Bell Work
• What was Bandura’s study?
More Psychoanalysis
Freud believed that personality was almost
completely formed by age 5 or 6, when the Oedipal
Conflict is resolved and the Superego is formed. He
also believed that there were two primary sources
of influence on personality: (1) traits that develop
as a result of fixations, and (2) the relative strengths
of the id, ego, and superego.
Freud's Early Exploration into
the Unconscious
• Used hypnosis and free
association (relax and
say it all) to delve into
unconscious.
• Mapped out the “mental
dominoes” of the patients
past in a process he
called psychoanalysis.
Freud
• Implausible, unvalidated, or contradicted by
new research
• Nevertheless, Freud drew psychology's
attention to the unconscious, to the struggle
to cope with anxiety and sexuality, and to the
conflict between biological impulses and
social restraints. His cultural impact has been
enormous.
Neo-Freudians
• Psychologists that took some premises from
Freud and built upon them.
Alfred Adler
Karen Horney
Carl Jung
Alfred Adler
• Childhood is important
to personality.
• But focus should be on
social factors--not sexual
ones.
• Our behavior is driven by
our efforts to conquer
inferiority and feel
superior.
• Inferiority Complex
Karen Horney
• Childhood anxiety is caused by a dependent child’s
feelings of helplessness.
– This triggers our desire for love and security.
• Fought against Freud’s “penis envy” concept.
Carl Jung
• Less emphasis on social
factors.
• Focused on the
unconscious.
– We all have a collective
unconscious: a shared,
inherited reservoir of
memory traces from our
species' history. A
storehouse of memory
traces inherited from
our ancestral past, which
includes not only the
racial history of mankind
but also of prehumans
and animals.
Carl Jung
• Analytical psychology
• Life is a series of periods identified by different uses of
psychic energy. People reach one of the most
important points in their late thirties or early forties.
The energy used earlier in youthful interests and
pursuits is transferred to more cultural and spiritual
interests. If the equilibrium of a person's energies is
upset at this period, he or she may be permanently
crippled psychologically.
– Jung's View of the Personality - Jung postulated two basic
personality types: the introvert and the extrovert.
– Archetypes - Inherited predispositions within the collective
unconscious to respond to specific events with great
emotion.
• Anima-female
• Animus-male
Idiographic Theorists
• Idiographic-Subjective
– Idios-”own” or “private”
• Nomothetic-Objective
• Using the same set of
traits to classify everyone
is impossible.
• Each person may have a
few traits that are unique
to them (selfish may be
important to describe one
person but not another).
• Gordon Allport and his
cardinal dispositions (also
central and secondary).
Allport & Traits
• Cardinal trait - This is the trait that dominates
and shapes a person's behavior. These are the
ruling passions/obsessions, such as a need for
money, fame etc.
• Central trait - This is a general characteristic
found in some degree in every person. These
are the basic building blocks that shape most
of our behavior although they are not as
overwhelming as cardinal traits. An example of
a central trait would be honesty.
• Secondary trait - These are characteristics
seen only in certain circumstances (such as
particular likes or dislikes that a very close
friend may know). They must be included to
provide a complete picture of human
complexity.
Trait
• A characteristic of
behavior or a
disposition to feel
and act as assessed
by self-reported
inventories or peer
reports.
Assessing Our Traits
• Personality Inventories: a questionnaire
where people respond to items attempting
to gauge different aspects of their
personality
Trait Theory Criticism
• Do NOT take into
account the
importance of the
situation.
Ms. Beam’s Freshman PE class
Behaviorist Theory of Personality
• The way most people
think of personality
is meaningless.
• Personality changes
according to the
environment
(reinforcers and
punishments).
• If you change
environment, then
you change the
personality.
Biological Theories of Personality
• What % of
personality is
inherited –
heritability?
• We are not sure
BUT
temperaments do
seem to be stable
from infants to
old age.
Humorism
• Ancient Greek & Romans
• Blood-sanguine;
courageous, hopeful,
playful, carefree
• Yellow Bile-choleric;
ambitious, leader-like,
restless, easily angered
• Black Bile-melancholic;
despondent, quiet,
analytical, serious
• Phlegm-phlegmatic; calm
thoughtful, patient,
peaceful
Somatotype Theory
• A biological theory by
William Sheldon.
• Endomorphs (fat)
tend to be friendly
and outgoing.
• Mesomorphs
(muscular) tend to be
more aggressive.
• Ectomorphs (thin)
tend to be more shy
and secretive.
• Study has not been
replicated.
Humanistic Theory of Personality
• Do not believe in
determinism (your
actions are dictated by
your past).
• They believe that
humans have free will
(our ability to choose
your own destiny).
• We are innately good
and as long as our selfesteem and selfconcept are positive we
will be happy.
Humanistic Psychology
• In the 1960’s people
became sick of Freud’s
negativity and trait
psychology’s objectivity.
•Along came psychologists
wanted to focus on
“healthy” people and how to
help them strive to “be all
that they can be”.
Abraham Maslow’s Self Actualizing
Person
• Hierarchy
of Needs
•Ultimately seek self- actualization (the
process of fulfilling our potential).
•Maslow developed his ideas by studying
what he termed “healthy people”.
Who did Maslow study?
Self-Actualized People
•They are self aware and
self accepting
•Open and spontaneous
•Loving and caring
•Not paralyzed by others’
opinions.
•They are secure in who they are.
Self-Actualized People
• Problem-centered rather than self-centered.
Focus their energies on a particular task.
Few deep relationships, rather than many
superficial ones.
Carl Rogers
• Humanist
• The object of humans is to
become self-actualized.
• We are like Acorns
• What do Acorns need to
grow?
– Water sun and soil.
• Except to grow into
healthy humans we need:
– Genuineness
– Acceptance
(Unconditional Positive
Regard)
– Empathy
Genuineness
• Being open with
your own feelings.
•Dropping your
facade.
•Being transparent
and self-disclosing.
Acceptance
• Unconditional
Positive Regard:
An attitude of
acceptance regardless
of circumstances.
Accepting yourself or
others completely.
Empathy
• Listening, sharing, understanding and
mirroring feelings and reflecting their
meanings.
Self-Concept
• All of thoughts and feelings about ourselves trying to answer the
question…. WHO AM I?
• Both Rogers and Maslow believed that your self-concept is at the
center of your personality.
•If our self concept is positive….
We tend to act and perceive the world positively.
•If our self-concept is negative….
We fall short of our “ideal self” and feel
dissatisfied and unhappy
How does a Humanistic psychologist
test your personality?
• You would be asked to fill out a questionnaire
asking to describe yourself both as you would
ideally like to be and what you actually are.
When the ideal self and the way you currently see
yourself are alike- you are generally happy.
Assessing your Self-Concept
ME
Ideal Self
Self-Serving Bias
• A readiness to
perceive oneself
favorable.
•People accept more
responsibility for
successes than
failures.
•Most people see
themselves as better
than average.
Social-Cognitive Theories on
Personality
• Focus on how we
interact with our
culture and
environment
• Reciprocal
Determinism (traits,
environment and
behavior all interact
and influence each
other.)
Bandura is Back
• Social cognitive theory stems from social
learning theory (under the umbrella of
behaviorism).
Behaviorism (as introduced by Watson)
supports a direct and unidirectional pathway
between stimulus and response, representing
human behavior as a simple reaction to
external stimuli.
Social Cognitive Perspective
Different People choose different
environments.
The TV you
watch, friends
you hang with,
music you listen
to were all
chosen by you
(your
disposition)
But after you choose the environment, it also shapes you.
Social Cognitive Perspective
• Our personalities help create situations to
which we react.
If I expect someone to be
angry with me, I may give
that person the cold
shoulder, creating the very
behavior I expect.
Personal Control
• Our sense of controlling our
environment rather than the
environment controlling us.
Social-Cognitive Theories on
Personality
• Internal Locus
of Control
• External Locus
of Control
• External Locus
of Control can
lead to a state
of learned
helplessness.
Be careful of the Barnum Effect!!!
• People have the
tendency to see
themselves in
vague, stock
descriptions of
personality.
• Horoscopes,
astrologers, and
psychics all use
this concept.