Discovering Personality Traits through a Self-Identification Exercise

1. I am . . . • On a sheet of paper number from 1 to 20. • Beside each number list what you consider to be some of your own positive and negative personality qualities. • Introduce yourself to the other group members and tell them about your personality. • As a group identify the four descriptive terms used most frequently on the exercise. • Why do you think these specific terms were used to describe personality? • Identify any of the self-descriptive terms that do not really qualify as personality characteristics. • What makes a personal quality part of your personality?

2. “Personality is the organization of enduring behavior patterns that often serve to distinguish us from one another.” • personality psychologists study individual differences and construct tests to measure those differences. • personality involves enduring behavior patterns, and thus consistency or predictability of character. • We expect people to stay somewhat the same over time. Thus, when we see an old friend after an absence of several years, we often think, “Yes, it’s the same old Harry.” • personality involves the organization of individuality. • Personality involves an internal coherence or unified organization of character that embraces the whole person.

3. Personality theorists have argued that an adequate understanding of behavior demands an integrative understanding of various processes operating within the individual. • In attempting a grand synthesis, personality psychologists easily run the risk of generalizing and providing speculative analyses. But this is also what makes personality theory exciting. • Big Questions: • How are mind and body related? • Is personality inherited or learned? • Do humans have free will? • Is there a self? Is the self knowable?

4. PERSONALITY: MAJOR TRAITS FOUND STABLE THROUGH LIFE • By DANIEL GOLEMANPublished: June 09, 1987 • THE largest and longest studies to carefully analyze personality throughout life reveal a core of traits that remain remarkably stable over the years and a number of other traits that can change drastically from age to age. • The new studies have shown that three basic aspects of personality change little throughout life: a person's anxiety level, friendliness and eagerness for novel experiences. But other traits, such as alienation, morale and feelings of satisfaction, can vary greatly as a person goes through life. These more changeable traits largely reflect such things as how a person sees himself and his life at a given point, rather than a basic underlying temperament. • One of the recently completed studies followed 10,000 people 25 to 74 years old for nine years. Another involved 300 couples first tested in 1935. The studies are joined by a new analysis of more than two dozen earlier studies of lifetime personality and a study of twins that looks at the genetic contribution.

5. Psychoanalytic Approach • Describe what is meant by personality, and explain how Freud’s treatment of psychological disorders led to his study of the unconscious. • Describe Freud’s view of personality structure in terms of the interactions of the id, ego, and superego. • Identify Freud’s psychosexual stages of development, and describe the effects of fixation on behavior. • Discuss how defense mechanisms protect the individual from anxiety. • Explain how projective tests are used to assess personality. • Discuss the contributions of the neo-Freudians, and describe the shortcomings of Freud’s ideas.

6. Trait Approach. • Discuss psychologist’s descriptions of personality, personality types, and describe research efforts to identify fundamental personality traits. • Explain how personality inventories are used to assess traits, and identify the “Big Five” trait dimensions. • Discuss research regarding the consistency of behavior over time and across situations. • Humanistic Approach • Describe the humanistic perspective on personality in terms of Maslow’s focus on self-actualization and Rogers’ emphasis on people’s potential for growth. • Describe humanistic psychologists’ approach to personality assessment, and discuss the criticism of the humanistic perspective • Social-Cognitive Approach • Describe the social-cognitive perspective, and discuss the important consequences of personal control, learned helplessness, and optimism. • Describe how social-cognitive researchers assess behavior in realistic situations, and evaluate the social-cognitive perspective on personality. • Describe psychology’s interest in people’s sense of self, and discuss the benefits and liabilities of self-esteem and self-serving pride. • Describe the impact of individualism and collectivism on self-identify and social relations.

7. What is Personality? • Personality • an individual’s characteristic pattern of thinking, feeling, and acting • four basic perspectives • Psychoanalytic • Trait • Humanistic • Social-cognitive

8. Clinical Realm: Psychodynamic / Humanistic: comes out of analysis of patients All agree that our lives include past, present, and future; that our minds have both conscious and unconscious levels; and our behaviors are sometimes emotional and impulsive and at other times cooler and more calculated. How can we explain PERSONALITY? Research Realm:Social Cognitive – influenced by learning, perception and social interactions

9. 1 = strongly disagree 2 = disagree 3 = neutral 4 = agree 5 = strongly agree • Events that occurred during childhood have no effect on one’s personality in adulthood. • Sexual adjustment is easy for most people. • Culture and society have evolved as ways to curb human beings’ natural aggressiveness. • Little boys should not become too attached to their mothers. • It is possible to deliberately “forget” something too painful to remember. • People who chronically smoke, eat, or chew gum have some deep psychological problems. • Competitive people are no more aggressive than noncompetitive people.

10. 1 = strongly disagree 2 = disagree3 = neutral 4 = agree5 = strongly agree • Fathers should remain somewhat aloof (uninvolved or unwilling to become involved )to their daughters. • Toilet training is natural and not traumatic for most children. • The phallus (a picture, sculpture, or other representation of a penis, especially one regarded as a symbol of the reproductive force of life) is a symbol of power. • A man who dates a woman old enough to be his mother has problems. • There are some women who are best described as being “castrating bitches.” • Dreams merely replay events that occurred during the day and have no deep meaning. • There is something wrong with a woman who dates a man who is old enough to be her father. • A student who wants to postpone an exam by saying “My grandmother lied . . . er, I mean died, should probably be allowed the postponement In scoring your own responses, first reverse the numbers you placed in front of statements 1, 2, 7, 9, 13, and 15. Then, to obtain a total score, add the numbers in front of all 15 statements. Scores can range from 15 to 75, with higher scores reflecting greater agreement with a Freudian perspective.

11. The Psychoanalytic Perspective, an overview • Motivation is largely hidden by unconscious repressive forces. • Freud argued that humans are driven by life instincts (sex) and by death instincts (aggression) • The ID (largely unconscious) is incompatible with society’s morals (childhood urges, sexual desires, aggressive drives). Repressive side of mind needs to protect the mind of these drives, so it creates defense mechanisms. • Anxiety or other neurosis = mechanisms fails. • Psychotherapy – goal is to trace neurotic symptoms back to unconscious roots. Expose those roots to rational judgment, thereby depriving them of their compulsive power.

12. The Psychoanalytic Perspective • Psychoanalysis • Freud’s psychoanalytic theory that attributes our thoughts and actions to unconscious motives and conflicts • techniques used in treating psychological disorders by seeking to expose and interpret unconscious tensions

13. The Psychoanalytic Perspective • Free Association • in psychoanalysis, a method of exploring the unconscious • person relaxes and says whatever comes to mind, no matter how trivial or embarrassing

14. The Psychoanalytic Perspective • Unconscious • According to Freud- a reservoir of mostly unacceptable thoughts, wishes, feelings and memories • Preconscious • information that is not conscious, but is retrievable into conscious awareness

15. Ego Conscious mind Unconscious mind Superego Id Personality Structure • Freud’s idea of the mind’s structure is messed up

16. Personality Structure • Id • contains a reservoir of unconscious psychic energy • strives to satisfy basic sexual and aggressive drives • operates on the pleasure principle, demanding immediate gratification

17. Personality Structure • Superego • the part of personality that represents conscience, morality and social standards • Goal is to apply the moral values and standards of one’s parents and society in satisfying one’s wishes. • Ego Ideal – person’s view of the kind of person they should strive to become. • Conflicts with ID.

18. Personality Structure • Ego • the largely conscious, “executive” part of personality • mediates among the demands of the id, superego and reality • operates on the reality principle, satisfying the id’s desires in ways that will realistically bring pleasure rather than pain

19. ID , EGO, SUPEREGO • You find money. . . What do you do? • ID – Buy something with it • SUPEREGO – Return it. • CONFLICT • Ego – return money & buy something with your own . • Satisfies both drives.

20. Personality Development • Psychosexual Stages • Individuals pass through a series of psychosexual stages during which id impulses of a sexual natures find a socially acceptable outlet. • id’s pleasure-seeking energies focus on distinct erogenous zones • Unresolved conflicts between id impulses and social restrictions during childhood continue to influence one’s personality in adulthood • Oedipus Complex • a boy’s sexual desires toward his mother and feelings of jealousy and hatred for the rival father

21. Freud’s Psychosexual Stages Stage Focus Oral Pleasure centers on the mouth-- (0-18 months) sucking, biting, chewing (People who smoke, overeat, or chew gum presumably has had trouble with feeding and weaning early in the oral stage) Anal Pleasure focuses on bowel and bladder (18-36 months) elimination; coping with demands for control (Problems with toilet training during the anal stage may lead to the development of anal-expulsive or anal-retentive personalities in adulthood) Phallic Pleasure zone is the genitals; coping with (3-6 years) incestuous sexual feelings Latency Dormant sexual feelings (6 to puberty) Genital Maturation of sexual interests (puberty on) Personality Development Pleasure comes from “immature” sexual expression (masturbation)

22. Phallic Phase • Why do boys develop a masculine identity, even though they are raised by their mothers? • Why do girls develop sexual attraction toward males and boys to females? • Why do boys become “momma’s boys”? • Why do girls “marry their fathers”? • Why do some males exhibit homosexual behavior?

23. Freud’s Theories – rejected! • Oedipus complex – boys feel an erotic attraction towards their mothers. • Successful resolution at this stage requires a process of identification with father, displacing their attraction to females. • Penis envy – because they don’t have one and become attracted to boys (who do).

24. Personality Development • Identification • the process by which children incorporate their parents’ values into their developing superegos • Fixation • a lingering focus of pleasure-seeking energies at an earlier psychosexual stage, where conflicts were unresolved

25. Ego’s Defense Mechanisms • “Anxiety is the price we pay for civilization.” Sigmund Freud • Unconscious function of the ego that protects it form anxiety-evoking material by preventing accurate recognition of this material.

26. Defense Mechanisms • Reaction Formation • Sublimation • Denial • Repression • Regression • Projection • Displacement • Rationalization

27. Defense Mechanisms • Defense Mechanisms • the ego’s protective methods of reducing anxiety by unconsciously distorting reality • Repression • Underlies all other defense mechanisms • the basic defense mechanism that banishes anxiety-arousing thoughts, feelings, and memories from consciousness • A child who is abused by a parent later has no recollection of the events, but has trouble forming relationships. • A man has a phobia of spiders but cannot remember the first time he was afraid of them. • A person greets another with 'pleased to beat you' (the repressed idea of violence toward the other person creeping through).

28. Repression . . . . • Repression is different than suppression, which is an intentional squashing of a thought. This is the phenomenon of "see no evil, say no evil" and refusing to think about something painful or anxiety producing. • What is repressed is repressed, and takes work to fully identify and address through psychoanalysis.

29. Defense Mechanisms • Regression • defense mechanism in which an individual retreats, when faced with anxiety, to a more infantile psychosexual stage where some psychic energy remains fixated • An adolescent cries when forbidden to use the car. • An adult becomes highly depenent on his parents after a breakup of a marriage.

30. Defense Mechanisms • Reaction Formation • defense mechanism by which the ego unconsciously switches unacceptable impulses into their opposites • people may express feelings that are the opposite of their anxiety-arousing unconscious feelings • A person who is angry at a teacher behaves in a “sickly sweet” manner because that ANGER causes anxiety.

31. Defense Mechanisms • Projection • defense mechanism by which people disguise their own threatening impulses by attributing them to others • A hostile person perceives the world as a dangerous place. • A sexually frustrated person interprets innocent gestures as sexual advances. • Rationalization • defense mechanism that offers self-justifying explanations in place of the real, more threatening, unconscious reasons for one’s actions • A student blames her cheating on the sub leaving the test on the desk. • Income tax cheating “everyone does it”

32. Defense Mechanisms • Displacement • defense mechanism that shifts sexual or aggressive impulses toward a more acceptable or less threatening object or person • as when redirecting anger toward a safer outlet • Mom and dad come home and yell at you because they are mad at their boss.

33. Defense Mechanisms • Denial – refusal to accept the true nature of a threat. • Teenagers live in denial – “it can’t happen to me” • Smokers

34. Defense Mechanisms • Sublimation • defense mechanism by which people rechannel their unacceptable impulses into socially approved activities • MMA fighters • A person paints naked people for the sake of “beauty” and “art”.

35. Assessing the Unconscious • Projective Test • a personality test, such as the Rorschach or TAT, that provides ambiguous stimuli designed to trigger projection of one’s inner dynamics • Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) • a projective test in which people express their inner feelings and interests through the stories they make up about ambiguous scenes

36. Assessing the Unconscious- TAT

37. Assessing the Unconscious • Rorschach Inkblot Test • the 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

38. Assessing the Unconscious- Rorschach

39. Neo-Freudians • Alfred Adler • importance of childhood social tension • Karen Horney • sought to balance Freud’s masculine biases • Carl Jung • emphasized the collective unconscious • concept of a shared, inherited reservoir of memory traces from our species’ history

40. Evaluating the Psychoanalytic Perspective • Important within its historical context • Researchers find little support that defense mechanisms disguise sexual and aggressive impulses • History does not support Freud’s idea that sexual repression causes psychological disorder