1. Bell Ringer What is a “Freudian slip?” Give an example
(if you don’t know… take an educated guess!)

2. Personality
entry #4

3. Where does our personality come from?
Personality: An individual’s characteristic pattern of thinking, feeling, and acting.
OBJECTIVE 1| Define personality.
Each dwarf has a distinct personality.

4. Psychologists use 5 approaches to explain the development of personality:
1. Psychoanalytic Approach (aka Psychodynamic)
2. Humanistic Approach
3. Trait Approach/The Big 5
4. Learning Approach
5. Social-Cognitive Approach

5. Psychoanalytic Theory
Describes personality as primarily unconscious and heavily colored by emotion
Believes that behavior is merely a surface characteristic and that to truly understand who we are we have to analyze the symbolic meaning of behavior and the deep inner workings of the mind

6. Created by Sigmund Freud
Believed we repress
(forcibly block from our
conscious thought)
thoughts, beliefs, and
memories that are too
upsetting to
acknowledge

7. Exploring the Unconscious
A reservoir (unconscious mind) of mostly unacceptable thoughts, wishes, feelings, and memories. Freud asked patients to say whatever came to their minds (free association) in order to tap the unconscious.
OBJECTIVE 3| Discuss Freud’s view of the mind as an iceberg, and explain how he used this image to represent conscious and unconscious regions of the mind.

8. Dream Analysis
Another method to analyze the unconscious mind is through interpreting manifest and latent contents of dreams.
The Nightmare, Henry Fuseli (1791)

9. Freud believed our personality is made up of 3 structures:Id
Ego
Superego

10. Id Instincts & impulses Sexual drives Aggression
Seeks immediate gratification
Ruled by the “Pleasure Principle” = maximize pleasure, minimize pain
Completely unconscious

11. Ego Controls the id Rational decision-making
Obeys the “Reality Principle” = deals with the demands of reality

12. Superego Moral decision making
Is one’s “conscience”  tells you right from wrong

13. Freud’s Iceberg Analogy

14. Psychoanalytic Theory
Believes that behavior is merely a surface characteristic and that to truly understand who we are we have to analyze the symbolic meaning of behavior and the deep inner workings of the mind (#2)

15. Created by Sigmund Freud
Believed we repress
(forcibly block from our
conscious thought)
thoughts, beliefs, and
memories that are too
upsetting to
acknowledge (#3)

16. Exploring the Unconscious
Freud asked patients to say whatever came to their minds (free association) in order to tap the unconscious. (#1)
OBJECTIVE 3| Discuss Freud’s view of the mind as an iceberg, and explain how he used this image to represent conscious and unconscious regions of the mind.

17. Freud believed that a person’s personality develops mostly during the first few years of life (#4)
Personality is rooted in unresolved childhood conflicts (#4)
Believed that children pass through 5 Psychosexual stages of development: childhood stages of development during which the id’s pleasure-seeking energies focus on the erogenous zones (#5)

18. Fixation
Freud believed that conflicts unresolved during early psychosexual stages could surface as maladaptive behaviors in adult years. Strong conflict could lock, or fixate, the person’s pleasure-seeking behaviors in that stage.
Fixation: being stuck in a stage of development, and carrying the behaviors from that stage into adulthood. (#6)

19. Freud’s Psychosexual Stages of Development
Oral
0-18 months
Pleasure focus is on the mouth
 sucking, biting, chewing
(no key terms for this stage)

20. Freud’s Psychosexual Stages of Development
Anal
18-36 months
Pleasure focus is on bowel and bladder elimination
coping with demands for control
(no key terms for this stage)

21. Freud’s Psychosexual Stages of Development
Phallic
3-6 years
Pleasure focus is on genitals
coping with incestuous feelings
Key terms: Oedipus Complex (a boy’s sexual desires toward his mother and feelings of jealousy and hatred for the rival father), Electra Complex

22. Freud’s Psychosexual Stages of Development
Latency
6-puberty
No focus, sexual feelings are dormant
(children eventually cope with Oedipus Electra by repressing these feelings and identifying with rival parent= if you can’t beat em, join em)
Key terms: Identification superego gains strength and begins to incorporate the parents values (trying to become like parent)
Gender Identity: sense of being male or female

23. Freud’s Psychosexual Stages of Development
Genital
puberty on
Focus is on maturation of sexual interests
No key terms at this stage

24. Defense Mechanisms
Defense mechanisms are used by the ego to resolve conflicts and demands between the id and superego. (#11)
These defense mechanisms reduce or redirect anxiety by distorting reality (#11)

25. Defense Mechanisms Repression: bury it in the unconscious
Ex: mugging or rape too traumatic to deal with, push it into unconscious… no recollection of it happening
Projection: disguise your own threatening impulses by attributing them to others
Ex: “She’s such a slut!”

26. Defense Mechanisms
Denial: the conscious mind ignores or can’t admit the problem
Ex: alcoholics, drug addicts
Displacement: take out feelings on someone/something else completely unrelated to the problem
Ex: you have a fight with your boyfriend and come home and scream at your brother

27. Defense Mechanisms
Sublimation: take negative behaviors and try to put them towards a positive use
Ex: join football team to redirect aggressive actions
Regression: reverting to an earlier stage of development in response to frustration or an inability to cope – acting infantile/childish
Ex: Bad day at school- come home and curl up in mommy’s lap and suck your thumb

28. Defense Mechanisms
Rationalization: try to justify our behaviors or feelings – make excuses
Its not my fault I flunked my psych test, Mrs. DeKalb tests are too hard- its unfair!
Reaction Formation: acting the opposite of what you really unconscious think or feel
Mrs. DeKalb you are sooooo pretty and the best teacher ever!

29. Projective Personality Tests (#20)
Have no clearly defined answers
Use an open-ended format
Present ambiguous stimuli and ask test taker to interpret what they see
- The interpretation is thought to reveal information about their personality

30. Two most common projective personality tests are the
Rorschach Inkblot Test
Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) (#21)

31. Rorschach Inkblot Test
Created by Swiss psychiatrist Hermann Rorschach in 1921
Uses 10 official inkblots
5 black and white
2 black and red and white
3 multicolored

32. Rorschach Inkblot
Person is shown card with inkblot and asked what they think it could be
Responses to cards are interpreted according to the following factors:
Location  responding to whole card or part of card?
Determinants  responding to particular shaping, coloring, textures
Content  the precise object that the test-taker is seeing
Form  is the answer based on the actual shape of the blot, or are they seeing a different form entirely?

35. Thematic Apperception Test
Created in the 1930’s by Harvard psychologist Henry Murray
Involves a picture interpretation technique
Test takers are shown ambiguous pictures and asked to create a story for the picture

36. TAT Subject’s story may include: What has led up to the event shown
What is happening at the moment
What the characters are feeling and thinking
What the outcome of the story was

37. TAT
Each story is carefully analyzed to uncover the test takers unconscious mind, including any
Repressed aspects of personality
Motives and needs for achievement
Power and intimacy
Problem solving abilities

40. Learning Theory of Personality
2 learning approaches:
Behaviorism
Social-Learning Theory

41. Behaviorism
Watson: believed external forces or influences- NOT internal traits or inner conflicts- shape people’s preferences and behavior
Skinner agreed, believed we should focus on how organisms behave, not what’s going on in their mind
Neither believed in the influences of personal freedom, choice, and self-direction

42. Behaviorists believe our personality is LEANRED and shaped by:
Environmental influences (reinforcements, punishments)
parent/peer approval
Cultural factors
Social customs
Socialization
The process by which we learn socially desirable behaviors and adopt them as part of our personality

43. Social Learning Theory
Bandura and others agree we learn from our environment, but emphasized that we learn by OBSERVATION of our environment, not just reinforcement and punishment
Said we can influence our environment based on our own internal factors:
Our skills
Our values
Our goals
Our expectations
Self-efficacy expectations: positive thinking about yourself “I think I can… I think I can…”

44. Bell Ringer What is a personality trait?
List at least 5 of your personality traits.

45. Trait Approach –entry #5
Rather than focusing on unconscious forces and unsatisfactory growth opportunities, some psychologists attempt to
explain personality in terms of stable and enduring behavior patters = TRAITS

46. Trait Approach Traits are fixed (created) at an early age
Traits are consistent and unchanging = you act/react the same in a variety of situations
Examples of Traits:
Honest
Dependable
Moody
Impulsive

47. Trait Theorists
Hippocrates: said personality caused by combinations of different bodily fluids, which he called humors
Blood  made people sanguine (cheerful)
Black bile  made people meloncholly (sad)
Yellow bile  made people phlegmatic (unconcerned, lazy)
Green bile  made people choleric (irritable, short-tempered)

48. Trait Theorists
Gordon Allport: defined personality in terms of identifiable behavior patters (traits)
-identified 18,000 words representing traits!
-Factor analysis is a statistical approach used to describe and relate personality traits = cluster similar traits into groups

49. Example of factor analysis:
People who describe themselves as outgoing also say that they like excitement, practical jokes, and taking on leadership roles.
 these behaviors can be clustered together to describe 1 basic personality trait:
=extraversion

50. Trait Theorists
Raymond Cattell: used factor analysis to develop a 16 Personality Factor inventory
-whittled down 18,000 traits in 16 basic source traits

51. -Believed that
by determining
which of these
16 traits a
person has you
can predict their
behavior in
certain
situations

52. Trait Theorists
Hans Eysenck: categorized personality traits according to two polar dimensions:
extraversion vs. introversion and
emotional stability vs. emotional instability.

53. Personality inventories are questionnaires
Assessing Traits
Personality inventories are questionnaires
(often with true-false or agree-disagree items) designed to assess several traits at once.
OBJECTIVE 16| Explain how psychologists use personality inventories to assess traits, and discuss the most widely used of these inventories.
The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) is the most widely used of all personality tests.

54. The “Big Five” says that there are 5 basic personality dimensions:
The Big Five Factors
Today’s trait researchers believe that Eysencks’ personality dimensions are too narrow and Cattell’s 16PF too large.
The “Big Five” says that there are 5 basic personality dimensions:
Conscientiousness
Agreeableness
Neuroticism
Openness
Extraversion
OBJECTIVE 17| Identify the Big Five personality factors, and discuss some of the strengths of this approach to studying personality.

55. The “Big Five” remember CANOE!
Conscientiousness 
Agreeableness 
Neuroticism 
(emotionally stable or unstable)
Openness 
Extraversion 
Organized, careful, disciplined -or- disorganized, careless, impulsive?
Trusting, helpful -or-
suspscious, uncooperative?
Calm, secure -or-
anxious, insecure?
Independent, open to variety, imaginative -or-
conforming, likes routine, practical?
Sociable, fun-loving, affectionate -or-
shy, quiet, reserved

56. Evaluating the Trait Perspective
-Walter Mischel (1968, 1984, 2004) points out that traits may be enduring, but the resulting behavior in various situations is different. =Therefore, traits are not good predictors of behavior.
-Trait theory explains where we get our personalty from, but does not explain where traits come from!
OBJECTIVE 18| Summarize the person-situation controversy, and explain its importance as a commentary on the trait perspective.