What is PERSONALITY? F&G Textbook: The characteristic ways of thinking, feeling and acting that make a person an individual. Psychology for the VCE student An individual’s unique and relatively consistent group of characteristics that determine patterns of thoughts, feelings and behaviour when alone or with others.

TRAIT THEORY of Personality Development 1930’s - Present THEORISTS: GORDON ALLPORT HANS EYSENCK ROBERT McCRAE & PAUL COSTA THEORISTS: GORDON ALLPORT HANS EYSENCK ROBERT McCRAE & PAUL COSTA

General Principles AIM: Identify, describe and measure individual differences Personality Traits – enduring characteristics that determine behaviour Personality traits are described on a continuum i.e. from one extreme to its opposite

General Principles Basic Assumptions: 1.Traits are stable, hence, predictable over time. 2.Traits are consistent across situations 3.Individual differences arise because personality consists of a combination of different traits expressed in different degrees.

GORDON ALLPORT ( ) Trait Theorist: GORDON ALLPORT ( ) American Psychologist Defined personality as: “the dynamic organisation within an individual of those psychosocial systems that determine one’s unique adjustment to his environment.”

Allport’s Personality Traits Traits or Dispositions – individual differences arising from experience but represent consistencies in one’s behaviour. Cardinal Traits – core traits, basic building blocks for personality development Central Traits – building blocks of personality more commonly recognised Secondary Traits – more inconsistent and less obvious

Trait Theorist: HANS EYSENCK ( ) German Psychologist, practiced in England Published with wife, Sybil Identified 2 dimensions of personality (1963) + 1 added later Intraversion – Extraversion Neuroticism – Emotional Stability Psychoticism (1976): Toughmindedness – Tendermindedness Antisocial, cold, insensitive – friendly, warm, caring

Character traits account for consistency of behaviour in different situations Traits can be quantified using personality inventories Eysenck’s Wheel

Trait Theorists: Robert McCrae Paul Costa Present Identified the Big Five Personality Trait Dimensions: O – C – E – A – N N-E-O-F-F-I

Five Factor Model of Personality

Contributions: Stability and enduring quality of personality supports new evidence that certain traits have genetic basis. Standardised method for measuring personality through personality inventories Widespread acceptability Stimulated lots of new research

Criticisms/Limitations Traits identified may not be personality but simply predispositions to behave in certain ways in different situations Simply describing Personality as inherited and environmentally influenced does not explain about its nature and how individual differences develop (i.e. Not Falsifiable!) Does not account for unconscious processes, beliefs and motives that may influence personality development Does not account for the potential for behaviour to change in different situations