Title: The trait paradigm, situationism and interactionism
1The trait paradigm,situationism and
interactionism
2What are traits or dispositions?
- Traits and language
- A trait is
- an aspect of personality that is reasonably
characteristic of a person and distinguishes him
in some way from many other people Morgan and
King - any enduring characteristic of a person that can
serve an explanatory role in accounting for the
observed regularities and consistencies in
behaviour - Reber - Types are trait clusters
- Ancient concept
- Modern trait approaches
- Psychometrics
- Nomothetic rather than idiographic
3Who are the key players in trait theory?
- Gordon Allport
- Raymond Cattell
- Hans Eysenck
- The Five Factor Model
- E.g., Costa and McCrae
- We will also discuss criticisms of the idea that
there are consistent and stable traits - Situationism
- Interactionism
4Gordon Allport
- Websters New International dictionary
- Personal dispositions
- Central dispositions
- Cardinal dispositions
- Ones ruling passion
- Common traits
- Functional autonomy
5Factor analysis and personality theory
- Correlations address the extent to which one
variable relates to another - Factor analysis extracts patterns from a set of
correlations - Factors have loadings onto variables
- Cattell was a big proponent of factor analysis
- 3 types of data
- Q data
- L data
- O-T data
6Cattells original 12 factors
- A Cyclothymia-schizothymia (sociability)
- B Intelligence
- C Emotionally mature stable character (ego
strength) - D Hypersensitive infantile emotionality
(excitability) - E Dominance-submission
- F Surgency-Desurgency
- G Positive Character integration (superego
strength) - H Adventureousness (parmia)
- I Sensitiveness (premsia)
- J Neurasthenia
- K Trained cultural mind-boorishness
- L Surgent cyclothymia-paranoia
7Cattells 16
- Outgoing-reserved
- More/less intelligent
- Stable-emotional
- Assertive-humble
- Happy go lucky- sober
- Conscientious-expedient
- Venturesome-shy
- Tender minded- tough minded
- Suspicious-trusting
- Imaginative- practical
- Shrewd-forthright
- Apprehensive- placid
- Experimenting-conservative
- Self sufficient group tied
- Controlled- casual
- Tense-relaxed
Fiskes research (1949) could not reproduce 16
factors found only 5.
8A hierarchy of factors
- Factors can be oblique or orthogonal
Exvia-invia
Anxiety
A B C D E F G H I J K L
M N O Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4
9Eysencks P-E-N
- Extraversion
- Outgoing, assertive, etc.
- Neuroticism
- Emotional instability
- Psychoticism
- Tendency toward psychopathology, including
impulsivity and cruelty
10Eysencks hierarchical organisation of personality
- Type level, e.g., extraversion or introversion
- Trait level, e.g., sociability
- Habitual response level
- Specific response level
11Eysencks concept of extraversion
extraversion
Sensation -seeking
Lively
Sociable
Active
Assertive
carefree
dominant
surgent
venturesome
12Eysencks biological perspective on E-I
- Personality is influenced by genetic makeup
- Drives differences in the autonomic nervous
system - 1. level of ANS activity
- 2. different balance between excitation and
inhibition in the cortex ARAS - Introverts have cortices that are over aroused
- Easy to condition
- Extraverts have cortices that are under aroused
- Difficult to condition
13Evidence for extraversion
- FMRI study
- E is related to the reward system in the brain
- Introverts are more sensitive to pain, more
easily fatigued, etc. - Extraverts have a shorter attention span than
introverts (Rim, 1977) - Depressant drugs (alcohol) produce extroverted
effects - Stimulants produce introverted effects (Eysenck,
1970) - Extroverts are more likely to smoke and
introversts are more likely to drink - Extroverts are more sexually active
(stimulation-seeking) - Parapsychology and Eysencks theory
- Extraverts would perform better at ESP
- Extraversion is increasing among college students
14Neuroticism
- Anxious
- Depressed
- Irrational
- Guilt feelings
- Shy
- Moody
- Low self esteem
- emotional
- Tense
- N also has a biological explanation
- The level of ANS activity overall
- Over activity ? emotionally reactive
15Psychoticism
- More controversial aspect of Eysencks
personality construct - Related to psychopathology
- Distribution among normal population
- Relationship with creativity
- Unusual thinking and associations, etc.
- The notion of healthy schizotypy has recently
been revisited, e.g., Gordon Claridge, 1997
16Psychometric tests
- Maudsley Medical Questionnaire
- Eysenck Personality Inventory (EPI)
- Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ)
- Sensation Seeking Scale (with Zuckerman)
17The Big 5 or OCEAN
- Openness to experience
- Conscientiousness
- Extroversion
- Agreeableness
- Neuroticism
- Goldberg, 1990
- John, 1990
- McCrae Costa, 1985
- Norman, 1963
5
18Evidence for and Applications of the Big 5
- Good evidence that trait dimensions do exist
- Applications
- parenting, career, health, relationships, etc.
- extrasensory perception
- Openness to experience, extraversion
- Are five factors enough to explain personality?
19Spirituality as the 6th dimension?
- What is spirituality?
- Ralph Piedmont (e.g., 1999) argues that
spirituality is the 6th dimension of personality - Cross culturally valid
- Applied context
- Spiritual transcendence (ST) facilitates
emotional adjustment and resilience in people
with arthritis - ST is a predictor of psychosocial outcomes from
substance abuse, etc
20Mischels criticism of traits
- In 1968, Mischel published a criticism of
traditional personality theory - Psychoanalytic theory and trait theory
- Traits fail to predict behaviour in real life
- Situations may be more powerful than internal
traits - The person-situation controversy
- The .30 barrier
- Inherent problems in measurement that construct
correlations between different traits
21To what extent is personality continuous/consisten
t across time?
- Consistency over time/longitudinal consistency
stability - Good evidence of longitudinal stability (Block
Conley) - Short term reliability, longer term variability
- Personality changes little after age 30 (Costa
and MCrae, 1990) - Methodological considerations
- E.g., spouse ratings versus alterations in self
concept (C M, 1980), peer ratings versus self
ratings (Haan, 1981) - Some people change a lot, others do not change at
all - Patterns from childhood can often predict later
behaviour - What about the influence of the ageing process?
22To what extent is personality continuous/consisten
t across situations?
- The power of the situation is sometimes so
strong that it overrides our inclinations - E.g., reactions to traumatic events, e.g, the
sinking of the titanic - culturally accepted and encouraged behaviour
- Nazi Germany
- Consistency over situations consistency
- Inconsistencies across situations
- Dudycha (1936) punctuality is inconsistent
- Bouchard et al assertiveness is inconsistent
- Coie curiosity is inconsistent
- Paulus and Martin - Flexibility is inconsistent
- Currand et al Social anxiety is inconsistent
- Trait theorists defend themselves
- The notion of aggregation
- Epsteins (1983) findings with wider ranges of
behaviour and situations - Variability and situational specificity
- Funder and Colvin, 1991 - People express the same
trait differently in various situations
23Dudycha, 1936
24Interactionism
- Moderator variables
- E.g., gender
- Person x situations
- Moos (1969)
- Traits as genotypes
- Individual structure of a trait (Bem and Allen,
1974) - Person x mode
- Trait relevance
- Metatraits
- Which types of situation minimise or maximise the
expression of traits? - Measuring the personality of situations
25summary and conclusions about traits and
dispositions
- Traits are a valuable construct for understanding
human personality - Not clear how many there are
- 3, 5, 6, 16?
- Differences in theorists approaches
- theory driven (deductive) versus data driven
(inductive) - Support for traits from biological perspective
and applications to real world - Criticisms
- Situationism
- A nomothetic approach does not capture what it is
to be a unique person