Last Class in Review

• Attitudes:
– A relatively stable opinion containing beliefs and opinions about people, groups, ideas,
and activities
• Implicit (unconscious) vs. Explicit (conscious)
• Factors that change our attitudes
• Group influences on behavior
– Conformity
– Groupthink
– The anonymous crowd
• Diffusion of responsibility (bystander apathy, social loafing, deindividuation)
• Why do people go against conformity and stand up for beliefs?
– Dissent and Altruism
• Group Identity
– Social identity: gives us a sense of our place in the world
– Ethnic identity vs. Acculturation
• Ways to balance the conflict:
1. Bicultural
2. Assimilation
3. Ethnic Separatists
4. Marginal
– Ethnocentrism
• Robber’s Cave
• Stereotypes
• Prejudice
– Explicit vs. Implicit
• How do we measure implicit prejudice
– How can we reduce prejudice?
• Group exercise: Chapter 10 review questions
 Learning Objectives
1. What are the 3 elements that make up the structure of personality,
according to Freud? What happens when conflicts are not resolved
at a given stage?

2. What are 6 common defense mechanisms? Be able to identify

examples of each.

3. What are the 5 stages of psychosexual development?

4. What is the difference between the Jungian theory and Freud’s

Psychoanalytic theory?

5. What is the collective unconscious? What are archetypes?

6. What is most important in the Object-Relations Theory?

7. What are the 3 major shortcomings of psychodynamic theories?

8. What do the humanistic approaches to personality focus on?

 chapter 2

Definitions
Personality
Distinctive and relatively stable pattern of behaviors,
thoughts, motives, and emotions that characterizes an
individual

Trait
A characteristic of an individual, describing a habitual
way of behaving, thinking, and feeling
• shy, outgoing, ambitious, lazy, easy-going, anal, high-
strung, confident, grumpy, happy, friendly, etc
 chapter 2

Theories of Personality
Psychodynamic Theories
Biological Theories
Environmental Psychology Theories
Cultural Psychology Theories
Humanistic Theories
 chapter 2

Psychodynamic theories
Sigmund Freud – psychoanalysis

Explains behavior and personality in terms of

unconscious dynamics within the individual
• Emphasizes internal conflicts, attachments, and
motivations

• Adult personalities are formed by experiences in

early childhood

•Three variations:
• Freud and traditional psychoanalysis
• Jungian Theory
• Object-Relations School
 chapter 2

Freud’s Psychoanalysis:
The structure of personality
1. Id
- Unconscious

2. Ego
- unconscious, preconscious,
conscious

3. Superego
- unconscious, preconscious,
conscious
 chapter 2

Freud’s Psychoanalysis:
The ID
Operates according to the
pleasure principle

–Present from birth

–Primitive
• basic needs and wants

–2 competing instincts:
• Life (sexual) - libido
• Death (aggressive)

–Unconscious
 chapter 2

Freud’s Psychoanalysis:
The Ego
Operates according to the reality
principle

– Arises in first 3 years of life

–Mediates between ID and Superego

–Rational part of mind

• you can’t always get what you
want

– Floats between all 3 levels of

consciousness
 chapter 2

Freud’s Psychoanalysis:
The Superego
Moral Conscience

– Develops around age 5

• At end of Phallic Stage

–Stores and enforces rules

• Inner voice that tells you not to
do something or that what you
did was wrong

–2 subsystems:
• Ego Ideal = parents
approve/value
• Conscience = parents disapproval
 chapter 2

Freud’s Psychoanalysis: Defense mechanisms

1. Repression
• When a threatening idea, memory, or emotion is blocked
(either consciously or unconsciously) from consciousness
2. Projection
• When repressed feelings are attributed to someone else
3. Displacement
• When a person’s emotions are directed towards people or
animals that are not the real object of the emotion
• Sublimation: acting out socially unacceptable impulses in a
socially acceptable way
4. Reaction formation
• When a feeling or belief that causes anxiety is transformed into
the opposite feeling or belief in our consciousness

5. Regression
• Returning to a previous stage of development

6. Denial
• Refusal to admit something unpleasant or that something that
provokes anxiety is happening
 chapter 2

Your turn
Your math instructor caught you with the textbook
open during a test. Despite the fact that you know
he knows you were cheating, you protest your
innocence. This defense mechanism is:
1. Denial
2. Reaction formation
3. Regression
4. Displacement
 chapter 2

Personality development:
Freud’s Psychosexual Stages
Fixation occurs when the conflicts at a given stage
aren’t resolved successfully

Freud’s Psychosexual Stages

1. Oral (birth – 18 months)
• Babies learn about the world with their mouths, oral pleasures
• Oral fixation – preoccupation with oral activities as an adult
2. Anal (18 months – 3 years)
• Control of eliminating and retaining feces, toilet training issues
• Anal retentive – obsession with cleanliness, perfection, control
• Anal expulsive – messy, disorganized
3. Phallic (Oedipal; 3 – 5 or 6 years)
• Pleasure zone is the genitals
• Oedipus complex – development of feelings for opposite sex parent and rivalry
feelings towards same sex parent
– Boys – fear of castration; Girls – penis envy
4. Latency (6 – puberty)
• Sexual urges repressed, play with same sex peers
5. Genital (puberty on)
• Leads to adult sexuality
 chapter 2

Other psychodynamic
approaches

1. Jungian theory

2. The Object-Relations School

 chapter 2

Jungian Theory
(aka analytical psychology)
Carl Jung (1875-1961)

Divides unconscious into 2 parts:

Personal unconscious: reservoir of personal information and
memories that was once conscious, but has been forgotten or
suppressed and is unique to the individual

Collective unconscious: deepest level of the human psyche

that contains universal memories, symbols, and experiences
of all humans
• a reservoir of inherited experiences
• Archetype: a generic, idealized model of a person,
personality or behavior
– Innate, universal prototypes
– Appear in myths, stories, art, and dreams
 chapter 2

Jungian Theory
(aka analytical psychology)
•Archetype: a generic, idealized model of a
person, personality or behavior
• Stereotype, epitome

• 4 main archetypes:
– The Self
– The Shadow
– The Anima
– The Animus

• Commonly seen archetypes

– The Child
– The Hero
– The Great Mother
 chapter 2

Object-Relations School
Melanie Klein & D.W. Winnicott

Emphasizes interpersonal relationships and believes the

ego-self exists only in relation to other objects
 most important = mother-child relationship

• Central problem = balance between need for independence and

need for others
• Emphasizes the importance of the infant’s first two years of life
and the baby’s formative relationships, especially with mother

Object: Something to which the subject relates, usually a

person, a part of a person or symbols for these.
External object: an actual person, place, or thing
Internal object: a memory, idea, or fantasy about a person
place or thing
 chapter 2

Evaluating
psychodynamic theories
Three scientific failings:
1. Violating the principle of falsifiability

2. Drawing universal principles from the

experiences of a few atypical patients

3. Basing theories of personality development

on retrospective accounts and the fallible
memories of patients
 chapter 2

Humanistic Approaches
to Personality
Humanistic psychology
An approach that emphasizes personal growth, resilience,
and the achievement of human potential

Humanist psychologists:
1. Abraham Maslow
2. Carl Rogers
3. Rollo May
 chapter 2

Humanistic Psychology:
Abraham Maslow
Personality development is a gradual
progression to self-actualization
 chapter 2

Your turn
You are on your way to a restaurant to meet some
friends, and you are hungry. As you are walking
from your car to the restaurant, you are looking
forward to talking with your friends. Just then, you
hear a gunshot. According to Maslow, your primary
motivation would be determined by
1. Your hunger
2. Your desire to converse with your friends
3. Your desire for safety
 chapter 2

Humanistic Psychology:
Carl Rogers
Interested in fully functioning individuals
Congruence
this is displayed by fully functioning people and is a harmony
between the image they project to others and their true
feelings or wishes

To become fully functioning we need:

–Unconditional positive regard
A situation in which the acceptance and love one receives
from significant others is unqualified, no strings attached

Unfortunately many children and adults are treated

with:
–Conditional positive regard
A situation in which the acceptance and love one receives
from significant others is contingent upon one’s behavior
 chapter 2

Evaluating humanist
approaches
The bad:
1.Assumptions are not testable

2.Hard to operationally define many of the concepts

The good:
1.Added balance to the study of personality
2.Encouraged others to focus on “positive psychology”
3.Fostered new appreciation for resilience
 Last Class in Review
• Personality: Distinctive and relatively stable pattern of
behaviors, thoughts, motives, and emotions that characterizes
an individual
• Trait: A characteristic of an individual
• Psychodynamic Theories of Personality:
– Freud’s Psychoanalysis
• Id, Ego, Superego
• Defense mechanisms of the Ego:
– Repression, projection, displacement, reaction formation, regression, denial
• Psychosexual Stages
– Oral, Anal, Phallic, Latent, Genital
– Jungian Theory
– Object-Relations School
 Learning Objectives
1. What are the Big Five personality dimensions currently favored by
personality researchers?
2. What are temperaments and how are they related to personality
traits?
3. What does heritability refer to?
4. What is reciprocal determinism?
5. How does the environment influence personality?
6. What is the non-shared environment?
7. What are 3 lines of evidence that suggest parents have a minor
influence on the development of their children’s personality?
8. How does culture influence personality?
9. What the the main differences between an individualistic and
collectivist culture?
 chapter 2

Measuring Personality:
Objective tests (inventories)
Standardized questionnaires asking a series of questions
where people rate themselves
– Typically include scales
– Assumes that you can accurately report
– No right or wrong answers

The responses help develop picture of you

called a personality profile

2 common tests:
Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI)
Multidimensional Personality Questionnaire (MPQ)
 Allport’s Trait Theory
Gordon Allport (1897-1967)
1. Cardinal Trait
• Dominates and shapes personality, rare
2. Central Trait
• Basic building blocks of personality that
everyone has to some degree
3. Secondary Trait
• Only seen in certain circumstances
 Raymond Cattell
1905-1998
16 Personality Factors
1. Warmth
2. Reasoning
3. Emotional Stability
4. Dominance
5. Liveliness
6. Rule-consciousness
7. Social Boldness
8. Sensitivity
9. Vigilance
10. Abstractedness
11. Privateness
12. Apprehension
13. Openness to change
14. Self-reliance
15. Perfectionism
16. Tension
 chapter 2

Personality Traits: The Big Five

1. Openness to experience
• Open = Curiosity, imaginative, creative
• Resistant = Conforming, predictable

2. Conscientiousness
• Conscientious = Responsible, persevering, self-disciplined
• Impulsive = Quick to give up, fickle, careless

3. Extroversion
• Extroversion = Outgoing – talkative, sociable, adventurous
• Introversion = Shy – silent, reclusive, cautious

4. Agreeableness
• Agreeable = Good-natured, cooperative, secure
• Antagonistic = Irritable, abrasive, suspicious, jealous

5. Neuroticism
• Neurotic = anxious, impulsive, worrier, emotionally negative
• Emotionally stable = only has those feelings when the circumstances dictate
 Genetic Influences on
Personality
• Nature vs. Nurture debate
– Nature: Biology/genetics determines personality
– Nurture: Experiences determines personality
– Not mutually exclusive
• Biology and experience interact and shape our personalities
together
• How can biology influence our personality?
– Genes: functional units of heredity, composed of DNA and
specify the structure of proteins
• Specify how the brain and nervous systems should develop
and function
– Influence the behaviors that make up our personality
 How do psychologists measure
genetic contributions to personality?

1. Studying personality traits in other

species
2. Studying temperaments of infants and
children
3. Heritability studies in twins and
adopted individuals
Personality Traits in Other Species
• Examine the physiology, genetics, ecology and
ethology of animals

• Evidence of 4 of the Big Five traits in 64 different

species
– monkeys  dogs  octopi
– Conscientiousness has only been found in humans

• Puppy Personality Experiment (Gosling, 2003)

– Owners provided personality assessments of dogs and
themselves
– A person who knew them both filled out a personality
inventory
– Independent observers rated the dogs in a park
 All 3 ratings were very similar
 chapter 2

Personality Traits
in Infants and Children
Temperaments
Physiological dispositions to respond to the environment in certain
ways
• Present in infancy, assumed to be innate
• Relatively stable over time

Temperaments:
1. Easy/Flexible: positive disposition, curious about new
situations, adaptable, low-moderate emotional intensity
40% of babies

2. Difficult/Feisty: negative moods, slow to adapt to new situations

10 % of babies

3. Slow-to-Warm: inactive, calm reactions to environment,

negative moods and withdraw from new situations, adapt slowly
15 % of babies

35 % have babies have combination of characteristics and can’t be

categorized
 chapter 2

Dimension of Temperament Definition

1. Activity level Proportion of active to inactive time

2. Approach-Withdrawal The response to a new person or object,

based on whether the child accepts or
withdraws from the situation
3. Adaptability How easily the child is able to adapt to
changes in his or her environment
4. Quality of Mood The contrast of the amount of friendly, joyful, and
pleasant behavior with unpleasant, unfriendly behavior

5. Attention span and persistence The amount of the time a child devotes to an activity and
the effect of distraction on that activity

6. Distractibility The degree to which stimuli in the

environment alters behavior
7. Rhythmicity (regularity) The regularity of basic functions, such as
hunger, excretion, sleep and wakefulness
8. Intensity of reaction The energy level or reaction of the child’s
response
9. Threshold of responsiveness The intensity of stimulation needed to elicit a
response
 chapter 2

The Heritability of
Personality Traits
Heritability
a statistical estimate of how much variation in a trait
can be attributed to genetics within a given population
• 0 – 1.0
– 0.5 = 50 % of the variation in a personality trait can be
attributed to genetics
– 1.0 = 100 % of the variation in a personality trait can be
attributed to genetics

Heritability of personality traits is about 0.5

Within a group of people, about 50% of the variation associated with a
given trait is attributable to genetic differences among individuals in
the group.

Genetic predisposition is not genetic inevitability

 chapter 2

The Heritability of
Personality Traits
How is heritability studied?
– Adoption studies
• Compare correlations between traits of children and
their biological and adoptive parents
– Twin Studies
• Identical twins = share 100 % of genes
• Fraternal twins = share about ½ genes, just like
regular siblings
• Compare same-sex groups of identical and
fraternal twins
• Look at personality traits in adopted identical and
fraternal twins
 Environmental Influences
on Personality Traits
1. Situational Influences (social learning)
2. Parental Influences
3. Social circles (peer pressure)
 Situational Influences:
Social Learning
• Behaviorist view:
– Behaviors are rewarded and punished
differently in different situations
• Social-cognitive view:
– Personality traits result from a person’s
learning history and their expectations,
beliefs, perceptions of events and other
cognitions
– Reciprocal (mutual) determinism
 chapter 2

Situational Influences:
Reciprocal Determinism
Two-way interaction between aspects of the
environment and aspects of the individual in the
shaping of personality traits
 chapter 2

Situational Influences:
Non-shared environment
Unique aspects of a person’s
environment and aspects of the
individual in the shaping of personality
traits
 chapter 2

Parental Influences
Parental child-rearing practices have a strong
influence on who we become, but research has
shown that it is not the primary determinant:

1. The shared environment of the home has little

influence on personality.
• The non-shared environment is a more important
influence.

2. Few parents have a single child-rearing style

that is consistent over time and that they use
with all children.
3. Even when parents try to be consistent, there
may be little relation between what they do
and how their children turn out.
 chapter 2

Parental Influences
Nevertheless, parents still do influence
their children in a number of ways:

• Religious beliefs and values

• Intellectual and occupational interests, skills
• Feelings of self-esteem or inadequacy
• Degree of helpfulness

Influence on traits that are highly heritable:

• Aggressiveness
• Shyness
 chapter 2

Social Influence:
Peer Pressure
How many of you have behaved
differently around your parents that
you do your friends?

Adolescent culture:
• different peer groups, organized by different
interests, ethnicity and status

Peer acceptance is so important to children and

adolescents that being bullied, victimized, or
rejected by peers is far more traumatic than
punitive treatment by parents.
 chapter 2

Cultural Influences on
Personality
Culture
A program of shared rules that govern the behavior of
members of a community or society

A set of values, beliefs, and attitudes shared by most

members of that community

Individualist cultures
Cultures in which the self is regarded as autonomous, and individual
goals and wishes are prized above duty and relations with others

Collectivist cultures
Cultures in which the self is regarded as embedded in relationships,
and harmony with one’s group is prized above individual goals and
wishes
 chapter 2

Cultural Influence on Personality

Individualistic Cultures Collectivist Cultures
Define self as autonomous, Define self as an interdependent
independent of groups part of a group
Give priority to individual, personal Give priority to needs and goals of
goals group
Value independence, leadership, Value group harmony, duty,
achievement obligation, security
Give more weight to individual’s Give more weight to group norms
attitudes and preferences, than to than individual attitudes to explain
group norms to explain behavior behavior
Attend to the benefits and costs of Attend to needs of group members;
relationships; if costs exceed if relationship is beneficial to group,
advantages, a person is likely to but costly to individual, the individual
drop a relationship is likely to stay in the relationship
 chapter 2

Cultural Influences in
Personality
When culture is not appropriately considered,
people attribute unusual behavior to
personality.
• Timeliness

• Personal Space