focuses on one particular trait and its consequences for behaviour (ex. narcissism). asks “what do people with a certain personality trait do?”
- The Single-Trait Approach
Looks at the relationships between a particular behavior and as many different traits as possible. Examines correlations between one behaviour and many traits. asks, “who does that important behaviour?”
- The Many-Trait Approach
attempts to identify the few traits that are central to understanding all others. This includes the big five: extraversion, neuroticism, conscientiousness, agreeableness, and openness. These are broad traits that can organize the understanding of personality. Asks, “which traits are the most important and really matter?”
- The Essential-Trait Approach
shows how people differ in kind, not just disagreeing. Three basic personalities: well-adjusted, maladjusted, overcontrolled, and maladjusted undercontrolling. Common: MBTI and Enneagram. Asks, “Are people in different types different in ways that conventional trait measures cannot capture?”
- Typological Approaches to Personality
traits are not…
…total determinants of behaviour
Self-monitoring (single-trait approach)
It’s not necessarily better to be high or low.
Actors scored high, and mental patients scored low
High-Self Monitoring: can adapt well, read the room, go with the flow
Low-Self Monitoring: more consistent, more guided by inner personality, easier to judge, perfectionist, irritable
- Charming, make good first
impression - Manipulative, overbearing,
entitled, vain, arrogant, exhibitionistic - May not feel good about themselves
- Many negative behaviors and attributes
- aggressive when positive self-view is threatened
- they’re defending unrealistic self-concept
- failure to control decisions and make impulsive decisions, have a hard time with delayed gratification
Narcissism (excessive self-love)
uncooperative and inflexible, likely to obey commands to harm others, fewer positive emotions, crave strong leaders; attitudes may be from attempts to lessen fear; likely to have had parents high on authoritarianism
Authoritarian Personality
The Big Five
- Extraversion
- Neuroticism
- Conscientiousness
- Agreeableness
- Openess
important aspects of life will be labeled with words
lexical hypothesis
Implications of the Big Five
- Traits are orthogonal, or unrelated - they’re all independent of one another
- they are more complex than they seem at first
Implications of the Big Five
- Traits are orthogonal, or unrelated - they’re all independent of one another
- they are more complex than they seem at first
- Crave extreme levels of stimulation and react less to sensory stimuli
- Active, outspoken, dominant, forceful, adventurous, spunky
- Cheerful, upbeat, optimistic
- Ambitious, hard-working, achievement-oriented
- Powerful influence on behavior
- Sensitive to rewards
- Experience positive emotions more
disadvantage: mate poaching, argumentative, need to be in control, poor time management, at risk for becoming overweight
Extraversion
- Ineffective problem solving; strong negative reactions
to stress - Sensitive to social threats
- Emotional instability, negative emotionality
- self-reports: unhappiness, anxiety, and physical illness
- associated with undesirable life outcomes
- strong negative reactions to stress
Neuroticism (negative emotions)
Dutiful, careful, rule-abiding, ambitious
Valuable employees
Careful and considerate drivers
Avoid risk and seek to protect themselves
Live Longer
downsides: more prone to feel guilty when not meeting expectations , satisfaction with life decreases with unemployment, may not be popular or creative
Conscientiousness
- Conformity, friendly compliance, likeability, warmth, love
- Compassion, morality, trust, affability, modesty
- Cooperative and easy to get along with
- Rate others more positively, say nice things more than mean things
- Smoke less
- Women tend to be more agreeable than men
Life outcomes: involved in religious activities, good sense of humor, psychologically well adjusted, healthy heart, recover quickly from accidents or illness, more peer acceptance and dating satisfaction, large number of social interests, unlikely to engage in criminal behavior
Agreeableness
- most controversial trait
- Viewed by others as creative,imaginative, open-
minded, and clever - Politically liberal
- More likely to use drugs and play a musical
instrument - Appreciate nature, active in environmental causes
- creativity and perceptiveness
- imaginative, intelligent,original, curious,artistic, inventive, and witty; and as not simple or shallow
Openness/Intellect/Culture
- Not useful for selection or predicting life outcomes
- Based on normally distributed scores
- Measurement is not reliable
- No evidence that different types follow, persist in, or succeed in different lines of work
criticisms for typological approaches (MBTI, enneagram)
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Ch 222
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Ch 312
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Ch.514
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Ch.618
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Ch. 723
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Ch.835
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Ch 9.11
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Ch 10. Basics of Psychoanalysis29
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Ch 11. Psychoanalysis After Freud14
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Ch 12. Humanistic Psychology16
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Ch 13. Cultural Psychology12
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Ch 14. Personality Processes31
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Ch 15. The Self20
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Ch 17 Mental and Physical16
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Ch 16 Relationships & Business10
