1
Q
Define Personality
A
“Individual patterns of thinking, feeling, and behaving that tend to persist across time and contexts”
Lilienfeld et al., 2015
- The mind and how it interacts with the world
- Generally fixed through a lifetime
- Persists - Personality is fairly stable
- Abstract psychological constructs that can’t be measured
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2
Q
Key points of Personality
A
- Distinctive - each person has a unique personality
- Consistent - Fairly stable in relation to our behaviours
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3
Q
Two Methods to Study Personality
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- Nomothetic
- Idiographic
4
Q
Nomothetic Personality
A
- Attempts to understand personality through general laws
- These governed across all individuals
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Q
Idiographic Personality
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Understand Personallity by finding unique blend of characteristics and experiences of single individuals.
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Q
Why Study Personality?
A
Understand individual differences in characteristics
Understand how a persons parts come together holistically
Can we predict what we might expect someone to do in certain situations
7
Q
Psychic Determination
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- All psychological constructs have a cause and this will determine behaviour
- Freud developed models to understand cause of behaviour
* Topographic model
* Structural model
* Developmental model
* Drive Model
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Q
Freud - Psychoanalytic Approach
A
- Infulence is considered historical
- no longer relevant and outdated
- He developed the first theory of personality
9
Q
Psychic Determination - Topographic Model
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- Conscious
- Centre of Awareness
- Rational and Goal Driven
- Preconscious
- Could become conscious at any time
- Tip of the toungue concept
- But is tip of thebrain
- Unconscious
- Bulk of our mental processes
- These thoughts are irrational
- Play important role in governing behaviour
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Q
Freud Ambivalence
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- Conscious and unconscious are often in conflict
- Different motives from different levels of topographic iceberg
- This can cause ambivalence
- When Id, Ego & Superego are in conflict
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Q
Compromise Formations
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- Resolve ambivalence by fulfilment from conflicting motives
- Address and appease both kinds of thoughts
- This can be negative such as in mental illness
- Or positive such as working hard to acheive a goal
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Q
Freudian Slips
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- When you accidently say one thing and mean another
- Error in speech, memory, or physical action
- Thought to be reflective of the unconscious
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Q
Assessing Unconscious Topographic Patterns
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- Life History Methods
- Freud observed many case studies to try to work out why people behaved the way they did.
- Not a really able to back up scientifically
- Try to understand the whole person
- Review in context of life experiences
e.g. case studies
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Q
Drive or Instinct Model
A
- Based on Darwin’s work
- Human Behaviour is motivated by two drives
1. Aggressive Drive
2. Sexual/Libido Drive - Libido is about pleasure seeking and sensuality as well as sex.
- Hedonistic drive
- All psychic energy originates in the unconscious
15
Q
Structural Model
A
- exists on top oof the structural model
- Id, Ego & Superego
- run across unsconscious, preconscious and consciousness
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16
Q
Id
A
- Mostly unconscious
- Pleasure principle
- Assessed by perception test
- Seeks all different kinds of pleasure, not just sexual.
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Q
Ego
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- Primarily in our conscious
- Decision maker
- Bound by reality principle
- Decides what we can and can’t do
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Q
Superego
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- covers breadth of our awareness
- In preconscious and unconscious
- Concerned with our sense of morality
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Q
Defence Mechanisms
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- Ego engages these defences to resolve stress
- attempts to reinforce positive emotion
- attempts to protect from negative or threatening emotion
- Temporary coping mechanisms
20
Q
10 Defence Mechansims
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- Repression
- Denial
- Projection
- Reaction Formation
- Sublimation
- Rationalisation
- Displacement
- Regression
- Identification
- Intellectualisation
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Q
Repression
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- Keeps memories or thoughts apart from conscious awareness
- Blocking out traumatic memories or events
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Q
Denial
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- Refusal to acknowledge external reality
- Existence of disruptive thoughts, memories or feelings
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Q
Projection
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- Attribution of our own feelings and impulses on to others
- We do not acknowledge them in ourselves
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Q
Reaction Formation
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- Turning unacceptable feelings or impules into their opposites
e.g when a parent unconsciouls resents their child and spoils them in response
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Sublimation
Converting sexual or aggressive impulses into more socially acceptable activities
e.g. a person with anger issues takes up boxing
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Rationalisation
* Avoiding uncomfortable feelings by explaining them away
* Unconscious attempt to avoid bad feelings by using reasons or excuses
* Logical reasons given to justify innapropriate behaviour
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Displacement
Directing negative emotions to a substitute target
e.g. when angry with partner, mother lashes out on their child
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Regression
* Returning to an earlier stage of psycho sexual development
e.g. an adult having a temper tantrum, or "I don't want to talk about this any more"
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Identification
Identifying with a threatening person or group to become accepted or boost self esteem
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Intellectualisation
* Focus on abstract or impersonal ideas to avoid anxiety provoking situations
* Allows memories to move through conscious and unconscious analysis
* uses abstract thinking to detach oneself from feelings
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Fairness to Freud
* Tried to base his work on observation
* Tried to find an explanation for what he saw
* However his psychosexual theories don't hold up
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PsychoSexual Theory
* Based on primary drives of aggression and libido
* These drives influence individuals in different ways according to their development
* Appropriate progress through these stages leads to balanced id, ego & superego.
* Imbalance through one stage inhibits progress to the next and causes incongruence, fixation at that stage and regression in the future.
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Psychosexual Stages - Oral
* lasts for the first 12-18 mths
* Conflict - Dependancy
* Key experience - Breast Feeding
* Regression - Over dependence, passive gullible personality
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Psychosexual Stages - Anal
* Approx aged 2-3 years
* Key Experience - Toilet Training
* Conflict - Orderliness, cleanliness, compliance
* Regression - overly neat and pedantic or compulsive personality
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Psychosexual Stages - Phallic
* Approx 4-6 years old
* Focuses on genitalia
* Key experience - Is complicated
* Children identify with their opposite sex parent
* For boys results in Oedipus Complex, For girls is Electra Complex (Jung)
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Oedipus/Electra Complex
* Perception complexes with same sex parent
* Same sex competition to possess the opposite sex parent
* Says this is the stage where freud said girls develop penis envy because everybody wants a penis
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Psychosexual Stages - Latency
* Approx 7-11 years
* the calm after the storm of the phallic stage
* Consolidation of previous stages
* Demonstrated by managing aggresive drive and sublimating sexual drives
* Learn to play well with others - school, sports & Play
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Psychosexual Stages - Genital
* 12+ years
* Sexual Maturity and relationships
* This is the stage that is most criticised by modern psychology
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Neo-Freudians
* Alfred Adler - Inferiority Complex
* Karen Honey - Feminist: Signs of Regression
* Erich Fromm - Crave clost Connection, Questionable decisions, Increasing technology Increases Independence
* Carl Jung - Collective Unconscious
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Neo-Freudian Principles
* Generally share emphasis on Unconscious behaviour
* Identify the importance of early experience
* Determinisim - Early experiences shape how we behave as adults
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Neo-Freudian Principles - Different from Freud
* Place less importance on sexuality as a driving force
* Optimistic about personality development through lifespan
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Alfred Adler
* Adler believed aggression and sex were not primary drives but superiority
* Origin of Inferiority Complex -
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Inferiority Complex
* People who can't acheive superiority behave in ways to try and accomodate
* Unrealistic sense of inadequacy
* Sometimes marked by aggresive behaviour in compensation
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Carl Jung
* Early protege of Freud
* Developed Theory of Collective Unconsciousness
* Strongly disagreed with Freud's thinking
* Beleived in share inaccessible ancestral memory
* Explains Similarites of beleifs across cultures
* We have unconscious understanding of the world that gets passed on
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Karen Horney
* Reviserd psychoanalytic theory highlighting Inheritied differences of men and women
* Traced differences to society & culture not biology
* Said idea of genetic differences was a sign of represion of women
* Became critical of Freud and his thoeories
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Eric Frohm
* We crave close connections
* Increasing technology increases independence
* Can lead to questionable decisions
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Neo-Freudian Ideas
* Objects Relations Theory
* Relational Psychoanalysis
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Object Relations Theory
* Modern refinement of psychoanalytic thoery
* Focused on childhood experiences framing adult personality
* Positive or negative experiences become objects - or objectified
* Stored in unconscious and predict adult behaviour and social interactions
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Object Relations Theory
* Modern refinement of psychoanalytic theory
* Focused on childhood experiences framing adult personality
* Positive or negative experiences become objects - or objectified
* Stored in unconscious and predict adult behaviour and social interactions
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Relational Psychoanalysis
* Focuses on the relationship between the Therapist and the Client
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Life History Methods
* Unconscious mind is a motivator that drives our behaviour
* Focus on drawing out the unconscious patterns
* Aim to understand the wholeperson through their experience
* Identify consistent pattersn in drivers
* Uses case studies
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Projective Tests
* Assumes persons presented with vague stimulus will project their own desires into the stimulus
- Rorschach Inkblot Test
- Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)
* Reliability and Validity have been found to be low for Projective Tests
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Psychoanalytic Theory Limitations
* Unfalsifiable - Not Testable
* Sexism - Penis Envy, study focuses on males
* Questionable concept of unsconcscious - Can we measure what we don't know?
* Unrepresentative samples and unreliable data
* Limited External Validity
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Psychoanalytic Theory Contributions
* Supports the impact of unconscious on behaviour
* Childhood Experiences
* Human thought and action has meaning
* Inspired a drive for testable reasonable thoeries of personalitay
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Behaviorist Approach to Personality
* Personality is a bundle of habits
* Controlled by genes and contingencies
* Deterministic - Experiences can predict behaviour
* is cause and effect related and we can't deviate from that
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Internal Vs External Forces Motivate Behaviour
* Recognises External Forces as well as Internal Forces affect behaviour
* External forces can be rewards & punishments
* Intrnal Forces can be instinct or unsconscious
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Albert Bandura
* Reciprocal Determinism
* Social Environment and Cognitivist ways of learning
* Classical and Operant condtioning are socially and cognitively mediated
* We become who we are by watching and seeing what behaviour gets rewarded or punished
* Constant interaction between behaviours, environment and reactions
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Vicarious Learning
* We learn by watching as well as by doing
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Locus of Control
* Introduced by Julian Rotter 1966
* How much do individuals beleive that outcomes are within their control
* Reinforcers can lie inside or outside of our control
* Not two separate personality types
* On a continuum and people vary on that continuum throughout life
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External Locus of Control
* Life outcomes are not under presonal control
* Luck, chance and powerful others control outcomes
* Negative and positive outcomes are out of their control so it makes learning from experience more difficult
* Usually associated with distress
e.g. Many people have miserable lives because of their parents
You can be successful just by being at the right place at the right time
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Internal Locus of Control
* Life outcomes are under personal control
* Positively correlate with self esteem
* Use more problem focussed coping skills
* Negative outcomes seem like punishments and positive ones seem like rewards
e.g. If you set realistic goals you can succeed no matter what
If I study hard enough, I can pass any exam
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Self Efficacy
* A belief that we are able to acheive things
* related to Locus of Control and often considered the same thing
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Cognitive Social Model of Behaviour
Analogy that there is a black box in mind
* Attempt to understand how black box process input (stimulus) & output (response)
* George Kelly 1955
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Process for Cogntitive Social Model
1. Encoding - Catergorising Personal Constructs that are significant; Schemas
2. Personal Value - Relevance of the event for goals; what will happen if we put effort or reduce effortwith construct
3. Self-Efficacy - do we beleive we cna affect outcomes
4. Competencies - do we have the skills required to execute this outcome
5. Behaviour Outcome Expectancy - Expectancy that the behaviour will produce the desired result
6. Behavioural Plan - Construct a plan of action if we beleive we can succeed
7. Behaviour - Execute the Plan
8. Self Regulation - Evaluate our performance and adjust behaviour and set new goals
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Information Processing Theory
* Cognitive development studies that aims to explain how information is encoded into memory
* Humans process the information they receive, rather than merely responding to stimuli
* Cantor and Kihlstrom 1988
* Personal Constructs is key to who we are
* How we perceive ourselves, experiences and constructs is our personality
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Social Cognitive Learning Limitations
* Discount emotional experiences
* Assume conscious awarense of motivating factors
* People act when they know what they think, feel and want
* Rationalise behaviour at the expense of emotion
* Does not allow for experiences that are context dependant
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Social Cognitive Learning Contributions
* Focus on the role of Thought and Memory in personality
* Is testable - Measure factors in applied settings
* Brought new understanding of behaviour and personality - not just output
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Cognitve Agency
* The ability to use experience in our behaviour
* Not just unconscious reactions
* Not just reactive responses
* Factors have a sya in how we behave
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Humanistic Approach to Personality
* Alternative to psychoanalysis and behavioursim
* Focus on aspects of life that are distinctly humean
- Find Meaning in Life
- Being "True" to the Self
* Embrace Free Will in contrast to determinism
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Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs
1. Physiological
2. Safety
3. Love/Belonging
4. Esteem
5. Self Actualisation
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Maslow Self Actualisation
* Maslow started with people who he thought achieved acutalisation
- Albert Einstein, Eleanor Roosevelt, Mother Theresa
* Said these people were creative, spontaneous and acceptinig of self and others
* Can also be difficult to work with due to aloof and driven nature
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Peak Experiences
* Actualised people were prone to experiences that displayed their full potential
* Euphoric moments of clarity
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Carl Rogers - Person Centred Approach
* Rejected Determinism and embraced Free will
* Self Actualisation is a core human motive
* Devised a person centred approach to therapy
* Crucial tool for Therapy is Empathy and ability to undertand anothers experience.
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Person Centred Approach - 3 Main Components of Personality
* Organism
* Self
* Conditions of Worth
Then
* Incongruence
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Person Centred Approach - The Organism
* Innate genetic blueprint of each individual
* We then surround ourselves with factors
