Chapter 4
Theoretical and Measurement Issues in Trait Psychology
Theoretical Issues
• Meaningful Differences Between Individuals
• Consistency Over Time
• Consistency Across Situations
• Person-Situation Interaction
• Aggregation
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Meaningful Differences
Between Individuals
• There are meaningful differences between
individuals (traits psychology is also called
differential psychology)
• _____________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________
• Emphasizes how much a given individual differs from
average
• According to trait psychologists, every personality is the
product of a combination of a few basic, primary traits
• By combining a few primary traits in various amounts, it is
possible to distill the unique qualities of every individual
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Consistency Over Time
• Research indicates consistency over time for
broad traits
• e.g., intelligence, emotional reactivity, impulsiveness,
shyness, and aggression show high test-rest correlations,
even across years or decades between measurements
• (attitudes, interests, and opinions are less consistent over
time)
• People can still change in important behavioral ways
throughout adulthood, especially after encountering some
important ______________________
• _____________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________
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Consistency Over Time
• ______________________________________________
______________________________________________
______________________________________________
• Example: Disagreeableness
• As a child, a highly disagreeable person might be prone to
temper tantrums, etc. As an adult, a disagreeable person
might be difficult to get along with and hence might have
trouble sustaining personal relationships and holding down a
job
• -0.45 correlation between throwing temper tantrums in childhood
and being able to hold a job as an adult 20 years later
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Consistency Over Time
• How can there be consistency in a trait if it is
known to change with age?
• e.g., activity level, impulsiveness, sociopathy
• May be explained by the concept of ____________________
• If all people show a decrease in a particular trait at the same
rate over time, they might still maintain the rank order
relative to each other
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Consistency Across
Situations
• Trait psychologists traditionally assumed crosssituation consistency
• Although the evidence for consistency in traits over time is
substantial, ________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________
_
• Example: “friendliness”
• Even very friendly people are not friendly in every situation (at least not
to the same degree)
• It may be that a particular situation exerts an influence on how friendly most
people will likely be (e.g., party vs. library)
• If situations mainly control how people behave, then the existence
or relevance of traits is questionable
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Consistency Across
Situations
• Research supports low cross-situation consistency
across multiple traits (e.g., honesty, helpfulness, selfcontrol)
• ___________________ published a groundbreaking book
titled Personality and Assessment
• Suggested that personality psychologists should abandon their
efforts to explain behavior with traits, focusing instead on
situations
• ________________________ – If behavior varies across situations then
situational differences, and not personality traits, determine
behavior
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Consistency Across
Situations
• Mischel’s (1968) critique encouraged debate in
personality psychology about the importance of
traits compared to situations in causing behavior
• Both sides tempered views:
• Trait psychologists acknowledged the importance of
situations
• Situationists acknowledged the importance of traits
• Debate led to two lasting changes:
• Person-Situation Interaction
• Aggregation
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Person-Situation Interaction
• Two possible explanations for behavior:
• Behavior is a function of personality traits
• Behavior is a function of situation
• Integration  Person-Situation Interaction
• _____________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________
• Example: A person with the trait “hot temper”
• Acquaintances of this person may not be aware of this trait if they
never encountered the person dealing with a frustrating situation
• e.g., vending machine = person-situation interaction between a
particular personality trait (e.g., hot temper) and situation (e.g.,
frustration)
• _____________________________________________________
• e.g., if the situation is frustrating, and if the person has a hot
temper, then aggression will be the result
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Person-Situation Interaction
• Differences between people make a difference only
under certain circumstances
• Situational Specificity – ___________________________
____________________________________________________
• e.g., test anxiety trait
• Certain situations can provoke behavior that is out of
character for an individual
• Some trait-situation interactions are rare because of the
kinds of situations that elicit behavior related to those
traits are themselves rare
• *Personality psychologists no longer try to predict “all
of the people all of the time.” _______________________
____________________________________________________
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Person-Situation Interaction
• Strong situation – _____________________________
________________________________________________
• e.g., grief following loss of loved one
• When situations are weak or ambiguous, _________
________________________________________________
• Perhaps because it requires us to interpret the actions,
motives, and intentions of others (or events)
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Person-Situation Interaction
• Three additional ways in which personality and
situation interact to produce behavior
• Selection
• ________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________
• *Situations can also influence persons just as much as persons can
influence situations
• Evocation
• The reactions we produce in others, often quite
unintentionally; _________________________________________
__________________________________________________________
• Manipulation
• Various means by which people influence the behavior of
others; tactics of manipulation vary with personality
• *entails altering those environments already inhabited (selection
is choosing existing environments)
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Aggregation
• ______________________________________________
______________________________________________
______________________________________________
______________________________________________
• Longer tests are more reliable than shorter ones
and are better measures of traits
• ______________________________________________
______________________________________________
______________________________________________
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Aggregation
• ______________________________________________
______________________________________________
• i.e., at any given time, for any given behavior, many
factors influence why a person does one thing and not
another
• ______________________________________________
______________________________________________
• i.e., a person’s traits can “fluctuate” over time
• e.g., even a friendly person may occasionally appear distant,
irritable, etc. (may be feeling sick; received bad news)
• Thus, personality psychologists will never be good
at predicting single acts on single occasions
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Measurement Issues
• Trait approach relies on ________________________
to measure personality
• Personality psychologists assume that people
differ in the _____________ of various traits, and so
a key measurement issue is determining
_______________ of a trait person has
• Traits are often represented as dimensions along
which people differ
• Trait psychologists are aware of and address
circumstances that affect accuracy, reliability,
validity, and utility of self-report trait measures
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Measurement Issues
•
•
•
•
Carelessness
Faking On Questionnaires
Response Sets
*Barnum Statements
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Measurement Issues
• Carelessness
• Method for detecting such problems is an
_______________________________ embedded in test
• Infrequency scale contains items that most people answer in
a particular way
• If a participant answers differently than most, this suggests
carelessness
• Another method for detecting carelessness is to include
_________________________ spaced far apart in the
survey—if the person answers the same item differently,
this suggests carelessness
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Measurement Issues
• Faking On Questionnaires
• “Fake good”
• Attempt to appear better off or better adjusted than one is
• “Fake bad”
• Attempt to appear worse off or less adjusted than one is
• Method to detect is to a devise scale that, if answered in
particular way, suggests faking
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Measurement Issues
• Response Sets
• ___________________________
• Tendency to agree with items, regardless of content;
psychologists counteract by reverse-keying some items
• ___________________________
• Tendency to give endpoint responses
• ___________________________
• Tendency to answer items in such a way so that one comes
across as socially attractive or likable
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Measurement Issues
• ________________________
• These are statements that could apply to anyone
(generality statements)
• e.g., astrology predictions, “personality” websites
• Examples:
• “You sometimes have doubts about whether you have done the
right thing.”
• “You have a need for others to like or admire you.”
• “Although you are able to deal with confrontation in a pinch,
you typically like to avoid it if you can.”
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Summary and Evaluation
• Hallmark of trait perspective is the emphasis on the
differences between people
• Traits psychologists assume that people will be relatively
constant over time and across situations in behaviors,
because of their differences in various traits
• Traits are more likely to influence a person’s behavior when
the situation is weak and ambiguous and doesn’t push for
conformity from all people
• Personality traits refer to the average tendencies in behavior
• Trait psychologists are interested in the accuracy of
measurement
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