Personality

Question 1

What are state differences?

Answer 1

temporary differences in people’s psychology

Question 2

What are trait differences?

Answer 2

semi-permanent differences between people’s psychology

Question 3

Define personality?

Answer 3

a person’s characteristics and enduring style of behaving, thinking and feeling (i.e. traits, not states)

Question 4

What are the problems with self-report?

Answer 4

desirability biases

Question 5

What is the issue with observation?

Answer 5

observer bias
demand characteristics

Question 6

What are the origins personality?

Answer 6

1. Heredity and Evolution: personality is a genetic trait varies adaptation to changing environments.
2. Psychodynamic Theory: personality comes from unconscious experiences we have in our childhood and youth.
3. Social-Cognitive Approach: personality comes about from reward and punishment in social situations
4. Humanistic/Existential Approach: personality comes about as we try to maximize our well-being and autonomy

Question 7

What is the forer effect?

Answer 7

people assume general descriptions to be highly specific to them and their personality

Question 8

How can we make valid personality tests?

Answer 8

• indirect self-report: ask without signalling that you’re assessing a personality trait
• catch items: questions that catch people lying or wanting to appear more socially desirable
• converge multiple methods: compare self-report to reports by others

Question 9

What is five factor theory?

Answer 9

openness, extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism

Question 10

What is openness to experience?

Answer 10

curiosity for experiencing new and varied things.
Related to intellect and imagination/creativity
People in high openness are often described as creative, dreamers, idealists with a need to learn
People low in openness prefer concrete facts rather than ideals; they are traditional, down-to-earth, practical and prefer routines

Question 11

What is cosncientiousness?

Answer 11

degree of thoughtfulness, organization, and responsibility. Related to orderliness and industriousness
People high in conscientiousness typically do very well in school and are described as self-disciplined, exacting, focused and responsible.
People low in conscientiousness are more laid-back, and less goal and success oriented

Question 12

What is extraversion?

Answer 12

• for social activities, including feeling energized from interacting with others. Related to enthusiasm for and assertiveness in social situations
• People high in extraversion “recharge” by hanging out with others; they are described as very social and fun-loving.
• People low in extraversion (introverts) are not low in social skills, but instead “recharge” by being by themselves.

Question 13

What is agreeablesness?

Answer 13

• degree of kindness and need for social harmony as opposed to conflict. Related to one’s compassion, empathy, and politeness.
• People high in agreeableness: considerate, kind, empathetic, and willing to compromise for others.
• People low in agreeableness : skeptical and distrustful of other people and their motives and are not compromising in social situations.

Question 14

What is neuroticism?

Answer 14

• tendency to have negative, pessimistic, or unstable emotions. Related to emotional volatility and social withdrawal.
• People high in neuroticism experience a lot of anxiety and stress, and are usually very self-conscious and shy.
• People low in neuroticism: emotionally stable and not as affected by stressful situations.

Question 15

Under what 2 pressures does adaptation emerge?

Answer 15

• natural selection: selection of traits that support adaptive survival and procreation
• sexual selection: selection of traits that promote adaptive reproduction by advertising a mate as eligible and unique

Question 16

Define evolutionary psychology

Answer 16

studying psychology by treating human nature as universal adaptations shaped by principles of evolution

Question 17

What are critiques of evolutionary psychology?

Answer 17

• Just so stories: an unfalsifiable narrative explanation of psychology
• Past environment is unknown and not static
• Universal behaviours can emerge without evolutionary pressure

Question 18

What is heritability?

Answer 18

high correlations in personality traits for identical vs. fraternal twinsW

Question 19

What was the Silver fox experiment?

Answer 19

manipulates genes and environment
- wild foxes were domesticated within eight generations by only allowing those with a calm personality to have cubs
- tame foxes were embryonically implanted into wombs of aggressive mothers. And yet, when born and raised, they remained calm (and vice-versa).

Question 20

What is locus of control?

Answer 20

• tendency to perceive outcomes of a situation as Internal (controlled by yourself) or External (not controlled by you)
• high internal locus of control tend to be more organized, friendly, healthy, and social
• high external locus of control leads to anxiety

Question 21

What does WEIRD mean for psychology participants?

Answer 21

Western
Educated
Industrialized
Rich
Democratic

Question 22

What are the 2 differences not accounted for by big-five model?

Answer 22

• Individualistic cultures: in which the uniqueness of each individual person is strongly esteemed
• collectivist cultures: in which social harmony outweighs the importance of each individual person

Question 23

What is Freud’s psychodynamic theory?

Answer 23

Mind made up of 3 systems that work separately:
- ID
- superego
- ego

Question 24

What is the superego?

Answer 24

unconscious system that develops through punishment and cultural experience and tells us what we cannot do, operating primarily through guilt and shame

Question 25

What is the ID?

Answer 25

unconscious system present at birth that is the source of our bodily needs, desires, and impulses (especially aggression and sex)

Question 26

What is the ego?

Answer 26

only one that we have any conscious access to in contact with the real world and tries to find a balance between the id’s wants and the superego’s rules

Question 27

What are Freud's psychosexual phases?

Answer 27

oral, anal, phallic, latency, genital

Question 28

What are psychosexual phases?

Answer 28

- in each stage the child experiences pleasure for specific body areas and caregivers either provide or interfere with those pleasures. - Every person goes though all the stages in the same order - Stage successfully completed if child gets the kind of pleasure demanded by that stage - delayed or incomplete stage= fixation > slowing down of development and obsession with getting pleasure through that body area

Question 29

What is the oral stage?

Answer 29

- focuses on pleasure of the mouth (sucking, chewing) - At the start of stage only the id exists - Ego will emerge before completion of stage - Insufficient oral pleasure= oral fixation > too much eating, thumb sucking, constant need for affection

Question 30

What is the anal stage?

Answer 30

- focuses on pleasure of the anus (toilet train) - Superego continues to not exists even by the end of stage - insufficient anal pleasure= anal fixation > overly rigid and controlling personality, obsessed with material possessions

Question 31

What is the phallic stage?

Answer 31

- focuses on pleasure of genitals/phallic region - Superego develops by end of this stage - boy discovers he has penis and wants pleasure from it - in typical nuclear family, the only available person for this source of pleasure is the mother. But – the father stands in the way

Question 32

What is the oedipus complex during the phallic stage?

Answer 32

developmental experience stage in which the (male) child experiences love towards their mother and fear of their father

Question 33

What is the electra complex during the phallic phase?

Answer 33

- the id deeply desires a penis (“penis envy”) > girls become strongly attracted to their father and very angry at their mother, who they see as weak for lacking a penis. - for their father to love them, girls act more and more like their mothers, developing the superego and entering the latency stage. - Later, generalize their desire from their father onto other men.

Question 34

What is the latency phase?

Answer 34

child’s repressed conflicts lead to seeking friendship in non-erotic activities developing intellectual, creative, and interpersonal skills.

Question 35

What is the genital phase?

Answer 35

- adult, mature personality emerges; people become capable - even after genital stage, id and superego are inflexible, uncompromising, demanding and loud - Id has desires that are inappropriate - Superego has overly strict rules that fill you with shame

Question 36

What are defense mechanisms?

Answer 36

unconscious tactics the ego uses to cope and reduce anxiety

Question 37

What is repression?

Answer 37

removing painful experiences and unacceptable impulses from the conscious mind

Question 38

What is rationalisation?

Answer 38

supplying reasonable sounding explanations for unacceptable feelings and behaviours to conceal one's underlying motives or feelings

Question 39

What is reaction formation?

Answer 39

Unconsciously replacing threatening inner wishes and fantasies with an exaggerated version of their opposite

Question 40

What is projection?

Answer 40

attributing one's own threatening feelings, motives or impulses to another person/group

Question 41

What is regression?

Answer 41

reverting to an immature behaviour/earlier stage of development, a time when things felt more secure to deal with internal conflict and perceived threat

Question 42

What is displacement?

Answer 42

shifting unacceptable wishes or drives to a neutral or less threatening alternative

Question 43

What is identification?

Answer 43

dealing with feelings of threat and anxiety by unconsciously taking on the characteristics of another person who seems more powerful or better able to cope

Question 44

What is sublimation?

Answer 44

channelling unacceptable sexual or aggressive drives into socially acceptable and culturally enhancing activities

Question 45

What does your personality emerge from according to Freud?

Answer 45

- The perpetual unconscious conflict between your id, ego, and superego. - any unresolved fixations - From defense mechanisms that emerge when your ego is trying to prevent shame or impulses from reaching your consciousness.

Question 46

What are criticisms of Freud's Psychodynamic theory?

Answer 46

- No ID, ego and superego - No psychosexual stages - Cross-culturally poor effects - Non-falsifiable

Question 47

What are critiques of self-report tests?

Answer 47

- Tendency to respond in socially desirable way (underreport unflattering things) - Many things we don’t know about ourselves and thus unable to report

Question 48

what are projective tests?

Answer 48

- reveal inner aspects of individuals' personalities by analysis of their responses to a standard series of ambiguous stimuli - Designed to combat limitations of self-report - Developers assume that people will project personality factors that are below awareness (wishes, concerns, impulses, worldviews) onto ambiguous stimuli and won't censor these responses

Question 49

What is a Rorschach Inkblot test?

Answer 49

projective technique in which respondents' inner thoughts and feelings are believed to be revealed by analysis of their responses to a set of unstructured inkblots

Question 50

What is a thematic apperception test?

Answer 50

projective technique in which respondents' underlying motives, concerns, and the way they see the social world are believed to be revealed through analysis of the stories they make up about ambiguous pictures of people

Question 51

What are limitations of Projective techniques?

Answer 51

- open to biases of examiner - not been found reliable or valid in predicting behaviour when measured by rigorous scientific criteria