Personality

Unit 10

Chapter 13

AP Psychology ~ Ms. Justice

The Psychoanalytic Perspective

Freud

The Humanistic Perspective

Maslow & Rogers

The Trait Perspective

The Social Cognitive Perspective

Exploring the Self

BIG IDEAS

Personality

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

Each dwarf has a distinct personality.

1: What was Freud’s view of personality and

its development?

Psychoanalytic Perspective

= ?Sigmund Freud

(1856-1939)

Is he Psychology’s Elvis?

Psychodynamic Perspective

Freud developed the first comprehensive theory of

personality, which included the unconscious

mind, psychosexual stages, and defense

mechanisms.

In his clinical practice, Freud encountered patients suffering from nervous disorders.

Their complaints could not be explained in terms of purely physical causes.

Exploring the Unconscious

Freud said the unconscious mind is a reservoir of mostly unacceptable thoughts, wishes, feelings, and

memories.

He asked patients to engage in free association – to say whatever came to their minds in order to tap the

unconscious.

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Dream Analysis

Another method to analyze the unconscious mind is through interpreting manifest (the remembered storyline) and latent (hidden)

contents of dreams.

The Nightmare, Henry Fuseli (1791)

Psychoanalysis

Psychoanalysis is the retrieval and release of painful, embarrassing unconscious memories

through free association and dream analysis.

Model of Mind

The mind is like an iceberg. It is mostly hidden, and below the surface lies the unconscious mind. The preconscious stores temporary

memories.

Figure 13.1

p. 555

Personality Structure

Personality develops as a result of our efforts to resolve conflicts between our biological impulses

and social restraints.

Figure 13.1

p. 555

Id, Ego and Superego

The id unconsciously strives to satisfy basic sexual and aggressive drives, operating on the

pleasure principle, demanding immediate gratification.

The ego functions as the “executive” and mediates the demands of the id and superego.

The superego provides standards for judgment (the conscience) and for future aspirations.

Personality Development

Freud believed that personality formed during the first few years of life is divided into psychosexual stages. During these stages the id’s pleasure-seeking energies focus on pleasure sensitive body areas called erogenous zones.

Psychosexual Stages

Freud divided the development of personality into five psychosexual stages.

Table 13.1, p. 556

Oedipus Complex

A boy’s sexual desire for his mother and feelings of jealousy and hatred

for the rival father.

A girl’s desire for her father is called the Electra complex.

Identification

According to Freud, children cope with

threatening feelings by repressing them and by

identifying with the rival parent.

Through this process of identification, their

superego gains strength that incorporates their

parents’ values.

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2: How did Freud think people defended

themselves against anxiety?

Defense Mechanisms

The ego’s protective methods of reducing anxiety by unconsciously distorting reality.

1. Repression banishes anxiety-arousing thoughts, feelings, and memories from consciousness.

2. Regression leads an individual faced with anxiety to retreat to a more infantile psychosexual stage.

Defense Mechanisms

3. Reaction Formation causes the ego to unconsciously switch unacceptable impulses into their opposites. People may express feelings of purity when they may be suffering anxiety from unconscious feelings about sex.

4. Projection leads people to disguise their own threatening impulses by attributing them to others.

Defense Mechanisms

5. Rationalization offers self-justifying explanations in place of the real, more threatening, unconscious reasons for one’s actions.

6. Displacement shifts sexual or aggressive impulses toward a more acceptable or less threatening object or person, redirecting anger toward a safer outlet.

The Only Known

Recording of Freud’s

Voice“I started my professional activity

as a neurologist trying to bring

relief to my neurotic patients.

Under the influence of an older friend and by my own efforts, I

discovered some important and new facts about the unconscious in

psychic life, the role of instinctual urges and so on. Out of these

findings grew a new science, Psycho-Analysis, a part of psychology

and a new method of treatment of the neuroses. I had to pay heavily

for this bit of good luck. People did not believe in my facts and

thought my theories unsavory. Resistance was strong and

unrelenting. In the end I succeeded in acquiring pupils and building

up an International Psycho-Analytic Association. But this struggle is

not yet over. Sigmund Freud.”

3: Which of Freud’s ideas did his followers

accept or reject?

The Neo-Freudians

Like Freud, Adler believed in childhood

tensions. However, these tensions were social in

nature and not sexual. A child struggles with an

inferiority complex during growth and

strives for superiority and power. Alfred Adler (1870-1937)

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The Neo-Freudians

Like Adler, Karen Horney believed in the social aspects of childhood

growth and development.

She countered Freud’s assumption that women

have weak superegos and suffer from “penis envy.”

Karen Horney (1885-1952)[HORN-eye]

The Neo-Freudians

Jung believed in the collective unconscious,

which contained a common reservoir of

images derived from our species’ past.

This is why many cultures share certain

myths and images such as the mother being a symbol of nurturance.

Carl Jung (1875-1961)

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4: What are projective tests, and how are they

used?

Assessing Unconscious Processes

A projective test is a psychological instrumentintended to reveal the hidden unconscious mind.

Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)

The TAT is a projective test in which people express their inner feelings and interests through the

stories they make up about ambiguous scenes.

Thematic Apperception Test Video

Rorschach Inkblot Test

The most widely used projective test; uses a set of 10 inkblots and was designed by Hermann Rorschach.

It seeks to identify people’s inner feelings by analyzing their interpretations of the blots.

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Rorschach Inkblot Test Video

Projective Tests: Criticisms

1. When evaluating the same patient, even trained raters come up with different interpretations (lack of reliability -consistency of results).

2. Projective tests may misdiagnose a normal individual as pathological (lack of validity -predicting what it is supposed to).

5: How do contemporary psychologists view Freud and

the unconscious?

Evaluating the Psychoanalytic Perspective

1. Personality develops throughout life and is not

fixed in childhood.

2. Peer influence on the individual may be as

powerful as parental influence.

3. Gender identity may develop before 5-6 years of

age.

Modern Research tell us…

Evaluating the Psychoanalytic Perspective

4. There may be other reasons for dreams besides

wish fulfillment.

5. Sexual inhibition has decreased, but psychological

disorders have not.

Modern Research tells us…

Evaluating the Psychoanalytic Perspective

6. The majority of children who experience trauma,

death camp survivors, and battle-scarred veterans

are unable to repress painful experiences

into their unconscious mind.

Modern Research tells us…

The Modern Unconscious Mind (p. 562)

Modern research shows the existence of non-

conscious information processing. This involves:

1. schemas that automatically control perceptions and

interpretations

2. the right-hemisphere activity that enables the split-

brain patient’s left hand to carry out an instruction the

patient cannot verbalize

3. parallel processing during vision and thinking

4. implicit memories

5. emotions that activate instantly without consciousness

6. self-concept and stereotypes that unconsciously

influence us

6: How did humanist psychologists view

personality, and what was their goal in studying

personality?

Humanistic Perspective

By the 1960s, psychologists became discontent with Freud’s negativity and the mechanistic

psychology of the behaviorists.

Abraham Maslow(1908-1970)

Carl Rogers(1902-1987)

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Self-Actualizing Person

Maslow proposed that we as individuals are motivated by a hierarchy of needs. Beginning with physiological needs, we try to reach the

state of self-actualization—fulfilling our potential.

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Person-Centered Perspective

Carl Rogers also believed in an individual's

self-actualization tendencies.

He said that unconditional positive regard

is an attitude of acceptance of

others despite their failings.

7: How did humanist psychologists assess a person’s sense of self?

Assessing the Self

In an effort to assess personality, Rogers asked

people to describe themselves as they would like

to be (ideal) and as they actually are (real).

If the two descriptions were close the individual

had a positive self-concept.

8: How has the humanist perspective influenced

psychology? What criticisms has it faced?

Evaluating the Humanistic Perspective

Positive self-concept,

empathy, and the thought

that people are basically

good has had a pervasive

impact on counseling,

education, child-rearing,

and management.

Evaluating the Humanistic Perspective

1. Concepts are vague and subjective and lack scientific

basis.

2. Encouraging individualism can lead to

self-indulgence, selfishness, and an erosion

of moral restraints.

3. Lacks adequate balance between realistic optimism and

despair.

Criticisms

9: How do psychologists use traits to describe personality?

The Trait Perspective

An individual’s characteristic behaviors and conscious motives constitutes his or her

personality.

Examples of Traits:

Honest

Dependable

Moody

Impulsive

Exploring Traits

One way to condense the immense list of personality traits is through factor analysis, a

statistical approach used to describe and relate personality traits.

Each personality is uniquely made up of multiple traits.

Allport & Odbert (1936), identified almost 18,000 words representing traits.

Factor Analysis

Developed by Hans and Sybil Eysenck

10: What are personality inventories, and what are

their strengths and weaknesses as trait-

assessment tools?

Assessing Traits

Personality inventories are questionnaires designed to gauge a

wide range of feelings and behaviors, assessing several traits at once.

The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) is the most widely researched and

clinically used of all

personality tests.

MMPI

Mental health professionals use the MMPI to:

– develop treatment plans

– assist with differential diagnosis

– help answer legal questions

– screen job candidates during the personnel selection process

MMPI Test Profile

11: Which traits seem to provide the most useful

information about personality variation?

The Big Five FactorsToday’s trait researchers believe that earlier trait

dimensions, such as Eysencks’ personality dimensions, fail to tell the whole story.

So, an expanded range (five factors) of traits does a better job of assessment.

Conscientiousness

Agreeableness

Neuroticism

Openness

Extraversion

EndpointsTable 13.2, p. 571

12: Does research support the consistency of personality traits over time and across

situations?

Evaluating the Trait Perspective: The Person-Situation Controversy

Walter Mischel (1968, 1984, 2004) points

out that traits may be enduring, but the

resulting behavior in various situations is

different. Therefore, traits are not good

predictors of behavior.

However, trait theorists argue that behaviors from

a situation may be different, but average behavior

remains the same. Therefore, traits matter.

Consistency of Expressive Style

Expressive styles in speaking and gestures

demonstrate trait consistency.

Observers are able to judge people’s behavior and

feelings in as little as 30 seconds and in one particular

case as little as 2 seconds.

13: In the view of social-cognitive psychologists, what mutual influences shape an

individual’s personality?

Social-Cognitive Perspective

Bandura (1986, 2001, 2005) believes that personality is the result of an interaction that takes place between a

person and their social context.

For example, The school you attend and the music

you listen to are partly based on your dispositions.

Albert Bandura

Individuals & Environments

How we view and treat people influences how they treat us.

Our personalities shape situations.

Anxious people react to situations differently than relaxed people.

Our personalities shape how we react to events.

The school you attend and the music you listen to are partly based on your dispositions.

Different people choose different environments.

Examples of specific ways in which individuals

and environments interact:

page 577

14: What are the causes and consequences of personal

control?

Personal Control

External locus of control refers to the perception that chance or outside forces beyond our personal control determine our fate.

Internal locus of control refers to the perception that we can control our own fate.

Social-cognitive psychologists emphasize our sense of personal control, whether we control the environment

or the environment controls us.

Internal Locus of Control

Study after study has shown that people with an internal locus of control:

• Achieve more in school and work

• Act more independently

• Enjoy better health

• Feel less depressed

Learned Helplessness

When unable to avoid repeated adverse events, an animal or human learns helplessness.

Figure 13.8, page 579

Optimism vs. Pessimism

An optimistic or pessimistic attributional style is your way of explaining positive or negative events.

Success requires enough optimism to provide hope and enough pessimism to

prevent complacency.

Positive Psychology

Martin Seligman

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Positive psychology, such as humanistic psychology, aims to discover and promote

conditions that enable individuals and communities to thrive.

15: What underlying principle guides social-cognitive psychologists in their

assessment of people’s behavior and beliefs?

Assessing Behavior in Situations

Social-cognitive psychologists observe people in realistic and simulated situations because they

find that it is the best way to predict the behavior of others in similar situations.

As long as the person and the situation remain the same, the best predictor of future job performance,

grades, etc. is past behavior.

16: What has the social-cognitive perspective

contributed to the study of personality, and what criticisms has it faced?

Evaluating the Social-Cognitive Perspective

Pros:

• sensitizes researchers to the effects of situations

on and by individuals

• builds on learning and cognition research

Cons:

• pays too much attention to the situation and not

enough to the individual

17: Are we helped or hindered by high self-esteem?

Exploring the Self

Research on the self has revealed the spotlight effect -overestimating our concern that others evaluate our appearance, performance, and blunders.

Benefits of Self-Esteem

Maslow and Rogers argued that a successful life results from a healthy self-image (self-esteem).

When self-esteem is deflated, we view ourselves and others critically.

Self-Serving Bias

•Our readiness to perceive ourselves favorably.

•We accept responsibility for good deeds andsuccesses more than for bad deeds and failures.

•Most people see themselves as better than average.

•We see ourselves as more immune than others toself-serving bias.