Approaches to personality

Personality - all the consistent ways in
which the behavior of one person
differs from that of others, especially in
social situations
The psychodynamic approach


Relates personality to the interplay of
conflicting forces within the individual,
including some that the individual may
not consciously recognize
Sigmund Freud (1856-1939)


sexual desires
Id, Ego, Superego
Carl Jung (1875-1961)

Personal unconscious


Much like Freud’s view
The collective unconscious – basic ideas
that go beyond an individual’s personal
experiences

Concepts common to all of humanity
inherited from past generations


collective spirituality
ancient symbols
Alfred Adler (1870-1937)


Didn’t think sex was primary motivator
We are motivated by personal ambitions


When we are young we have an inferiority
complex
An Adlerian conflict

marry someone and then blame them for not
making something of yourself

an out
psychodynamic

The underlying theme for Freud, Jung,
and Adler, is that many of our behaviors
are driven by hidden personality
characteristics.

People would be better off if they
understood the underlying motivations for
their behaviors
The trait approach

The theory that people have consistent
personality characteristics that can be
measured and studied.
Trait approach continued

The goal of the trait approach is to
identify traits that people have and find
out where people fall on a continuum of
that trait.

Raymond Cattell narrowed personality
traits down to 16


see Figure 9.2 in your book
The contemporary view is that there are
five independent traits
Personality Psychology-The
Big Five
The Big Five Traits


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
Openness to Experience
Conscientiousness
Extraversion
Agreeableness
Neuroticism
Openness to Experience


Tendency to have an interest in new
experiences and different cultures
Like to try new things
Scale O…


High score: curious, imaginative, like
variety, and are interested intellectual
or artistic pursuits.
Low score: down-to-earth,
conventional, prefer routine, and are
not really intellectually oriented.
Conscientiousness


Determined to achieve whatever goal is
being pursued
Have a lot of self-control
Scale C…


High score: well-organized, persistent,
careful, and thorough.
Low score: disorganized, careless,
inefficient, and undependable.
Extraversion


Seek more stimulation from the outside
environment
Like social situations
Scale E…


High score: talkative, sociable, have
high energy, and assertive.
Low score: quiet, solitary, have low
energy, and reserved (also known as
introversion).
Agreeableness


Tendency to be very friendly to
everyone
Get along well with others
Scale A…


High score: warmhearted, kind,
trusting, and compassionate.
Low score: antagonistic, unkind,
suspicious, and unsympathetic.
Neuroticism


Tendency to be emotionally unstable
Do not handle stress well
Scale N…


High score: overly emotional, anxious,
high-strung, self-pitying, and selfconscious (depression is also related).
Low score: emotionally stable, calm,
even-tempered, self-satisfied, and
comfortable with who you are.
Evaluation of the Big Five
Pros:


find out where
someone fits
within different
traits
stability over time
Cons:


questionnaires
may not be
reliable data
how many traits
are enough
argument
The learning approach to
personality

Personality is understood as learned
behaviors in certain situations.

It is not whether you are “honest” or
“dishonest”

It is what you do in certain situations.


Return someone’s lost wallet
cheat on a significant other
The learning approach to
personality

Why do we behave this way? We learned from
watching others. Particularly significant others in out
lives.


Parents, other children
John B. Watson (1878-1958)

“Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own
specified world to bring them up in and I’ll guarantee to take
any one at random and train him to be any type of specialist
I might select -- doctor, lawyer, merchant-chief, and yes
even beggar-man thief, regardless of his talents, penchants,
tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors.”
Bandura (1925 – Present)


Our personality is shaped by learning
Focused on learning through observation and
social influence

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Social Learning Theory
If you observe your parents being honest and
getting rewarded for doing so, you may
acquire similar responses

The Bobo Doll experiment

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Violence
Non violence
No model
Humanistic approach to
personality

The psychodynamic approach and learning
approach are rooted in determinism.



Our behaviors are determined by unconscious
events for psychodynamic theory
Our behaviors are determined by learned
reactions to environmental influences according to
learning theory.
Humanistic psychology rejects that we are
determined to behave in certain ways
Humanistic approach to
personality


The emphasis is on the deliberate
conscious decisions that people make.
Carl Rogers (1902-1987)


Human nature is basically good.
People have a natural drive toward selfactualization - achievement of one’s full
potential

this controls the development of one’s
personality
Rogers

Children develop a self
concept and an ideal self.
 A self concept is an
image of what you really
are
 an ideal self is an image
of what you would like to
be
Ideal vs. Real self

measured by the Q-sort
 Cards that say things like



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“I am honest”
“I am suspicious of others”
First sort as true of me or not true of me
Then - resort as true of my ideal self or not
true of ideal

People who have a large discrepancy on these
sorted lists tend be in distress about their lives.
Humanistic Psychology and
treatment

Humanistic psychologists treat people
by helping them either change their
true self, or reestablish an ideal self
that is more realistic


Start acting in ways that are more like your
ideal.
Your expectations are too high for yourself
set more realistic ideals.
Carl Rogers believed in
Unconditional positive regard

Complete, unqualified, acceptance of another
person as he or she is.


I understand you are inherently good, even if you
have been doing some bad things.
We must separate a child’s behaviors from a
child’s self

We can punish a child for doing bad things, but
never for being a bad child

“I love you very much, but what you have done is
inappropriate and therefore will be punished.”
Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs

An organization of needs (motivators)
from the most necessary and insistent
to the ones that receive attention when
all others are under control
Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs

Physiological needs


food, drink, shelter
Safety needs


The world is organized and predictable.
Need to feel safe secure and stable

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Paranoid schizophrenia
Fugitive from the law
Dangerous part of a city

Belongingness and love needs.

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Esteem needs

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Need to be accepted
Need to avoid loneliness and alienation.
Need to be loved
Need for achievement and independence.
Need for recognition and respect from others
Self-actualization

Need to live up to one’s fullest and unique
potential
Sigmund Freud (1856-1939)

A medical doctor interested in neurosis.

The most common type of neurosis was hysteria

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a physical symptom having a psychological cause
Keep in mind that the physicians of the time did not
know much about disease
Syphilis
Epilepsy

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paralysis of the hand
blindness and deafness
Known today as conversion and dissociative disorders

Before Freud’s time these problems were thought to
be the result of


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weakness of will
possession of evil spirits
Physicians of Freud’s time thought hysteria had a
physical cause.
Freud said it was psychological (sexual in nature) and
rooted in the unconscious


most physicians did not like Freud’s view.
Their treatments

electrotherapy, suffocation, faradization, beating with wet
towels, insertion of tubes into the rectum, hot irons to the
spine, cauterization of the clitoris
Why Sex?


Freud really wanted his theory to be rooted in
biology.
One of Freud’s central tenets was that there were a
only a few drives

hunger, thirst, self preservation, and sex.


But humans do so much more than satisfy these basic
needs.


Later he threw in aggression
Build cathedrals, write poetry, make music, paint
Freud believed our primal instincts could be redirected into
other less biological behaviors.

Sublimation
We can refrain from sex


An animal may be unhappy if it refrains from
sex, but it will live.
Also Society puts barriers on sexual instincts,
but not on the other basic instincts.

Since Freud assumed hysteria, as well as other
behaviors are driven by natural instincts, Freud’s
theory is biologically based.
Another reason Freud focused
on sex – sexual repression

Middle class Victorian Europe was sexually repressed


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no birth control
avoid pleasures
women do not like sex


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husbands did not want to force their wives
often visited prostitutes
“inability of men to love where they lusted and lust
where they loved”
Childhood sexuality

At first Freud believed hysteria was due to
childhood seduction

Because his patients reliably told stories of being
seduced by their father


Historians now believe that he either forced these ideas
on his patients, or just made it all up
When they look at his early publications there is no
mention of father’s sexually abusing their children,

There is sexual abuse
 By other slightly older children
 By non-related men that served as guardians for these
children

Later he rejected the idea that hysteria was
the result of childhood sexual abuse.



said his patients were making it up
father’s would have to be perverse
Developed the idea that hysteria was due to
childhood fantasies of a sexual nature. Often
involving the opposite sex parent

These are unconscious fantasies. The Child is not
aware that they are having them
The childhood fantasy idea

Supposedly developed from Freud
psychoanalyzing himself.

Memory at age 2 1/2 - lusting for his
mother, and fearing his father would find
out


Oedipus Complex
More likely that Freud stole the idea
from his friend Wilhelm Fliess
Consequences of the
Seduction Fantasy Concept

Freud ceased to see the causes of
neurotic suffering in his patients’ lives



He felt the causes resided in their mental
lives
He became insensitive to the actual life
problems faced by his patients.
Here are a couple of case studies that
illustrate his new attitude
The case of Dora

Shortness of breath and a persistent cough


Diagnosed as hysteria
Dora’s father was having an affair with his best
friend’s wife (Frau K).


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Dora’s mother suffered from housewife psychosis
according to Freud.
Herr. K (Dora’s father’s friend) grasped Dora and
kissed her when she was 13. He made further
sexual advances toward her when she was 15.
Freud said she secretly lusted for Herr K


playing with her purse - masturbation wish
coughing - wish to perform fellatio
The basics of Freud

The mind is like an iceberg



To Freud most of our personality was hidden
beneath the surface - like an iceberg.
Our conscious awareness floats above the surface.
Below the surface is the much larger unconscious
region containing thoughts, wishes, feelings, and
memories of which we are largely unaware.
The Unconscious

Although the unconscious is hidden from our
conscious awareness it powerfully influences
us.

Could see it in:

free associations


dreams



Shoes  Clothes, Clothes  Closet, Closet  Hidden,
Hidden  Secrets .... Etc.
manifest content (remembered content)
latent content (their hidden meaning)
 Often discovered through free association
slips of the tongue

“please do not give me any bills; I cannot swallow them”
Personality structure

Personality arises from a conflict
between our aggressive, pleasure
seeking biological impulses and the
social restraints against them.

This conflict centers on three interacting
systems
The id

The only completely unconscious
structure


strives to satisfy basic drives to survive,
reproduce, and aggress
the pleasure principle - seeking
immediate gratification.

Like a new born infant that cries whenever
some basic need is not met immediately
The ego

As personality develops the young child
learns to cope with the real world.

The reality principle- try to satisfy the id’s
impulses in realistic ways - ways that will have
good long term consequences.


What would happen if we went with every animal like
whim?
it is a mediator

tries to balance the impulsive demands of the id, the
restraining demands of the superego, and the real life
demands of the external world.
The superego

Around age 4 or 5 the child begins to
recognize the voice of the superego.

Your conscience – idealistic principle



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Forces the ego to not only recognize the real, but also
the ideal.
It is a perfectionist, judging actions and producing
feelings of pride or guilt
A strong superego- produces a virtuous person
that is probably guilt ridden.
A week superego - produces a person who is selfindulgent and remorseless
The ego tries to reconcile the id’s and
superego’s opposing demands

A chaste person who is sexually
attracted to someone may satisfy both
the id and superego demands by joining
a volunteer organization to work with
the desired person.
Stages of psychosexual
development

According to Freud, psychosexual interest
begins in infancy


psychosexual pleasure = all strong, pleasant
excitement arising from body stimulation.
People have psychosexual energy which he
called libido.

It begins in an infant’s mouth and flows to other
parts of the body as the child grows older.
Five stages of psychosexual
development

If normal sexual development is
blocked or frustrated a person can
become fixated with that stage which
causes certain personality
characteristics.
1. The oral stage (birth to
about one year)


The infant derives intense psychosexual
pleasure form stimulation of the mouth,
particularly while sucking the mother’s breast
If you get fixated you get great pleasure from
eating, drinking, smoking, or talking, and may
have concerns with dependence and
independence.
2. The anal stage

About 1 to 3 years old.

Get psychosexual pleasure from stimulation of the
anal sphincter, the muscle that controls bowel
movements.

If you get fixated here you go through life trying to hold
things back - anal retentive


Orderly, stingy, and stubborn (the typical anal person)
less well known is that Freud thought it could also go the
other way - anal expulsive

Very messy
3. The Phallic stage

At about age 3 - 5


children begin to play with their genitals.
Become sexually attracted to the opposite-sex parent.

Boys have the Oedipus complex.




Fear their father will castrate them because they are attracted to
their mother.
Girls have the Electra complex and penis envy
These ideas have not been supported in developmental
psychology
If fixated in the phallic stage,

people can be flirtatious, vane, promiscuous, excessively
chaste, or have a disorder of gender role.
4. The latent Period

Age 5 or 6 to puberty.


Children enter a latent period and suppress
their sexual interest.
Children play with peers of their own sex.
5. The genital stage

Begins at puberty



begin to have a strong sexual interest in
other people.
If you are not fixated at an earlier stage,
you have plenty of energy left for
satisfaction from sexual intercourse.
If you are fixated, you have little energy
left for this stage.
Defense mechanisms


If the ego cannot find a way to mediate
the drives of the id and demands of the
superego then conflict and anxiety will
result.
Freud believed that people use defense
mechanisms to protect themselves from
this anxiety.
Types of defense mechanisms

Repression - motivated forgetting.

Not remembering traumatic aspects of certain
events



People who do not remember childhood sexual abuse
This is why we do not remember our childhood
lust for our parents.
Repression is often incomplete and our repressed
urges often seep out in our dreams, and slips of
the tongue
Denial

The refusal to believe information that
provokes anxiety


This can’t be happening
Alcoholics often deny that they have a
problem.


I can quit if I want to
Sometimes people who have
experienced a spinal cord injury deny
that they will never walk again
Rationalization


An attempt to hide the real reason for
your actions from yourself.
An attempt to prove that your actions
are rational and justifiable.


I won’t study because it doesn’t do me any
good anyway (his tests are too hard).
I don’t have a drinking problem, I just like
to have a few drinks with my friends.

“Just to be sociable”
Displacement

Diverting behavior or thought away
from the real target to a less
threatening target.


Getting mad at your boss.
Go home and kick the dog.
Regression

A return to a lower stage of
psychosexual development.


First day of school a child may begin
sucking their thumb again
having a new sibling results in an older
child wetting the bed
projection

Attributing one’s own undesireable
characteristics to other people.


A person who harbors hostile thoughts to
others may think everyone is thinking bad
things about them
A person who secretly likes pornography
may say that the world is just filled up with
perverts that like porn.
Reaction formation

Presenting oneself as opposite of what you
really are.

A person who constantly says that they hate
homosexuality, may actually have homosexual
tendencies.


American Beauty.
A person who aggressively opposes premarital
sex, may be secretly promiscuous, or at least think
about it all the time.
Sublimation

Transforming sexual aggressive
energies into culturally acceptable, even
admirable, behaviors.


Transforming sexual desires into paintings,
sculptures, or music without admitting it’s
existence.
Secretly aggressive person becomes a
surgeon, so they can satisfy their id’s
desire to cut people up