Personality

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Personality
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What are the perspectives on personality?

• Psychoanalytic
• Humanistic
• Trait
• Social cognitive
• The self

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Psychoanalytic perspective

• Sigmund Freud
• The mind is like an iceberg
• Conscious
• (Above the water)
• Unconscious
• Larger
• (Below the water)
• Thoughts
• Feelings
• Memories

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Freuds personality theory

• Id Pleasure principle
• Sex violence
• Hedonistic
• Ego Reality principle
• Mediates between Id and Superego
• Superego conscious
• Pride and guilt

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Freuds personality iceberg
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Ego defense mechanisms

• Repression
• Underlies all other defense mechanisms
• Keeps repressed urges (e.g. incest) from becoming
  conscious
• Regression
• Retreating to an earlier, more infantile stage of
  development
• Reaction formation
• Doing the opposite of what you actually feel
• Inadequate feelings become bravado
• I hate him becomes I love him
• Makes unacceptable impulses more acceptable

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Ego defense mechanisms (Cont.)

• Projection
• Projecting your unacceptable impulses to others
• E.g. He is lying like everyone else.
• Rationalization
• Thinking up socially acceptable reasons for your
  negative behavior.
• E.g. I only steal from rich people
• Displacement
• Diverts sexual or aggressive energies toward a
  more acceptable target.
• E.g. Mad child kicks the pet.

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How do we evaluate the unconscious?

• Projective tests
• Ambiguous stimuli that people project
  information onto
• E.g. describe or tell a story
• Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)
• Patient makes up a story based on ambiguous
  pictures
• Rorschach Test
• 10 inkblots - people discuss what they see in the
  inkblots
• Designed to identify peoples inner unconscious
  feelings
• Not successful in predicting behavior or diagnosis

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What is the Humanistic Perspective?

• The self concept - Who am I
• A basic focus of the Humanistic perspective
• Maslows Self-actualization
• People strive for self-actualization
• To be the best you can be
• After other needs are met for physiological,
  safety, love, and self-esteem

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Humanistic Perspective (cont.)

• Carl Rogers - Person Centered Perspective
• Unconditional positive regard
• If we feel accepted, we will be more open and
  expressive.

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What is the Trait Perspective?

• Traits Characteristic behaviors or disposition
• E.g. shy, outgoing, friendly, aggressive
• Myers-Briggs type indicator
• Describes personalities in complimentary terms

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Trait Perspective (cont.)

• MMPI Minnesota Multiphasic Personality
  Inventory
• Most widely used personality inventory
• Used to identify emotional disorders

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MMPI Minnesota Multiphasic Personality
Inventory
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What is the Social Cognitive Perspective?

• How does learning thinking society influence
  each other?
• Reciprocal Determinism
• Albert Bandura
• Behavior, internal personal factors, and the
  environment all operate to determine each other.

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Reciprocal Determinism
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Locus of control

• Internal locus of control
• I personally control my destiny.
• External locus of control
• Outside forces which I can not control determine
  my destiny.

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What is Learned Helplessness?

• Repeatedly faced with traumatic events over which
  people have no control, people feel helpless,
  hopeless, and depressed.

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Exploring your self concept

• Benefits of positive self esteem
• More persistent at tasks
• Less likely to use drugs and conform to group
  pressure
• Happier
• Self serving bias
• We like to perceive ourselves favorably
• We contribute successes to our own effort and
  failure to factors beyond our control.