Personality: Part 2 (power point text)
 What are Personality Traits?
 How would you describe your best friend? Your mother? Yourself?
 Traits –
Stable personality characteristics that are presumed to exist within the individual and guide his or her thoughts
and actions under various conditions (a characteristic pattern of behavior).
 A disposition to feel and act, as assessed by self-report inventories and peer reports and observations
 Pseudo personality assessments are very popular
 Made up assessments based on generalized information that fit just about everyone
 Widespread acceptance of vague and universal statements
 The Barnum effect
 Being readily disposed to accept generalization
 “always have a little something for everyone” and “there’s a sucker born every minute”.
 The fallacy of positive instances
 Tendency to notice and remember events that confirm our expectations and ignore those that are
nonconfirming
 Self-serving bias
 Prefer information that gives flattering descriptions and maintains a positive self image
 What is the Trait Perspective?
 Approaches to the study of Personality traits
 Why study personality traits?
 To describe how people differ
 To measure how they differ
 There is variation both within the individual and among individuals
 The study of personality traits has a long history
 From the Greek study of “humors” to twenty first century trait theory
 The Four Humors - Ancient Greeks (~2000 BC - 0 AD)
 Approaches to the study of Personality traits
 Jerome Kagan
 Temperament Studies
 Inherited, basic, pervasive personality dispositions that are apparent in early childhood and establish the
tempo and mood of an individual’s behaviors
 Genetic based neurotransmitter ‘cocktail’ mix accounts for differences among people (sadness, shyness,
anxiety)
 Research indicates 10-15% born shy, 10-15% born bold
 Kagan longitudinal study found 1st day temperament correlated with temperament 11 yrs later
 Approaches to the study of Personality traits
 Jerome Kagan
 Temperament Studies
 Is Biology destiny?
 If 10% are born shy, yet 40% of young adults are shy…..
 Shyness is also learned via life experiences
 Initially inherited characteristics can become amplified or muted
 Inherited temperament may only set the range of response to some life events
 Temperaments
 Temperament is not perfectly stable as genes don’t operate continuously but switch on and off during
development AND temperament can be modified by experience.
 Activity Level
Overall output of energy
vigor = intensity
tempo = speed; prefer fast-paced activities
 Sociability
Desire for other people's attention, to share activities, desire for the responsiveness and
stimulation that is part of social interaction
Value interacting with others
 Emotionality
Tendency to become physiologically aroused (easily and intensely) in upsetting situations
three emotions: distress, anger, fear (other emotions don't involve enough arousal to be
relevant to this
temperament)
 Approaches to the study of Personality traits
 Gordon Allport (1897-1967)
Believed in the individuality and uniqueness of the person and that people have consistent personalities.
Found 17,953 words to describe the way people are psychologically different from each other (e.g. shy, trustworthy,
laconic, phlegmatic, kind, conscientious, anxious, etc.)!
Studied categories of traits
 Individual: traits possessed by one person
 Common: traits possessed by many people
 Cardinal traits: One trait that dominates the person
 Central traits: small number of traits important traits that may affect many behaviours
 Secondary traits: many consistent traits which are not often exhibited
 Motivational traits: Very strongly felt traits
 Stylistic traits: Less strongly felt traits.
 RaymondCattell narrowed Allport and Odbert’s (1936) listing of 17,000+ words down to 4,500 words and then
narrowed these down further to 171 trait names. Cattell then collected self-ratings on these words and then
conducted factor analysis. He used both observer and behavioral data. The result was his 16 personality factors
(16 PF).
 Hans Eysenck (1916-1997)
 German psychologist who researched the genetically-influenced dimensions of personality
 Two major dimensions:
 Introversion/Extraversion
 Emotionally Unstable/Stable
 Assessing Traits
 Personality Inventory
 A questionnaire use to assess selected personality traits (often with true-false or agree-disagree items)
on which people respond to items designed to gauge a wide range of feelings and behaviors
 Reliability and validity are important attributes of good psychological tests
 A valid test is one that measures what it is designed to measure
 Assessing Traits
 Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI)
 Most widely researched and clinically used of all personality tests
 Originally developed to identify emotional disorders (considered its most appropriate use)
 Now used for many other screening purposes
 Does not measure enduring traits
 Contains 10 clinical scales (and lie scales
 Empirically derived
 a test developed by testing a pool of items and then selecting those that discriminate between
groups
 MMPI Test Profile
 Today’s trait researchers believe that Eysencks’ personality dimensions are too narrow and Cattell’s 16PF too
large
 A strong consensus has emerged since the mid-1980's about the number and nature of personality traits. Five
superordinate factors have emerged, often referred to to as the "Big Five" or the 5-factor model. These
presence of these five factors is well supported by a wide variety of research.
 The Big Five Personality FActors
The Big Five Theory and the NEO-PI (Big Five Inventory)
 A basic framework of personality, strongly believed to reveal fundamental aspects of human personality
 Factor analysis found 5 dominant personality factors/dimensions
 Each is bipolar describing a range of low to high on that trait
 Relatively accurate description of person based on specific position on trait dimension
 Validity across cultures
 Stability of personality across the lifespan
 Relationship of personality characteristics to physical health and various life events
 The Big “5”
 Each Supertrait is measured by 6 facets (or subordinate traits). These are:
 The Big Five Personality
 Big Five Research
 Questions about the Big Five
 Can We Predict Behavior based on Traits?
 Person-Situation Controversy
 Consistency and inconsistency in behavior
 Walter Mischel:
 We do not behave consistently from one situation to the next
 Knowledge of situation is more important in predicting behavior than knowing person’s
personality traits
 Gauge reinforcement contingencies and adjust behavior to the circumstances
 Trait theorists argue that behaviors from a situation may be different, but average behavior
remains the same. Therefore, traits matter.
Person-Situation Controversy
 Theoretical dispute concerning the relative contribution of personality factors and situational factors in
controlling behavior
 Personality variables have the greater effect on behavior when situational cues are weak or ambiguous.
 Less individual variation in behavioral responses when situations are strong and clear
 Not just personality (10% of factors affecting behavior)
 Not just situation (10% of factors affecting behavior)
 An interaction of situation and personality
 Evaluating Trait Theory
 Trait theory, especially the Big 5 model, is able to describe personality
 Cross-cultural human studies find good agreement for the Big 5 model in many cultures
 Even primate personality can be accurately described by the big 5 model system
 Some ability to predict behavior (work settings)
 Documented high level of personality stability after age 30
 Problems with trait theory include:
 Lack of explanation as to WHY traits develop
 Oversimplifies and leaves out important details
 Most traits are moderate
 Issue of explaining transient versus long-lasting traits
 Potential problem with self fulfilling prophecy
 Act as label suggest making it difficult to change
 May struggle with label and trait
 Review options
 Personality Type
 Type –
Especially important dimensions or clusters of traits that are not only central to a person’s personality but are
found with essentially the same pattern in many people
 The key function of type and trait theories of personality is to allow us to categorize people into a manageable
number of categories
 Myers Briggs Type Indicator
Given to over 2 million a year!
 Career counseling
 Relationship counseling
 Business and management
 Measures 4 dimensions of personality type
 *sensing - intuiting
 *introversion and extroversion,
 *thinking and feeling
 *judgment and perception
 Cautions
 Reliability issues
 Mixed validity
 There is little evidence that the test predicts occupational success
 Type may not be as fundamental as trait
 Do not rigidly interpret
 Use for exploration not life choices
 Exploring the self
 The self, as organizer of our feelings, actions, and thoughts is pivotal in understanding personality
 A vigorously researched topic
 The Center of Personality - Sense of Self
 Self Focus
 Motivation- Possible Self Hopes and Fears
 Explores visions of the self we dream of becoming
 Possible selves motivate us
 Help set goals
 Bring forth energy
 Self-Consciousness – Spotlight Effect
 Our tendency to overestimate others’ noticing and evaluating our appearance, performance,
and blunders
 Self-Reference – Memory
 The Center of Personality - Sense of Self
 Self-Serving Bias
 A readiness to perceive oneself favorable
 Self Esteem
 One’s feelings of high or low self-worth
 Avoid floccinaucinihilipilification
 Culture & Self-Esteem
People maintain their self-esteem even with a low status by valuing things they achieve and comparing themselves to
people with similar positions.