, looks at the relationships between

them, and groups items with similar response scores together into a

'factor'

Traits lead to behaviour, rather than situational cues

Also acknowledging that some traits are unique to specific

individuals, and that not everybody possesses them

Attitudes = expressing interest in people or objects in a specific

situation, can be positive/negative/neutral

Sentiments = complex attitudes that include our own opinions

and beliefs about said object

Ergs = innate motivators that seek to satisfy our drives and

cause us to return to certain stimuli more regularly

Source trait --> umbrella term for a group of similar surface traits, that

still accounts for their variation

Surface trait --> collection of traits that are similar in people, and likely

to be positive

Cattell's study considers both genetics and the environment

His theory being empirically valid allows predictions to be

made, which can be empirically tested

His approach was adopted by others, who carried out

background research to support theory and implemented

factor analysis

The developed measures of personality are still used today, but

have been slightly modified

Dynamic traits address what motivates us as humans

In these future modified models, the number of dimensions to

account for the underlying structure of personality was

significantly reduced

Personality being stable allows us to form general predictions

about how people might behave in the future

The participants, theology students, were people who were

thinking about/already had a role to support their faith and

beliefs

The idea was that someone highly religious would be

thought to be more helpful

Deception is commonly misunderstood as 'always bad', but in

reality, it is only bad when it causes significant harm or distress

to the participant, which in this study did not

The 'victim' slumped in the alleyway was planted as a confederate by

the researchers for this particular study

It was recorded whether the 40 participants helped the confederate,

considering these 3 factors and if it would affect their ability to help the

'victim'

The extent to which they are religious

Time availability

Primed by the religious passage

People who read the good Samaritan passage were more likely to

help, whereas people who had less time received lower scores

The situational aspect in this research example is social support,

which could vary for individuals

Extraversion also predicted friendship adjustment

Openness also predicted general adjustment

Rigidity refers to people being unable to cope with emerging

situations and getting stuck on a solution that they feel

confident with/have practiced before

A perfectionist may hold the belief that it's not solely about

doing well, it's about doing well easily, without being seen to try,

or appearing to need help

Sub-types of perfectionism include clinical perfectionism and

socially prescribed perfectionism (which is linked to negative

outcomes)

Perfectionism is a system of causal descriptions

This is called a 'causal loop diagram', which is a type of 'system

thinking/theory'

In a perfectionist scenario, they do not balance learning, which

entails failure, with performance needs.

Instead, they are trying to perform well rather than learning, so

that they do not need to make errors

*De-based = de-valued

People may link physical appearance to personality, e.g., if they

have lots of muscles, they deemed as 'scary'

There is not necessarily a consensus as to what personality is , as

different approaches to Psychology will focus on different aspects

of these definitions

The trait approach to personality research is quite dominant, so

most people will have heard of the 'Big 5', byt there are a range of

other approaches.

For example, Freud's stages of psychosexual stages focus on

drives, where humanistic psychology focuses on self-

concepts

Instinctoid tendencies are weak and can easily be overcome by

negative environmental factors, whereas if positive intinctoid

tendencies are fostered in childhood, the child will have the

capacity to display traits like honesty, trust, kindness, love and

generosity

Trait theorists try to understand the underlying personal structure of

all people, and what they have in common

What is the number of traits that can sufficiently explain

personality?

The perfectionist wants to be consistent, and can only change their

behaviour to maintain performance, how they evaluate themselves, or

their view of the world

However, the trap is that they cannot change this world view,

because it involves maintaining high standards

There are diminishing returns for effort as we invest more time in an

activity, so we need to identify where is 'good enough'

Personality ✅

Wednesday 25 September 2024

11:22 PM

Personality -

Theories…

Personality -

Theories…

Personality could be an individuals characteristic traits,

which they use to carve their own path

Allport can be considered the 'Father of Personality Research'

Humanistic psychologists will be interested in the

psychological parts, rather than any characteristics or

cognitive elements

Red - Allport suggests that certain

experiences moulds our personality (this

came from a trait perspective)

Green - others think that it is susceptible to

change, but once you get to a certain point, it

will become more or less stable

Purple - examples of human

experiences/activities are our cognition and

the attitudes we hold, for example

Motivational basis --> Why do people do what they do?

What is driving our collective/individual behaviour

Human nature --> Are we driven by hedonism, or personal

gain at the expense of others? Or are we driven to be the

best person we can be?

Describe/categorise --> We can label what drives our

behaviour if we understand it, for example, extraversion. But

measurement varies depending on the theory or approach

What people are like and how --> Are we innately good or

bad? How do children develop motivations?

Range of normal behaviour --> examining in variation the

individual differences that people possess

This can change with context and history, but

sometimes there are established norms, so

Psychologists look at the people who deviate from this

Comprehensiveness = we must adequately

describe personality and how it is perceived first

Parsimony = doesn't use too many extra

terms or theories to explain behaviour

Heuristic value = the research encourages

people to discuss and debate the theory, or

motivates people to research to disprove the

theory instead

Psychodynamic psychologists believe that humans are

innately bad, and we are driven by selfish desires to feel

immediate gratification, which is not always appropriate

We experience internal struggles about whether to

behave in an appropriate manner

This manifest into personality and behaviour

'Personality is not fixed' emphasises that people can adapt

their internal unique traits/personality, leading to different

behaviour

The environment has a bigger influence on

personality

When someone is in an unhealthy environment,

they develop different drives other than self-

actualisation

When a child is being reared, they initially go through primary

association of learning the likes/desires of their immediate

primary caregivers, and adopt these attitudes/beliefs

Secondary socialisation occurs when children go to school /

media / distant family exposes them to different attitudes and

beliefs

These are the underlying motives behind human behaviour

Deficiency needs

To gather these traits, Maslow conducted case studies of

people (who all happened to be in positions of in social power)

who he believed to have 'self-actualised' and looked at the

common traits

Description = all humans are positive and motivated only by

hierarchical needs and psychopathology stems from

defence mechanists is simplistic

People only focus on the positive side, suggesting

people only act in a positive manner

Explanation = there can be other, unexplained motivators

beyond what Maslow said ,e.g., ignores the fact that

behaviour can be driven by multiple things

Applied value = employees need to feel like they belong,

and need development opportunities to reach their full

potential

Too parsimonious = how personality actually develops from

the process of meeting needs is underdeveloped

Needs to be more concepts within his theory, as it's

too narrow

'Dimensions' refers to scales, along which every person sits at a

different level

For example, introversion at one end and extraversion at

the other end

Factor analysis is a type of statistical analysis which examines

responses to questionnaire items, looks at the relationships between

them, and groups items with similar response scores together into a

'factor'

Traits lead to behaviour, rather than situational cues

Also acknowledging that some traits are unique to specific

individuals, and that not everybody possesses them

Attitudes = expressing interest in people or objects in a specific

situation, can be positive/negative/neutral

Sentiments = complex attitudes that include our own opinions

and beliefs about said object

Ergs = innate motivators that seek to satisfy our drives and

cause us to return to certain stimuli more regularly

Source trait --> umbrella term for a group of similar surface traits, that

still accounts for their variation

Surface trait --> collection of traits that are similar in people, and likely

to be positive

Cattell's study considers both genetics and the environment

His theory being empirically valid allows predictions to be

made, which can be empirically tested

His approach was adopted by others, who carried out

background research to support theory and implemented

factor analysis

The developed measures of personality are still used today, but

have been slightly modified

Dynamic traits address what motivates us as humans

In these future modified models, the number of dimensions to

account for the underlying structure of personality was

significantly reduced

Personality being stable allows us to form general predictions

about how people might behave in the future

The participants, theology students, were people who were

thinking about/already had a role to support their faith and

beliefs

The idea was that someone highly religious would be

thought to be more helpful

Deception is commonly misunderstood as 'always bad', but in

reality, it is only bad when it causes significant harm or distress

to the participant, which in this study did not

The 'victim' slumped in the alleyway was planted as a confederate by

the researchers for this particular study

It was recorded whether the 40 participants helped the confederate,

considering these 3 factors and if it would affect their ability to help the

'victim'

The extent to which they are religious

Time availability

Primed by the religious passage

People who read the good Samaritan passage were more likely to

help, whereas people who had less time received lower scores

The situational aspect in this research example is social support,

which could vary for individuals

Extraversion also predicted friendship adjustment

Openness also predicted general adjustment

Rigidity refers to people being unable to cope with emerging

situations and getting stuck on a solution that they feel

confident with/have practiced before

A perfectionist may hold the belief that it's not solely about

doing well, it's about doing well easily, without being seen to try,

or appearing to need help

Sub-types of perfectionism include clinical perfectionism and

socially prescribed perfectionism (which is linked to negative

outcomes)

Perfectionism is a system of causal descriptions

This is called a 'causal loop diagram', which is a type of 'system

thinking/theory'

In a perfectionist scenario, they do not balance learning, which

entails failure, with performance needs.

Instead, they are trying to perform well rather than learning, so

that they do not need to make errors

*De-based = de-valued

People may link physical appearance to personality, e.g., if they

have lots of muscles, they deemed as 'scary'

There is not necessarily a consensus as to what personality is , as

different approaches to Psychology will focus on different aspects

of these definitions

The trait approach to personality research is quite dominant, so

most people will have heard of the 'Big 5', byt there are a range of

other approaches.

For example, Freud's stages of psychosexual stages focus on

drives, where humanistic psychology focuses on self-

concepts

Instinctoid tendencies are weak and can easily be overcome by

negative environmental factors, whereas if positive intinctoid

tendencies are fostered in childhood, the child will have the

capacity to display traits like honesty, trust, kindness, love and

generosity

Trait theorists try to understand the underlying personal structure of

all people, and what they have in common

What is the number of traits that can sufficiently explain

personality?

The perfectionist wants to be consistent, and can only change their

behaviour to maintain performance, how they evaluate themselves, or

their view of the world

However, the trap is that they cannot change this world view,

because it involves maintaining high standards

There are diminishing returns for effort as we invest more time in an

activity, so we need to identify where is 'good enough'

Personality ✅

Wednesday 25 September 2024

11:22 PM

Preview

Personality Theories and Debate

Overview of Lecture

What is personality?
Aims of personality theorists
Humanistic Personality Theories
Maslow - Self-actualisation and Hierarchy of needs.
Rogers - Self-actualisation and Concept of the self.
Trait approach to Personality
Cattell - 16 factors of personality.
Eysenck - 3 factors of personality.
The Big 5.
Person-situation debate

What is Personality?

. Everyday sense of the word? ("They have no personality")

. From a Psychological perspective?

"A dynamic organisation, inside the pers that create the person's characteristic panality? ? 0 " on, of psychophysical systems tterns of behaviour, thoughts Personality could be an ir which they use to carve th People may link physical have lots of muscles, they Allport can be consideredand feelings" (Allport, : "The enduring configuration of charact comprises an individual's unique adjust traits, interests, drives, values, self-conc patterns" (APA, What is perso "A dynamic organisation, inside the perso that Create the person's characteristic pa and feelings" (Allport, : Personality is a process - that Percal1961, p. 11) eristics and behaviour that ment to life, including major ept, abilities, and emotional n.d.) nality? on, of psychophysical systems tterns ofbehaviour, thoughts 1961, p. 11) Personality refers to both our minds ality is Humanistic psychologist psychological parts, rat cognitive elements Red - Allport suggests tha experiences moulds our came from a trait perspe Green - others think that change, but once you get will become more or less Purple - examples of hum experiences/activities are the attitudes we hold, foradjusts depending on experiences we have and changes in our lives. Personality is relatively stable and characteristic of an individual ICIJVI influe wide exper What is perso "A dynamic organisation, inside the perso that create the person's characteristic pa and feelings" (Allport, : "The enduring configuration of charact comprises an individual's unique adiust traits, Interests, drives, values self-conc patterns" (APA,ntial across a ange of human ences/activities. and our body, which interact to produce behaviour nality? on, of psychophysical systems tterns of behaviour, thoughts 1961, p. 11) eristics and behaviour that ment to life, including major ept bilities, and emotional n.d.) There is not necessarily a different approaches to of these definitions The trait approach to per most people will have he other approaches. - For example, Freud drives, where hum concepts

Aims of Personality Theorists

To increase our understanding of the mo
Understand the quality of human nature - are we innately good or bad?
Describe/categorise how individuals beh ave & measure personality.
Understand what people are like and ho w they became that way.
Understand the range of normal behavioy theorists tivational basis of behaviour. our.

Motivational basis -- > WI What is driving our collec Human nature -- > Are we gain at the expense of ot best person we can be? Describe/categorise -- > V behaviour if we understa measurement varies dep What people are like and bad? How do children de Range of normal behavio individual differences tha - This can change wi sometimes there a Psychologists look

Evaluating Personality Theories

(Maltby et al., 20

Description
Com
E
Bring order to complex behaviours a
Explanation
Help us understand why
Pars
E
Empirical Validity
Generate predictions that can be tested
T
Heu
Testable Concepts
App
Is
Concepts should be able to be operationalised - to allow testing
Idiographic Thity Theories 17) prehensiveness xplain wide variety of normal & bnormal behaviour timony conomical with concepts ristic Value heory stimulates further research lied Value of practical use

Comprehensiveness = we describe personality and Parsimony = doesn't use terms or theories to expl Heuristic value = the rese people to discuss and de motivates people to rese theory instead eorists

Humanistic Assumptions

Humanistic personality theories arose, a s Maslow (and Rogers) did not agree with the dominant psychoana lytic and behaviourist theories.
Human nature is positive.
Emphasis on personal growth.
Emphasis on the uniqueness of human b eings.
Understand individual experience and cons ciousness.

Psychodynamic psycho innately bad, and we a immediate gratification - We experience ir behave in an app - This manifest int. Emphasis on tree will and human respor sibility. . Personality is not fixed - we can change.

Maslow - Self-actualisation

Instinctoid tendencies towards healthy g rowth and development.
Healthy environment = Honesty, trust, kind ness, love and generosity.
Unhealthy environment = Destructive, aggr essive, unloving, self-defeating.
Deficiency motives = Basic needs that w e are driven to fulfil.
Growth motives = Develop an individual 's potential.
Deficiency motives are negative motivat ors and linked to survival.
Growth motives can be positive and enjo yable linked to higher functioning and becoming healthy huma n beings.
Socialisation is an important stage of per sonality development in children.sibility.

'Personality is not fixe their internal unique behaviour - The environme personality Instinctoid tendencies a negative environmental tendencies are fostered capacity to display traits generosity When someone is in an they develop different actualisation - When a child is being association of learni primary caregivers, a - Secondary socialisati media / distant famil beliefs

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Preview

Personality Theories and Debate

Overview of Lecture

What is Personality?

Aims of Personality Theorists

Evaluating Personality Theories

Humanistic Assumptions

Maslow - Self-actualisation

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