ch1 - Personality Theories
Defining Personality
The two types of personality varabities are dispositions and inner mental life. These two concepts are used to understand an individual and how they differ from one to another.
Dispositions
They are descriptors so basically used to describe someone.
This helps to show to understand an individual and see how they differ because using one of those terms
“Aniza is an impulsive person, she tends to overspend her money to buy whatever she desires in the moment without thinking of the consequences afterward.” This helps us to understand that she is impulsive with her money and that differ her from people who are not impulsive with their money.
There is two different types of dispositions; these personality tendencies are called enduring and distinctive
Enduring: The personality tendies are somewhat consistent.
An example is that you act oddly social with your friends but that doesn’t mean you are no longer an introverted person but your personality is suddenly social/outgoing with them.
Distinctive: The personality characteristic differentiate people from each other
An example of this is that in your new social setting that is seen as extraverted, your introverted personality is a characteristic that is a characteristic that differentiates you from the extraverted people.
Inner Mental Life
How do someone deal with their emotions, their self awareness, and their sense of clarity about their values and life purposes.
Intraindiviual functioning: When The variations between two or more traits, behaviours, or characteristics of a single person.
An example of this is idk
Interindividual differences: When the variations between individuals in one or more traits, behaviours, or characteristics.
An example of this is idk
A term that is used to describe all these things is called a system is a connected set of interacting parts that comprise a whole.
You can say me, artemis, and clementine is a system since we make a whole. They are alters and I am the host but we are in a system because we work together to do stuff with this body tho (even though usually clementine isn’t active but she is still part of our system).
The term personality is a psychological system that contributes to an individual enduring and distinctive pattern of experience and behaviours.
Understanding Structures, Processes, Development, and Therapeutic Change
Personality structure
The enduring “building block” of personality
Involves emotions, motivation, cognition, or skills
A more technical way of saying that is that the theories adopt different units of analysis when analyzing personality structure.
One kind of units of analysis is personality traits.
Traits are a consistent style of emotion or behaviour that a person displays across a variety of situations. Trait is a synonymous with disposition; traits describe what a person tends to do or is predisposed to
Another kind of units of analysis is personality type. Type is a clutterising of different traits.
An example is that psychologist have research combinations of personality traits and suggested there is three type of people that are
People who respond in an adaptive, resilient manner to psychological stress
People who respond in manner that is socially inhibited or emotionally overcontrolled
People who respond in an uninhibited or undercontrolled manner
Personality process
Dynamic changes in thinking, emotion, and motivation that can occur from one moment to the next (over a brief period of time). These are referred to as (technical name) personality dynamics.
Psychologist emphasise different stuff of personality process/dynamics
Motivational process
Basic biological drives
People anticipations of future events
Role of conscious thinking process in motivation
Motivational thinking is unconscious
Motivation enhance and improve on oneself is central to human motivation
Self process
So basically psychologists have different ideas on stuff and we just gonna stick to the grey/middle ground because i understand it but people are complex so it not a one fit all type of shit.
Growth and development
How we develop into the unique person each of us is. How the individual became this way. To understand the littlest steps one took and what they faced that may have changed them.
Certain experiences can alter the genes of one person so basically they work together hand in hand to shape a person. In a sense that can be explained bit about generational trauma
Temperament
Biologically based emotional and behavioural tendencies that are evident in early childhood
Ones that have been studied in depth are fear reactions and inhibited behaviours.
Gene contributes to the changes in an individual brain fear system. These biological differences, in turn, produce psychological differences in behaviour and emotion.
An example of this is how you react to a fearful situation versus Rida in a fearful situation. You're most likely to hide your emotions and don’t show your emotion outwardly when you are in a fearful situation and take lead when someone doesn’t while she is most likely to show emotions and behave in a completely different way then you.
Things that also affect our (was proved to be important) personality are culture, social class, family, and peers (environmental determinants)
Psychopathology and behaviour change
How people change and why they sometimes resist change or are unable to change
The Personality Theory: an introduction
The personality theory has to answer the how, what, and why questions about personality structure, processes, development, and change. They also need to consider the determinants of personality ranging from the molecular to the sociocultural and conceptual issues ranging from the philosophical views of the person that is embedded in their theory to the question of whether one can have a scientific theory of the person in the first place.
Psychodynamic theory
Views the mind as an energy system; the basic biological energies of the body reside, in part, in the mind. Mental energies, then, are directed to the services of basic bodily needs.
Psychoanalysis
The mind is said to contain different systems that serve different functions
Satisfying bodily needs
Representing social norms and rules
Striking a strategic balancing between biological drives and social constraints
Phenomenological theories
Mostly Focus on people conscious experiences of the world around them, that is, their phenomenological experience
It focuses on the person itself. Focus on self.
These theorists recognize that people have biological based motive but they also believe there is a higher motive involving personal growth and self fulfilment and that those motives are more important than personal well being than are the animalistic drives highlighted by freud.
Contemporary personality science
Finding regarding the genetic bases of personality traits as well as work revealing the brain systems underlie individual differences
Behaviourism
Behaviour is seen as an adaptation to rewards and punishments experience in the environment
Personal construct theory
People’s capacity to interpret the world
social-cognitive theory
Similar to personal construct theory but analyse the thought process that comes to play when they interpret the world. That in two ways.
Explores in details the social setting in which people acquire knowledge, skills, and beliefs
Heavy attention on self regulation. Which means the psychological process through which people set goals for themselves, control their emotional impulsives, and execute course of action
The toolkit metaphor has two benefit
Ask good questions about personality theories
Avoid asking bad questions about personality theories
Three Goals for the Personality Theorist
The three goals personality theories have are scientific observation, scientific research, and applications from observations and theory to practice.
Scientific observation
A science observation is when a group of people who are running the experiment/observation is observing the group of people who are the participants do what the researchers told them to do and the research observes them basically. The researchers do this to prove a theory.
There are three important steps on how it is done.
Step 1: Study diverse groups of people
The reason for this is because not everyone is the same. People from different groups would react differently or have different thoughts and emotions on certain subjects.
Step 2: Ensure your observations of people are objective
Make sure the results doesn;t have any biases or any assumptions that were made by you basically. It need only be results/conclusions that have been drawn out from the observation. Facts babes.
Step 3: Use specialised tools to study thinking, emotion, and neurobiological systems
The tools are used to overcome any obstacles the psychologists have and those tools will help them get the information they want for their scientific experiment/observation. These tools can be anything tbh, it just depends on the issue they are facing.
Scientific research
The three distinctive qualities are systemic, testable, and comprehensive.
Systemic
To relate stuff together; have to explain if there is an interpersonal cause of said issue and/or if it has a biological cause.
An example is that you are an emotionally unstable person because you have zero/barely control on your mood. A psychologist would try to figure out if it is because of an interpersonal cause or if it is a biological cause (can be both too i’m assuming idk).
Testable
To prove the theoretical idea that can be tested by objective scientific evidence. Basically can you run a test on whatever tf you have a theory on.
An example is that (not the best example in truth) when you tried that prescribed pill (even though that wasn’t your first intention) to see if there are any changes in your mood or behaviour (there fucking wasn’t though just vision wanna flash wtf).
Comprehensive
Basically trying to understand them as a whole. Like are they like this because they learned it or because they just like that (inherited it).
An example is you questioning if you are naturally an introvert or is it because you learn to shut yourself out from society because of the bad experiences in the past. Would that change in the future when you get more comfortable with yourself? Those types of questions lol.
Application from observations and theory to practice
When psychologists develop their testable, systemic theory but also convert their theoretical ideas into beneficial ideas.
So personality psychologist aim at 3 things
1. Observe people scientifically
2. Develop theories that are systemic, testable, and comprehensive
3. Turn their research findings and theoretical conceptions into practical application
An example is that you realize that Aniza is impulsive with her money. So how do we fix that? First we look if it is an interpersonal cause that she is doing or is it a biological cause. An example of an interpersonal cause is that she is upset and a biological cause is that she just spoiled. Then we test out our hypothesis to help her. Though we also need to comprehend if that was she always like that or is it a learned behaviour.
Important issues in Personality Theory
They mean when they say Conceptual issues are set of questions about personality that are so fundamental that they may arise no matter what topic one is addressing and that one must address regardless of one;s theoretical perspective
A critical consideration is the person who made the personality theory because then what is the overall view that person has.
Now all psychologist value that both internal and external determined of human action
Evaluating Personality Theories
The three functions to a personality theory are
Organize existing information
Research provides an array of facts about personality, personality development, and individual differences.
Make it easier when it is organize in a logical, systematically order so them scientists know wtf they know
Generate new knowledge about issues
A good theory fosters new knowledge about these issues. It is generative. The theory helps people to generate new knowledge about the topics they recognize as important in their field
Identify entirely new issues that are deserving of study
A personality theory may identify entirely new areas of study-areas that people never have known about were it not for the theory.
Psychodynamic theory basically shows people that psychological issues that were utterly novel to most people; the possibility that out most important thoughts and emotions are unconscious, the possibility that events in early childhood determine our personality in adult life.
Major Concepts
Personality
Those characteristics of the person that account for consistent patterns of experiences and action
Process
In personality theory, the concept that refer to the motivational aspects of personality
Structure
In personality theory, the concept that refer to the more enduring and stable aspects of personality
System
A collection of highly interconnected parts that function together; in the study of personality, distinct psychological mechanisms may function together as a system that produces the psychological phenomena of personality
Temperament
Biologically based emotional and behavioural tendencies that are evident in early childhood
Traits
An enduring psychological characteristics of an individual; ir a type of psychological construct (a “trait construct”) that refers to such characteristics
Type
A cluster of personality traits that may constitute a qualitatively distinct category of persons (a personality type)
Units of analysis
A concept that refers to the basic variables of a theory; different personality theories invoke different types of variables, or different basic units of analysis, in conceptualising personality structure
Review
We all think about personality in our day to day lives. The works of personality theories differ from this everyday thinking in that personality theories pursue five goals that are uncommon in everyday thinking about persons. They engage in scientific observation that underlie theories that are internally coherent and systematic, testable, and comprehensive, and that foster useful applications
Personality theories address what, how, and why questions about personality by developing theories that address four distinct topics; personality structure, personality processes, personality development, and personality change (including via psychotherapy)
Personality theories have confronted a range of issues throughout the history of the field. In developing theories that encompass these issues, the theorist hopes to develop a framework that serves three scientific functions’ Organizing existing knowledge about personality, fostering new knowledge on important issues, and identifying new issues for study.
The existence of multiple theories in the field can be understood by thinking of theories as toolkits, each of which provides unique conceptual tools for doing the jobs of the personality psychologist.
The two types of personality varabities are dispositions and inner mental life. These two concepts are used to understand an individual and how they differ from one to another.
Dispositions
They are descriptors so basically used to describe someone.
This helps to show to understand an individual and see how they differ because using one of those terms
“Aniza is an impulsive person, she tends to overspend her money to buy whatever she desires in the moment without thinking of the consequences afterward.” This helps us to understand that she is impulsive with her money and that differ her from people who are not impulsive with their money.
There is two different types of dispositions; these personality tendencies are called enduring and distinctive
Enduring: The personality tendies are somewhat consistent.
An example is that you act oddly social with your friends but that doesn’t mean you are no longer an introverted person but your personality is suddenly social/outgoing with them.
Distinctive: The personality characteristic differentiate people from each other
An example of this is that in your new social setting that is seen as extraverted, your introverted personality is a characteristic that is a characteristic that differentiates you from the extraverted people.
Inner Mental Life
How do someone deal with their emotions, their self awareness, and their sense of clarity about their values and life purposes.
Intraindiviual functioning: When The variations between two or more traits, behaviours, or characteristics of a single person.
An example of this is idk
Interindividual differences: When the variations between individuals in one or more traits, behaviours, or characteristics.
An example of this is idk
A term that is used to describe all these things is called a system is a connected set of interacting parts that comprise a whole.
You can say me, artemis, and clementine is a system since we make a whole. They are alters and I am the host but we are in a system because we work together to do stuff with this body tho (even though usually clementine isn’t active but she is still part of our system).
The term personality is a psychological system that contributes to an individual enduring and distinctive pattern of experience and behaviours.
Understanding Structures, Processes, Development, and Therapeutic Change
Personality structure
The enduring “building block” of personality
Involves emotions, motivation, cognition, or skills
A more technical way of saying that is that the theories adopt different units of analysis when analyzing personality structure.
One kind of units of analysis is personality traits.
Traits are a consistent style of emotion or behaviour that a person displays across a variety of situations. Trait is a synonymous with disposition; traits describe what a person tends to do or is predisposed to
Another kind of units of analysis is personality type. Type is a clutterising of different traits.
An example is that psychologist have research combinations of personality traits and suggested there is three type of people that are
People who respond in an adaptive, resilient manner to psychological stress
People who respond in manner that is socially inhibited or emotionally overcontrolled
People who respond in an uninhibited or undercontrolled manner
Personality process
Dynamic changes in thinking, emotion, and motivation that can occur from one moment to the next (over a brief period of time). These are referred to as (technical name) personality dynamics.
Psychologist emphasise different stuff of personality process/dynamics
Motivational process
Basic biological drives
People anticipations of future events
Role of conscious thinking process in motivation
Motivational thinking is unconscious
Motivation enhance and improve on oneself is central to human motivation
Self process
So basically psychologists have different ideas on stuff and we just gonna stick to the grey/middle ground because i understand it but people are complex so it not a one fit all type of shit.
Growth and development
How we develop into the unique person each of us is. How the individual became this way. To understand the littlest steps one took and what they faced that may have changed them.
Certain experiences can alter the genes of one person so basically they work together hand in hand to shape a person. In a sense that can be explained bit about generational trauma
Temperament
Biologically based emotional and behavioural tendencies that are evident in early childhood
Ones that have been studied in depth are fear reactions and inhibited behaviours.
Gene contributes to the changes in an individual brain fear system. These biological differences, in turn, produce psychological differences in behaviour and emotion.
An example of this is how you react to a fearful situation versus Rida in a fearful situation. You're most likely to hide your emotions and don’t show your emotion outwardly when you are in a fearful situation and take lead when someone doesn’t while she is most likely to show emotions and behave in a completely different way then you.
Things that also affect our (was proved to be important) personality are culture, social class, family, and peers (environmental determinants)
Psychopathology and behaviour change
How people change and why they sometimes resist change or are unable to change
The Personality Theory: an introduction
The personality theory has to answer the how, what, and why questions about personality structure, processes, development, and change. They also need to consider the determinants of personality ranging from the molecular to the sociocultural and conceptual issues ranging from the philosophical views of the person that is embedded in their theory to the question of whether one can have a scientific theory of the person in the first place.
Psychodynamic theory
Views the mind as an energy system; the basic biological energies of the body reside, in part, in the mind. Mental energies, then, are directed to the services of basic bodily needs.
Psychoanalysis
The mind is said to contain different systems that serve different functions
Satisfying bodily needs
Representing social norms and rules
Striking a strategic balancing between biological drives and social constraints
Phenomenological theories
Mostly Focus on people conscious experiences of the world around them, that is, their phenomenological experience
It focuses on the person itself. Focus on self.
These theorists recognize that people have biological based motive but they also believe there is a higher motive involving personal growth and self fulfilment and that those motives are more important than personal well being than are the animalistic drives highlighted by freud.
Contemporary personality science
Finding regarding the genetic bases of personality traits as well as work revealing the brain systems underlie individual differences
Behaviourism
Behaviour is seen as an adaptation to rewards and punishments experience in the environment
Personal construct theory
People’s capacity to interpret the world
social-cognitive theory
Similar to personal construct theory but analyse the thought process that comes to play when they interpret the world. That in two ways.
Explores in details the social setting in which people acquire knowledge, skills, and beliefs
Heavy attention on self regulation. Which means the psychological process through which people set goals for themselves, control their emotional impulsives, and execute course of action
The toolkit metaphor has two benefit
Ask good questions about personality theories
Avoid asking bad questions about personality theories
Three Goals for the Personality Theorist
The three goals personality theories have are scientific observation, scientific research, and applications from observations and theory to practice.
Scientific observation
A science observation is when a group of people who are running the experiment/observation is observing the group of people who are the participants do what the researchers told them to do and the research observes them basically. The researchers do this to prove a theory.
There are three important steps on how it is done.
Step 1: Study diverse groups of people
The reason for this is because not everyone is the same. People from different groups would react differently or have different thoughts and emotions on certain subjects.
Step 2: Ensure your observations of people are objective
Make sure the results doesn;t have any biases or any assumptions that were made by you basically. It need only be results/conclusions that have been drawn out from the observation. Facts babes.
Step 3: Use specialised tools to study thinking, emotion, and neurobiological systems
The tools are used to overcome any obstacles the psychologists have and those tools will help them get the information they want for their scientific experiment/observation. These tools can be anything tbh, it just depends on the issue they are facing.
Scientific research
The three distinctive qualities are systemic, testable, and comprehensive.
Systemic
To relate stuff together; have to explain if there is an interpersonal cause of said issue and/or if it has a biological cause.
An example is that you are an emotionally unstable person because you have zero/barely control on your mood. A psychologist would try to figure out if it is because of an interpersonal cause or if it is a biological cause (can be both too i’m assuming idk).
Testable
To prove the theoretical idea that can be tested by objective scientific evidence. Basically can you run a test on whatever tf you have a theory on.
An example is that (not the best example in truth) when you tried that prescribed pill (even though that wasn’t your first intention) to see if there are any changes in your mood or behaviour (there fucking wasn’t though just vision wanna flash wtf).
Comprehensive
Basically trying to understand them as a whole. Like are they like this because they learned it or because they just like that (inherited it).
An example is you questioning if you are naturally an introvert or is it because you learn to shut yourself out from society because of the bad experiences in the past. Would that change in the future when you get more comfortable with yourself? Those types of questions lol.
Application from observations and theory to practice
When psychologists develop their testable, systemic theory but also convert their theoretical ideas into beneficial ideas.
So personality psychologist aim at 3 things
1. Observe people scientifically
2. Develop theories that are systemic, testable, and comprehensive
3. Turn their research findings and theoretical conceptions into practical application
An example is that you realize that Aniza is impulsive with her money. So how do we fix that? First we look if it is an interpersonal cause that she is doing or is it a biological cause. An example of an interpersonal cause is that she is upset and a biological cause is that she just spoiled. Then we test out our hypothesis to help her. Though we also need to comprehend if that was she always like that or is it a learned behaviour.
Important issues in Personality Theory
They mean when they say Conceptual issues are set of questions about personality that are so fundamental that they may arise no matter what topic one is addressing and that one must address regardless of one;s theoretical perspective
A critical consideration is the person who made the personality theory because then what is the overall view that person has.
Now all psychologist value that both internal and external determined of human action
Evaluating Personality Theories
The three functions to a personality theory are
Organize existing information
Research provides an array of facts about personality, personality development, and individual differences.
Make it easier when it is organize in a logical, systematically order so them scientists know wtf they know
Generate new knowledge about issues
A good theory fosters new knowledge about these issues. It is generative. The theory helps people to generate new knowledge about the topics they recognize as important in their field
Identify entirely new issues that are deserving of study
A personality theory may identify entirely new areas of study-areas that people never have known about were it not for the theory.
Psychodynamic theory basically shows people that psychological issues that were utterly novel to most people; the possibility that out most important thoughts and emotions are unconscious, the possibility that events in early childhood determine our personality in adult life.
Major Concepts
Personality
Those characteristics of the person that account for consistent patterns of experiences and action
Process
In personality theory, the concept that refer to the motivational aspects of personality
Structure
In personality theory, the concept that refer to the more enduring and stable aspects of personality
System
A collection of highly interconnected parts that function together; in the study of personality, distinct psychological mechanisms may function together as a system that produces the psychological phenomena of personality
Temperament
Biologically based emotional and behavioural tendencies that are evident in early childhood
Traits
An enduring psychological characteristics of an individual; ir a type of psychological construct (a “trait construct”) that refers to such characteristics
Type
A cluster of personality traits that may constitute a qualitatively distinct category of persons (a personality type)
Units of analysis
A concept that refers to the basic variables of a theory; different personality theories invoke different types of variables, or different basic units of analysis, in conceptualising personality structure
Review
We all think about personality in our day to day lives. The works of personality theories differ from this everyday thinking in that personality theories pursue five goals that are uncommon in everyday thinking about persons. They engage in scientific observation that underlie theories that are internally coherent and systematic, testable, and comprehensive, and that foster useful applications
Personality theories address what, how, and why questions about personality by developing theories that address four distinct topics; personality structure, personality processes, personality development, and personality change (including via psychotherapy)
Personality theories have confronted a range of issues throughout the history of the field. In developing theories that encompass these issues, the theorist hopes to develop a framework that serves three scientific functions’ Organizing existing knowledge about personality, fostering new knowledge on important issues, and identifying new issues for study.
The existence of multiple theories in the field can be understood by thinking of theories as toolkits, each of which provides unique conceptual tools for doing the jobs of the personality psychologist.