Personality:
• Personality is defined as the unique pattern of relatively stable
behaviours and mental processes that characterize an individual
and how he or she interacts with their environment
• Influenced by genetics (dispositions or temperament 40 – 60%)
• Influenced by environment (development in the context of family
and culture)
It is rare for siblings to have the same personality, as they compete for
resources
Younger children tend to develop a more social personality
Independent thinking is advocated in individualist cultures, whereas group
harmony is more important in collectivist cultures
• We often use vernacular terms to describe personality (e.g.
intelligent, extroverted, conscientious, pleasant, moody)
Psychologists are interested in:
• Characterizing and describing personality traits
• Studying the relationship between personality traits and behaviour
• Understanding and predicting behaviour from personality traits (e.g.
forensics, personnel selection)
Approaches to Personality:
• Descriptive (Trait theories)
Articulates what is observed and places little emphasis on explaining the
observed behaviours
1 • Biological or genetic (Dispositional theories)
• Learning (Behavioural and Cognitive social learning theories)
• Psychodynamic
• Humanistic , Existential or Phenomenological
The humanistic perspective assumes that people have free will and that
they continuously make choices
The existential philosophy assumes that people are entirely free and thus
responsible for what they make of themselves
The phenomenological philosophy is based on the premise that reality
consists of objects and events as they are perceived or understand in
individual consciousness and not of anything independent of human
consciousness
• Each approach has it own set of assumptions about the determinates
of personality
• Many forms of psychological illness are attributed to dysfunctional
personality and personality development
Thus, different forms of therapy often follow different approaches
Early approaches to understanding personality:
• Initial attempts to identify personality traits involved studying the
English language for terms describing human behaviour
• There are approximately 18,000 terms describing behaviour (5% of
the English language)
Dispositional theories:
2 • Earliest theories of personality were dispositional theories, which
assume that personality is made up of stable, long-lasting behavioural
tendencies, dispositions or temperaments
• Dispositional theories originate with Hippocrates, the ancient Greek
considered to be the father of modern medicine
• Hippocrates proposed humoural theory
The theory states that the body consists of 4 basic humours or fluids:
blood, phlegm, black bile, yellow bile
The relative proportion of each humour in anyone’s body determines
disposition or temperament
Body fluid Temperament Characteristics of too much
blood sanguine optimistic, hopeful
phlegm phlegmatic calm
black bile melancholic depression
yellow bile choleric hot headed, irritable
Modern dispositional theories:
Sheldon (1940-1950) believed that personality and physique were
related
Physique Description Characteristics
Endomorphic soft, round viscerotonic (relaxed, sociable)
Mesomorphic muscular energetic assertive
Ectomorphic thin, tall, fragilcerebrotonic (restrained, fearful,
introverted, artistic)
Problems with dispositional theories:
3 • too simplistic
• generate stereotypes and prejudices
• provide very little explanation as to why one has a particular
personality
• assume personality stable (most stable traits have r = 0.5-0.7,
meaning that 25-49% of personality may be determined by the
aforementioned dispositions)
Other Modern theories of personality:
• Trait theory
• Psychodynamic theory
• Learning theory (Behavioural and Cognitive social learning)
• Humanistic theory (Phenomenological, Existential)
• Note that it is difficult to find someone who is totally committed to
any specific theory
Today, personality theorists tend to be eclectic (deriving ideas or style
from a broad and diverse range of sources)
4 Trait theory:
• Personality and behaviour controlled by a wide variety of relatively
stable personality traits e.g., dependency, aggressiveness, gentleness,
thoughtfulness
• Trait theory is really an expression of an empirical methodology
• Trait theory in its purest form does not provide a mechanism for
explaining behaviour, only a set of descriptions of behaviour
• Personality determined by a combination of traits
• Trait theories largely based on studies using factor analysis, a
statistical technique for determining intercorrelations amongst item
(trait) variables
• Different statistical criteria for establishing trait factors can lead to
different numbers of personality factors being identified
E.g. Cattell identified 16 personality factors, while Gall identified 37
Eysenck (1960's):
• Eysenck was a trait theorist who extended trait theory beyond being
simply an empirical description of personality
• He believed personality traits are based primarily on learning
(classical and operant conditioning) and, to a lesser extent, on genetic
factors
• Eysenck identified 2 primary dimensions to personality by means of
factor analysis
Neuroticism (emotional stability)
Introversion/extroversion (inward vs. outward view on world)
5 Factor Analysis
Introversion ←−−−−−−→ Extraversion
Dimension
• Retiring • Outgoing and talkative
• Reserved (factor) • Wants many friends
• Likes solitary activities • Enjoys parties
• Does not parties • Disliked solitary activities
• Dominates social situations
• Eysenck’s personality circle appears similar to the four personality
types first proposed by Hippocrates
6 • Introverts are more easily conditioned and develop behaviours that
show susceptibility to conditioning (e.g. anxiety and depression)
Big Five:
Acronym OCEAN
• Openness to experience
• Conscientiousness
• Extroversion
• Agreeableness
• Emotional stability (neuroticism)
Low Scorers High Scorers
Loner Joiner
Quiet Talkative
Extroversion Passive Active
Reserved Affectionate
7 Suspicious Trusting
Agreeableness Critical Lenient
Ruthless Soft-hearted
Irritable Good-natured
Neglig
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