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Chapter 13

Personality

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Classic Perspectives on Personality

Contemporary Perspectives on Personality

Chapter Overview

13-1: WHAT THEORIES INFORM OUR UNDERSTANDING OF PERSONALITY?

Personality: An individual’s characteristic pattern of thinking, feeling, and acting

Two historically significant personality theories:

Freud’s psychoanalytic theory: Childhood sexuality and unconscious motivations influence personality

Psychodynamic theorists inspired by Freud

Humanistic theories: Focus on inner capacities for growth and self-fulfillment

These two broad perspectives provided inspiration for later theorists:

Trait theorists

Social-cognitive theorists

Classic Perspectives on Personality What Is Personality?

Explore interaction between traits and social context

Social-cognitive theories

Examine characteristic patterns of behavior (traits)

Trait theories

Focus on our inner capacities for growth and self-fulfillment

Humanistic approach

Focus on the dynamic interaction between conscious and unconscious mind, including associated motives and conflicts

Psychodynamic theories

Classic Perspectives on Personality What Is Personality?

Classic Perspectives on Personality The Psychodynamic Theories

Psychodynamic theories: Human behavior is a dynamic interaction between unconscious and conscious minds, and associated motives and conflicts.

The theories are descended from Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalysis, which is both:

Freud’s theory of personality that attributes thoughts and actions to unconscious motives and conflicts.

The techniques used in treating psychological disorders by seeking to expose and interpret unconscious tensions.

13-2: HOW DID SIGMUND FREUD’S TREATMENT OF PSYCHOLOGICAL DISORDERS LEAD TO HIS VIEW OF THE UNCONSCIOUS MIND?

Observed patients whose disorders had no clear physical explanations

Concluded their problems reflected unacceptable thoughts and feelings, hidden away in the unconscious mind

Sigmund Freud (1856–1939)

The Psychodynamic Theories Freud’s Psychoanalytic Perspective: Exploring the Unconscious

Unconscious: According to Freud, a reservoir of mostly unacceptable thoughts, wishes, feelings, and memories; According to contemporary psychologists, information processing of which we are unaware.

Free association: In psychoanalysis, a method of exploring the unconscious in which the person relaxes and says whatever comes to mind, no matter how trivial or embarrassing.

The Psychodynamic Theories Freud’s Psychoanalytic Perspective: Exploring the Unconscious

Personality Structure

13-3: WHAT WAS FREUD’S VIEW OF PERSONALITY?

Freud believed that personality results from the mind’s three systems.

Id: Reservoir of unconscious psychic energy that strives to satisfy basic sexual and aggressive drives; operates on pleasure principle, demanding immediate gratification.

Ego: The largely unconscious “executive” part of personality that operates on the reality principle; seeks to realistically gratify the id’s impulses to bring long-term pleasure; contains our partly conscious perceptions, thoughts, judgments and memories.

Superego: Focuses on ideal behavior; strives for perfections; acts as moral conscious by representing internalized ideals and standards for judgement and for future aspirations.

The Psychodynamic Theories Freud’s Psychoanalytic Perspective: Exploring the Unconscious

Id (pleasure-seeking impulses)

Ego (reality-oriented executive)

Superego (internalized set of ideals, or conscience)

Psychologists have used an iceberg image to illustrate Freud’s idea that the mind is mostly hidden beneath the conscious surface.

Note that the id is totally unconscious, but ego and superego operate both consciously and unconsciously.

Unlike the parts of a frozen iceberg, however, the id, ego, and superego interact.

FREUD’S IDEA OF THE MIND’S STRUCTURE

Figure 13.1

Personality Development 13-4: WHAT DEVELOPMENTAL STAGES DID FREUD PROPOSE?

The Psychodynamic Theories Freud’s Psychoanalytic Perspective: Exploring the Unconscious

Table 13.1 Freud believed children pass through five psychosexual stages (oral, anal, phallic, latency, and genital). Unresolved conflicts at any stage can leave a person’s pleasure-seeking impulses fixated (stalled) at that stage.

The Psychodynamic Theories Freud’s Psychoanalytic Perspective: Exploring the Unconscious

Personality Development

Freud was convinced that personality forms during life’s first few years. He concluded that children pass through a series of psychosexual stages, during which the id’s pleasure-seeking energies focus on distinct pleasure-sensitive areas of the body called erogenous zones.

Oedipus complex: Refers to Greek legend of Oedipus, who unknowingly killed his father and married his mother.

Some psychoanalysts in Freud’s era believed girls experienced a parallel Electra complex.

Children eventually cope with the threatening feelings and decide instead to identify with the same-sex parent.

Strong conflict at any stage may lock, or fixate, the person’s pleasure-seeking energies at that psychosexual stage.

Defense Mechanisms

13-5: HOW DID FREUD THINK PEOPLE DEFENDED THEMSELVES AGAINST ANXIETY?

Freud believed that the ego protects itself with tactics that reduce and redirect anxiety by distorting reality with defense mechanisms.

Defense mechanisms are the ego’s protective methods of reducing anxiety by indirectly and unconsciously distorting reality.

Repression underlies all other defense mechanisms, according to Freud. It is sometimes incomplete and may be manifested as symbols in dreams or slips of the tongue.

The Psychodynamic Theories Freud’s Psychoanalytic Perspective: Exploring the Unconscious

For Freud, anxiety was the product of tensions between the demands of the id and superego. The ego copes by using unconscious defense mechanisms, such as repression, which he viewed as the basic mechanism underlying and enabling all the others.

Faced with a mild stressor, children and young orangutans seek from their caregivers.

Freud might have interpreted these behaviors as regression, a retreat to an earlier developmental stage.

REGRESSION

Freud believed that repression, the basic mechanism that banishes anxiety-arousing impulses, enables other defense mechanisms, six of which are listed above.

SIX WELL-KNOWN DEFENSE MECHANISMS

Table 13.2

13-6: WHICH OF FREUD’S IDEAS DID HIS FOLLOWERS ACCEPT OR REJECT?

The neo-Freudians accepted many of Freud’s ideas and techniques but placed more emphasis on conscious mind and on social motives

Alfred Adler believed that much of our behavior is driven by efforts to conquer childhood inferiority feelings that trigger our strivings for superiority and power.

Karen Horney said childhood anxiety triggers our desire for love and security, and also countered Freud’s assumptions, that women have weak superegos and suffer “penis envy,” attempting to balance his masculine bias.

Carl Jung believed we have a collective unconscious, a common reservoir of images, or archetypes, derived from our species’ universal experiences.

The Psychodynamic Theories The Neo-Freudian and Later Psychodynamic Theorists

Carl Jung “From the living fountain of instinct flows everything that is creative; hence the unconscious is the very source of the creative impulse” (The Structure and Dynamics of the Psyche, 1960).

Karen Horney “The view that women are infantile and emotional creatures, and as such, incapable of responsibility and independence is the work of the masculine tendency to lower women’s self- respect” (Feminine Psychology, 1932).

Alfred Adler “The individual feels at home in life and feels his existence to be worthwhile just so far as he is useful to others and is overcoming feelings of inferiority” (Problems of Neurosis, 1964).

Three Neo-Freudian Psychodynamic Theorists

Adler and Horney

Agreed with Freud about childhood importance

Believed childhood social, not sexual tensions crucial for personality formation

Adler

Proposed inferiority complex

Horney

Theorized childhood anxiety triggers desire for love and security

Countered assumption that women have weak superegos and suffer penis envy

Jung

Placed less emphasis on social factors and agreed with idea of influence of unconscious

Proposed collective unconscious (archetypes) derived from species’ universal experiences

Contemporary psychodynamic theorists and therapists:

Do not share Freud’s strong focus on sex as the basis of personality

Along with psychologists generally, view mental life as primarily unconscious

Agree with Freud that we often struggle with inner conflicts among our wishes, fears, and values

Contend that childhood social experiences influence adult personality and attachment patterns

The Psychodynamic Theories The Neo-Freudian and Later Psychodynamic Theorists

The Psychodynamic Theories Assessing Unconscious Processes

13-7: WHAT ARE PROJECTIVE TESTS, HOW ARE THEY USED, AND WHAT ARE SOME CRITICISMS OF THEM?

Projective test

Personality test that provides ambiguous stimuli designed to trigger projection of one’s inner dynamics

Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)

Projective test in which people express their inner feelings and interests through the stories they make up about ambiguous scenes

Some who use this test are confident that the interpretation of ambiguous stimuli will reveal unconscious aspects of the test-taker’s personality.

Most widely used projective test, a set of 10 inkblots, designed by Hermann Rorschach

Seeks to identify people’s inner feelings by analyzing their interpretations of the blots

The Rorschach Test

Figure 13.2

Modern Research Contradicts Many of Freud’s Ideas

Development is lifelong, not fixed in childhood

Parental influence overestimated and peer influence underestimated; the Oedipus complex questioned

Gender identity develops earlier than Freud theorized and is possible without influence of same-sex parent in home

Belief that dreams disguise and fulfill wishes is disputed, as is idea that suppressed sexuality causes psychological disorders

Freud’s questioning technique may have created false memories of abuse

Scientific shortcomings, and after-the-fact explanations of characteristics fail to predict behaviors and traits

13-8: HOW DO CONTEMPORARY PSYCHOLOGISTS VIEW FREUD’S PSYCHOANALYSIS?

The Psychodynamic Theories Evaluating Freud’s Psychoanalytic Perspective and Modern Views of the Unconscious

Freud is credited with drawing attention to:

The vast unconscious

The irrational

The importance of human sexuality

The tension between our biological impulses and social restraints

Freud’s supporters note that some of his ideas are enduring. Freud challenged our self-righteousness, exposed our self-protective defenses, and reminded us of our potential for evil.

The Psychodynamic Theories Evaluating Freud’s Psychoanalytic Perspective and Modern Views of the Unconscious

Modern Research Challenges the Idea of Repression

Today’s researchers agree that we sometimes spare our egos by neglecting threatening information. But repression, if it occurs, is a rare mental response to terrible trauma.

Some researchers do believe that extreme, prolonged stress, such as the stress some severely abused children experience, might disrupt memory by damaging the hippocampus, which is important for processing conscious memories (Schacter, 1996). But the far more common reality is that high stress and associated stress hormones enhance memory.

The Psychodynamic Theories Evaluating Freud’s Psychoanalytic Perspective and Modern Views of the Unconscious

The Modern Unconscious Mind

13-9: HOW HAS MODERN RESEARCH DEVELOPED OUR UNDERSTANDING OF THE UNCONSCIOUS?

Many research psychologists now think of the unconscious as information processing that occurs without awareness

Unconsciousness involves

Schemas, priming, right-hemisphere activity, implicit memories, emotions, and stereotypes

Research supports two of Freud’s defense mechanisms: reaction formation and projection

The Psychodynamic Theories Evaluating Freud’s Psychoanalytic Perspective and Modern Views of the Unconscious

Research confirms that we do not have full access to all that goes on in our mind, but the current view of the unconscious is that it is a separate and parallel track of information processing that occurs outside our awareness.

13-10: HOW DID HUMANISTIC PSYCHOLOGISTS VIEW PERSONALITY, AND WHAT WAS THEIR GOAL IN STUDYING PERSONALITY?

By the 1960s, there was discontent with the sometimes bleak focus on drives and conflicts in psychodynamic theory and the mechanistic psychology of B. F. Skinner’s behaviorism. Two pioneers offered a third-force perspective:

Abraham Maslow (1908–1970)

Carl Rogers (1902–1987)

Humanistic personality psychologists view personality with a focus on the potential for healthy personal growth.

They pay attention to the way people strive for self-determination and self-realization and study people through their own self-reported experiences and feelings.

Classic Perspectives on Personality Humanistic Theories

Abraham Maslow proposed that people are motivated by hierarchy of needs and, after other needs are met, strive toward self-actualization and later self-transcendence.

Self-actualization: According to Maslow, one of the ultimate psychological needs that arises after basic physical and psychological needs are met and self-esteem is achieved; the motivation to fulfill one’s full potential.

Maslow developed his ideas by studying healthy, creative people rather than troubled ones.

Humanistic Theories Abraham Maslow’s Self-Actualizing Person

Carl Rogers agreed with much of Maslow’s thinking and developed a person-centered perspective.

Posited that growth-promoting environment required three conditions:

Genuineness

Acceptance

Empathy

Unconditional positive regard and self-concept are key components of theory.

Unconditional positive regard: According to Rogers, an attitude of total acceptance toward another person.

Self-concept: All our thought and feelings about ourselves, in answer to the question, “Who am I?”

Humanistic Theories Carl Roger’s Person-Centered Perspective

13-11: HOW DID HUMANISTIC PSYCHOLOGISTS ASSESS A PERSON’S SENSE OF SELF?

Humanistic psychologists sometimes assessed personality using questionnaires to evaluate their self-concept.

One questionnaire inspired by Rogers had people describe their ideal and actual selves, which could later be used to judge progress during therapy.

Some humanistic psychologists rejected any standardized assessments and relied on interviews and intimate conversations to understand each person’s unique experience.

Some modern personality researchers believe our identity may be helpfully revealed using the life story approach.

Humanistic Theories Assessing the Self

13-12: HOW HAVE HUMANISTIC THEORIES INFLUENCED PSYCHOLOGY? WHAT CRITICISMS HAVE THEY FACED?

Influences

Pervasive impact, with influence on counseling, education, child-raising, and management

Laid the groundwork for positive psychology

Influenced much of today’s popular psychology

Renewed interest in concept of self

Criticisms

Presents vague and subjective concepts

Advances individualism and self-centered values

Offers naively optimistic assumptions

Humanistic Theories Evaluating Humanistic Theories

13-13: HOW DO PSYCHOLOGISTS USE TRAIT THEORIES TO DESCRIBE PERSONALITY?

Trait theorists see personality as a stable and enduring pattern of behavior

They describe differences rather than trying to explain them

Describe personality in terms of fundamental traits, characteristic patterns of behavior or ways of feeling and acting, as assessed by self-report inventories and peer reports.

Contemporary Perspectives on Personality Trait Theories

Classifying people as one or another distinct personality type fails to capture their full individuality since we are each a unique combination of multiple traits; better to place personality on several trait dimensions.

Factor Analysis

Use factor analysis to identify clusters of behavior tendencies that occur together.

Statistical procedure used to identify clusters of test items to tap basic components of a trait, such as extraversion.

Eysenck Personality Questionnaire developed by Hans Eysenck and Sybil Eysenck to reduce many of our normal individual variations:

Analyzed results revealed extraversion and emotionality as basic personality dimensions.

The Eysencks believed, and research confirms, that these basic factors are genetically influenced.

Trait Theories Exploring Traits

Two Personality Dimensions

Figure 13.3 Mapmakers can tell us a lot by using two axes (north–south and east–west). Two

primary personality factors (extraversion–introversion and stability–instability) are similarly useful as axes for describing personality variation. Varying combinations define other, more specific traits (from Eysenck & Eysenck, 1963).

Biology and Personality

Genetic predispositions influence many traits.

Brain-activity scans of extraverts indicate they seek stimulation because normal brain arousal is relatively low.

Dopamine and dopamine-related neural activity tend to be higher in extraverts.

Twin and adoption studies show genetic influence on temperament and behavioral styles.

Quiet people may be influenced by a reactive autonomic nervous system, making them respond to stress with greater anxiety and inhibition.

Trait Theories Exploring Traits

13-14: WHAT ARE SOME COMMON MISUNDERSTANDINGS ABOUT INTROVERSION? DOES EXTRAVERSION LEAD TO GREATER SUCCESS THN INTROVERSION?

Introversion is often misunderstood as shyness, but introverted people often simply seek low levels of stimulation from their environment.

Many studies have surprisingly shown no correlation between extraversion and sales

Many introverts prosper

Introversion in not a sign of weakness

Trait Theories Exploring Traits The Stigma of Introversion

13-15: WHAT ARE PERSONALITY INVENTORIES, AND WHAT ARE THEIR STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES AS TRAIT-ASSESSMENT TOOLS?

Personality inventory: Questionnaire on which people respond to items designed to gauge a wide range of feelings and behaviors; used to assess selected personality traits.

Test items on some but not all personality inventories are empirically derived, and tests objectively scored.

Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) is the most widely researched and clinically used of all personality tests. Originally developed to identify emotional disorders (still considered its most appropriate use), this test is now used for many other screening purposes. Translated into 100+ languages.

Trait Theories Assessing Traits

Objectivity does not guarantee validity. People can fake their answers to create a good impression, and the ease of computerized testing may lead to misuse of the tests.

13-16: WHICH TRAITS SEEM TO PROVIDE THE MOST USEFUL INFORMATION ABOUT PERSONALITY VARIATION?

The Big Five personality factors (Costa and McCrae, 2011) currently offer the most widely accepted picture of the basic dimensions of personality

Conscientiousness

Agreeableness

Neuroticism

Openness

Extraversion

Memory tip for the five dimensions: CANOE

Trait Theories The Big Five Factors

Researchers use self-report inventories and peer reports to assess and score the Big Five personality factors.

THE “BIG FIVE” PERSONALITY FACTORS

Table 13.3

Trait Theories The Big Five Factors

Sample questions from The Big Five Self-Assessment (rated on a scale from 1, very inaccurate, to 5, very accurate):

___ Am the life of the party

___ Sympathize with others’ feelings

___ Am always prepared

___ Worry about things

___Am full of ideas

(Scoring guide sorted by Big Five personality traits,

with different questions reflecting CANOE traits.)

See Figure 13.4

Big Five research questions:

How stable are these traits?

How heritable are they?

Do traits reflect differing brain structure?

Have these traits changed over time?

How well do these traits apply to various cultures?

Do the Big Five traits predict our actual behaviors?

Trait Theories The Big Five Factors

How stable are these traits?

Quite stable, especially after age 40.

How heritable are they?

Many genes, each having small effects, combine to influence traits.

Do traits reflect differing brain structure?

Size of different brain regions correlates with several Big Five traits.

Have these traits changed over time?

Extraversion and conscientiousness have increased.

How well do these traits apply to various cultures?

“Features of personality traits are common to all human groups” (McRae et al, 2005).

Do the Big Five traits predict our actual behaviors?

Yes, though situations also matter.

13-17: DOES RESEARCH SUPPORT THE CONSISTENCY OF PERSONALITY TRAITS OVER TIME AND ACROSS SITUATIONS?

Are our personality traits stable and enduring?

The Person-Situation Controversy

Behavior is influenced by the interaction of our inner disposition with our environment.

In general, personality traits are stable, socially significant.

Personality traits are predictors of mortality, divorce, and occupational attainment.

Consistency of specific behaviors from one situation to another is weak; average behaviors are predictable

At any moment the immediate situation powerfully influences a person’s behavior.

Our enduring traits are evident, however, across many situations and in such things as our music preferences, our online spaces, and our written communications.

Trait Theories Evaluating Trait Theories

A person’s personality traits persist over time and are predictable over many different situations.

But traits cannot predict behavior in any one particular situation.

13-18: HOW DO SOCIAL-COGNITIVE THEORISTS VIEW PERSONALITY DEVELOPMENT, AND HOW DO THEY EXPLORE BEHAVIOR?

The social-cognitive perspective on personality was proposed by Albert Bandura (1986, 2006, 2008)

Views behavior as influenced by the interaction between people’s traits (including their thinking) and their social context

Emphasizes interaction of our traits with our situations

Applies principles of learning, cognition, and social behavior to personality

Social-Cognitive Theories

Bandura views the person-environment interaction as reciprocal determinism:

The interacting influences of behavior, internal cognition, and environment.

Interaction of individuals and environments:

Different people choose different environments.

Personalities shape how people interpret and react to events.

Personalities help create situations to which people react.

Social-Cognitive Theories Reciprocal Influences

Figure 13.6 Reciprocal Determinism

Social-Cognitive Theories Reciprocal Influences

The Biopsychosocial Approach to the

Study of Personality

Figure 13.7 As with other psychological phenomena, personality is fruitfully studied at multiple levels.

To predict behavior, social-cognitive theorists often observe behavior in realistic situations:

Build on concepts of learning and cognition.

Assessment center strategies adopted by many educational, military, and corporate organizations to assess potential candidates. Modern research suggests assessment center exercises are more likely to reveal visible dimensions, such as communication ability, than others, such as inner achievement drive.

Social-cognitive psychologists contend that the best way to predict behavior in a given situation is to observe that behavior in similar situations.

Social-Cognitive Theories Assessing Behavior in Situations

Best means of predicting future behavior is the person’s past behavior patterns in similar situations.

13-19: WHAT CRITICISMS HAVE SOCIAL-COGNITIVE THEORISTS FACED?

Social-cognitive theories of personality have been criticized for focusing so much on the situation that they fail to appreciate the person’s inner traits.

Criticized for underemphasizing the importance of unconscious motives, emotions, and biologically influenced traits.

Personality traits have been shown to predict behavior at work, love, and play.

Social-Cognitive Theories Evaluating Social-Cognitive Theories

Consider the different ways two men, described in the text, react to news of winning a $90 million lottery jackpot.

13-20: WHY HAS PSYCHOLOGY GENERATED SO MUCH RESEARCH ON THE SELF? HOW IMPORTANT IS SELF-ESTEEM TO OUR WELL-BEING?

Exploration of the self in psychology has a long history:

William James (1890)

Gordon Allport (1943)

Humanistic psychology (1960s)

Self: In contemporary psychology, assumed to be the center of personality, the organizer of our thoughts, feelings, and actions.

Self one of psychology’s most vigorously studied topics.

Spotlight effect: Overestimating others’ noticing and evaluating our appearance, performance, and blunders (as if we presume a spotlight shines on us).

Consideration of possible selves motivates toward positive development; too intense focusing may lead to spotlight effect.

Exploring the Self

Self-esteem: One’s feelings of high or low self-worth.

Self-efficacy: One’s sense of competence and effectiveness.

High self-esteem correlates with less pressure to conform, with persistence at difficult tasks, and with happiness.

But the direction of the correlation is not clear; high self-esteem could simply be a side effect of meeting challenges and surmounting difficulties.

Giving praise in the absence of good performance may actually be harmful.

Temporarily deflating study participants’ self-image tends to have negative effects in how those individuals treat others.

Exploring the Self The Benefits of Self-Esteem

Psychologists caution against unrealistically promoting children’s feelings of self-worth. It’s better to reward their achievements, which leads to feelings of competence.

13-21: WHAT EVIDENCE REVEALS SELF-SERVING BIAS, AND HOW DO DEFENSIVE AND SECURE SELF-ESTEEM DIFFER?

Self-serving bias: A readiness to perceive oneself favorably

Suggests people accept more responsibility for good deeds than for bad, and for successes than for failure

Often creates a better-than-average effect

When self-esteem is threatened, people may react aggressively

Narcissism: Excessive self-love and self-absorption

Researchers distinguish between fragile defensive self-esteem and stronger secure self-esteem, which is less dependent upon external evaluation

Authentic pride, rooted in actual achievement, supports self-confidence and leadership

Exploring the Self Self-Serving Bias

13-22: HOW DO INDIVIDUALIST AND COLLECTIVIST CULTURES DIFFER IN THEIR VALUES AND GOALS?

Individualism: Giving priority to one’s own goals over group goals and defining one’s identity in terms of personal attributes rather than group identifications.

Collectivism: Giving priority to the goals of one’s group (often one’s extended family or work group) and defining one’s identity accordingly.

Although people within cultures vary, different cultures emphasize either individualism or collectivism. Individualism is valued in most areas of North America, Western Europe, Australia, and New Zealand. People in many Asian, African, and Latin American countries place a higher value on collectivism.

Exploring the Self Culture and the Self

Table 13.5 Value Contrasts Between Individualism and Collectivism