Personality Questions Addressed How did Freud develop psychoanalysis

Personality

Questions Addressed • • • How did Freud develop psychoanalysis? What personality traits are most basic? Do we learn our personality? Is everyone basically good? How do psychologists measure personality?

What Is Personality? • Person’s enduring psychological and behavioral characteristics

Four Main Approaches to Personality • • Psychodynamic Trait Social-cognitive Phenomenological

Freud’s Psychodynamic Approach

Sigmund Freud • physician in Vienna, 1890 s, treating “neurotic” disorders. • dysfunctions tell us about normal development • “psychic determinism” • later behavior determined by earlier psychological development • emphasized unconscious aspects of personality

Method • Case Studies • free association (Freudian slip) • dream analysis • transference

Some Defense Mechanisms • • • Repression Rationalization Projection Reaction Formation Regression • • Sublimation Displacement Denial Compensation

Structure of Personality • Id (Pleasure Principle) • Eros (life instinct), Libido • Thanatos (death instinct) • Ego (Reality Principle) • defense mechanisms • Superego (Moralistic Principle) • cultural prescriptions, taboos

Ego’s Tyrannical Masters • Outside World • Id • Superego

Freud’s Conception of the Personality Structure

Psychosexual Stages • Oral Stage: Mouth object of pleasure. • can’t be neglected or overindulged. • Anal Stage: Anus object of pleasure. Ego develops to cope with socially appropriate behavior. • Toilet training

Psychosexual Stages • Phallic Stage: Genitals region object of pleasure. • Boys experience Oedipus complex • Little Hans • Girls experience Penis Envy • Seduction Theory • Latency Period: Sexual impulses stay in background.

Psychosexual Stages • Genital Stage: Sexual impulses reappear at conscious level; genitals again focus of sexual pleasure.

Assessing the Unconscious § Projective Tests § Ambiguous stimuli § Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) § personality revealed through stories created § Rorschach Inkblot § see meaning in pictures § Somewhat reliable, not completely junk science

TAT

Rorschach Inkblot Test

Neo-Freudians § Alfred Adler § importance of childhood social tension § Karen Horney § sought to balance Freud’s masculine biases § Carl Jung § emphasized the collective unconscious § shared, inherited reservoir of our species’ history § introversion/extraversion

Positives • Freud’s contributions: • • first comprehensive theory talk therapies defensive mechanisms new methods (projective tests)

Freud Negatives • Based almost entirely on a cases studies • Victorian cultural values (seduction theory) • distorted by personal biases • too sexualized • Untestable

The Trait Approach

Assumptions of Trait Approach • • relatively stable over time relatively stable across situations individual differences biologically based

Two Personality Profiles

Eysenck’s Personality Dimensions

Are There “Basic” Traits? What trait “dimensions” describe personality? Eysenck’s (1965) Expanded set of factors genetically determined “The Big 5” dimensions Extraversion/Introversion Emotional Stability/Instability 1980 s

The Big Five Openness Conscientiousness Extraversion Agreeableness Neuroticism • Imaginative/Practical • Independent/Conforming • Organized/Disorganized • Careful/Careless • Sociable/Retiring • Fun Loving/Sober • Soft-Hearted/Ruthless • Trusting/Suspicious • Anxious/Calm • Insecure/Secure

How Big 5 Discovered? • Adjective Checklist • Cattell’s 16 PF • Step 1: Give people long list of adjectives (loner, bright, dominant , shrewd, open, tense, cool) • Step 2: See if certain personality characteristics “cluster together” • Step 3: Check for agreement (friend’s rating, behavior) • Step 4: Crosscultural?

Martin Luther King (16 PF) High • • • Dominant Aggressive Assertive Stubborn competitive Bossy Average • • • Apprehensive Self-blaming Guilt Prone Insecure Worrying Dominant vs. Deferential Apprehensive vs. Self-assured

Big 5 (1980 s) • studies repeated with more powerful clustering methods and more adjectives • identified Big 5 • cross-cultural relevance high

Are Personality Traits Inherited? • personality is partly biologically determined. • biological factors interact with environmental factors to produce specific personality features.

Heritability • • • Openness: 57% Extraversion: 54% Conscientiousness: 49% Neuroticism: 48% Agreeableness: 42%

Evaluating the Trait Approach • better at describing than explaining • how trigger behavior? • how do traits combine to form a complex and dynamic individual? • how about other traits? • authoritarianism • perfectionism • etc.