1. Psychwrite:
Date: 1 pt
Copy Question: 1 pt
Answer in 3-5 lines: 3 pts
Explain, using examples, whether you feel your personality is determined more by your traits or by the situations you find yourself in.

2. Upcoming Schedule Today–Trait Theory
Friday – Humanistic Theory & Personality Testing
Tuesday - Emotional Intelligence & Inside Out
Thursday – Inside Out
Monday – Personality Project
Wednesday – Personality project due

3. Assessment: Projective tests
How do you “measure” the unconscious?
Ambiguous stimulus
Subjective
TAT: Thematic Apperception Test
(Look at picture. What do you think it is about?)
Rorschach (Inkblot) test
(Look at inkblot. What do you think it is?)

4. TAT

5. Rorschach

7. Problems with Projective tests
VALIDITY: Does it measure what it is supposed to?
RELIABILITY: Consistent scores?

8. Freudian theory today Controversial theory
Lacks scientific evidence (how do you measure these concepts?)
Lacks GENERALIZABILITY! He used a small sample of sick Victorian women and generalized to all people (male and female, healthy and sick)
Theory has become MORE important to literature & movies than it is to modern psychology
Development is lifelong (not just childhood emphasis)
Is repression real? (disruption of hippocampus in trauma?)
What is the unconscious? (automatic/parallel processing, implicit memories, schemas)

9. Trait Theory
Personality

10. Psychodynamic v. trait theory
Sigmund Freud
Gordon Allport
Focus: Explain WHY you have this personality
EGO processes unconscious conflicts between the ID & SUPEREGO
Personality testing should uncover “hidden” meanings
Define personality in terms of stable behavior patterns.
Focus: DESCRIBE basic traits that make up human personality

11. Trait theory: Origins The Ancient Greeks
Let’s take a personality quiz
13. Hippocrates (ever heard of the hippocratic oath?)

13. Trait Theory: origins
William Sheldon’s Somatotypes (body types)

14. William Sheldon Physique Temperament
Endomorphic Viscerotonic soft relaxed round sociable overweight tolerant
Mesomorphic Somatotonic strong energetic muscular assertive broad shouldered courageous
Ectomorphic Cerebrotonic long timid, artistic thin introvertive fragile intellectual

15. Gordon allport 18,000 different traits in the dictionary
Personalities made up of:
#1: Cardinal traits: a pervasive trait that governs everything a person does.
Example: Mother Teresa

16. Gordon Allport
#2: Central traits: traits expected of a person most of the time, usually a cluster of 5 – 7 descriptive terms.
Example: How would you MOM describe you?
#3: Secondary traits: situation-specific traits that help round out your personality (attitudes, specific behavior patterns, skills, preferences). Less important and more likely to change.
Example: What’s your favorite candy bar?

17. Now…The BIG 5 Eysenck & eysenck

18. IPIP-NEO International Personality Item Pool
Measure personality traits associated with the Big 5.
Objective
Short form, 120 questions

19. Jung Typology test
Shortened version of Meyers-Briggs Typology Inventory(MBTI) 70 “Yes” or “No” questions Objective test: How you answer the question determines the “strength” of that personality dimension. “I like to be in crowds” Yes: extrovert No: introvert

20. Myers-Briggs Type Indicator

22. Type A & Type B Personalities
Which are you?
Complete Type A/Type B scale

23. The Barnum effect “There’s a sucker born every minute.” -P.T. Barnum
When a person finds personal meaning in statements that could apply to many people.

24. How do you squeeze your toothpaste?

25. evaluation: Trait theory/Testing
Very descriptive – especially compared to handwriting and inkblot testing
Verifiable with data
Objective rather than subjective
Criticisms:
The person-situation controversy…do trait theorists underestimate the variability of behavior from situation to situation?
How do you account for situations in a trait test or a type test?