3 - Trait Approaches and Type Approaches PDF

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Summary

Allport, Cattell, Eysenck, Goldberg and Jung's personality types....

Description

Trait Approaches: - Trait Personality Theories: - These aim to identify (in a scientific manner) personality variables that occur consistently in individuals and groups - A trait is any readily-identifiable, stable quality that characterizes an individual from other individuals -

Traits serve three major functions: - To summarise - Predict - Explain a person’s conduct

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There are three predominant assumptions of trait approached: - Permanence over time: our personality traits remains relatively stable over time - Permanence across situations: our personality traits remain relatively stable over situations - Behaviour altering: personality influences behaviour

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Allport’s Trait Theory:

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Utilised a systematic Lexical approach to the design of personality theory Divided personality traits into 3 categories: - Cardinal Traits: life-revolving, dominant trait - Central Traits: qualities which characterise daily interactions - Secondary Traits: traits exhibited under certain situations

Evaluating Allport: - Was the first to discuss the limitations of trait approaches - Distinguished between nomothetic and idiographic approaches - No standardised measure developed, the 4500 words he found could never be used to describe personality adequately

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Raymond Cattell’s Personality Factors: - Utilised a ‘new’ approach known as factor analysis to come up with his theory - Factor Analysis: statistical technique for the reduction of data - Factor analysis attempts to look for simple patterns within all of these e.g. how many of the 4500 words are actually looking at the same trait

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Cattell realised that a number of the personality traits described by Allport were the same, meaning that the 4800 words found could be reduced using factor analysis Came up with 16 personality factors from Allport’s 4500 identified traits

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Evaluating Cattell: - Developed a comprehensive, empirically-based trait theory of personality - Acknowledged the complexity of the personality construct - Used maths to show that personality could influence behaviour - Best know for the 16PF (personality factor): one of the most widely used and recognised measures of personality

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The ‘Giant Three’ Model - Hans J Eysenck: - Also known as the ‘PEN’ model - one of the most influential theories of personality ever - Developed using a combination of factor analytic and empirical approaches - Empirical: research-based (i.e. questionaires) - Factor analysis: reduced data down to 3 main factors

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Three Supertraits - Neuroticism - (Unstable, anxious, easily upset) or (Stable, relaxed, eventempered) - Psychoticism - (Impersonal, unsocialised, cruel) or (Normal) - Extraversion - (Outgoing, sociable, energetic) or (Reserved, quiet, prefer own company)

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Extraversion: characterises people based on their orientation toward external sources of stimulations from the environment verses an orientation inward at the opposite extreme Psychotism: includes a disposition toward psychosis and a degree of sociopathy Neuroticism: is basically a measure of emotional stability-instability

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Evaluation of Eysenck: - An extremely influential theory which has been widely applied - Research shows differences between extraverts and introverts - Neuroticism related to behaviour and mental health - There is also some biological evidence for neuroticism and extraversion - Evidence for psychoticism is less clear

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The Five Factor Model: - Lexical hypothesis = labels given to personality - Found that after giving officer cadets a personality questionnaire based on the 16PF there were 5 rather than 16 factors.

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The five factors are: -

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Openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism Each factor lies on a continuum along which individuals are placed

Five Factor Model runs on a continuum: - There are six facets to each of the five factors, gives a causal rather than descriptive explanation - Similar to the description put forward by Eysenck - MEasured via: NEOPI and NEOFI

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Goldberg’s Big Five Model: Lexical analysis: asked people to describe themselves Factor analysis: self and peer-reports

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Goldberg’s Five Dimensions: - Extraversion/introversion - Friendliness/hostility - Conscientiousness - Neuroticism/emotional stability - Intellect

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Evaluating the ‘Big 5’: - Generally accepted to be 5 factors, but what these factors actually are is disagreed - Researchers have called for the approach to be falsified - Some uncertainty what each of the factors actually do/look it - It is data, driven meaning it is not based in theory - There are lots of different measures so people are uncertain which is correct

Type Approaches: - Personality traits exist on a ‘continuum’, whereas Types are argued to describe all of an individual’s behaviour - Nomothetic (trait): creating group personality norms, and placing individuals into these norms - Idiographic (type): describing the variables specific to each individual, with infinite numbers of possibilities -

Personal disposition of the individual (idiographic) is more useful - gives the unique character of individuals.

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Galen and Kant’s Four Humors: - Hippocrates described physical illness as being due to an imbalance of bodily fluids (humors) - Balanced humors = balanced temperament

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Imbalance = physical and mental illness Kant - strength of feeling and level of activity = personality type

Galen

Kant

Melancholic

Depressed, anxious

Weak feelings

Choleric

Anger

High activity

Phlegmatic

Calm

Low activity

Sanguine

Confident

Strong feelings

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Gall and Phrenology: - Gall developed the work of Lavater in developing the concept of Phrenology - The first ‘scientific’ theory of personality - ‘Phren’ = mind; ‘logos’ = study - Theory developed through postmortems -

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Phrenology: Different areas of the brain are active when we are performing different tasks Argued that different parts of the brain do different things Sizes of the brain area are meaningful and can be inferred by bumps on the skull Where people have enlarged areas they are best at these faculties

Jung’s Personality Types: - His theory was influenced by both Freud and Adler - Suggested that there are two ‘types’ of people: - Extraverts (like freud) - Introverts (like himself) -

These ‘types’ are consistent - do not change over time

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To address differences within intro/extraverts he described 4 approaches: - Sensing: simply experience stimuli - Thinking: reason and logic to understand stimuli - Feeling: evaluates the worth of something - Intuitive: relate to the world using hunches

Extraverted Types

Introverted Types

Sensing: act rather than think, pleasureseeking and sociable

Sensing: sensitive, overreact to external stimuli

Thinking: tries to be objective and guided by facts, low emotions and rule-bound

Thinking: private people, often ill at ease with society. May appear cold or aloof

Feeling: easily influenced by others, ‘conventional’ in life. Respect authority and tradition

Feeling: quiet, thoughtful, ‘unsociable’ but with intense feelings

Intuitive: creative, exploit opportunities. Follow hunches rather than facts

Intuitive: withdrawn ‘dreamers’. Poor communicators as judgements (thinking and feeling) are repressed.

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The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI): - Is commonly-used test for measuring Jungian personality types - Has been shown to predict certain behaviours - MBTI is used by 89 of the richest 100 USA companies - Extraverts are more likely to work in sales

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Critique of the MBTI: - A lot of Jung’s theory is based in the unconscious, making it impossible to measure - When factor analyses are conducted, the MBTI often breaks down into a trait theory - Issues with reliability

Type A and B Personality Theory: - Type A Personality characterised by: - Extreme competitiveness - Achievement striving - Aggressiveness which is sometimes repressed - Frequent and intense anger - Haste, impatience, restlessness, feelings of time pressure - Hyper alertness - Tense facial musculature - Feelings of challenges of authority -

Risk factors don’t explain morbidity and mortality Men with CVD demonstrated certain behaviours related to CVD development - These are described as Type A Behaviour - Type B is healthy behaviour

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Action-emotion complex is important in Type A and B personality The research into the relationship between Type A and B personality and morbidity/mortality is contradictory Found more evidence for its existence rather than against

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Evidence for: Subcomponents - The ‘core’ features of TABP best predict CVD - Childa and Steptoe meta-analysis supported these findings

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Evidence for: Population - The Western Collaborative Group Study is the most often cited - Assessed 3000+ men over 8.5 years

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Evidence against: CAD (coronary artery disease) + high risk - Research looking at CAD and TABP inconsistent findings - Those at risk of developing CVD no more likely of becoming ill in those with TABP

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Type C Personality: - Known as the ‘Cancer-Prone Personality type’ , is a later development of Types A and B theory - Characterised by extreme extraversion and low neuroticism - Difficult to prove as a study showed there was no evidence for neuroticism and extraversion - Other factors predict development better than Type C personality

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Type D personality: - ‘Distressed’ personality type characterised by high negative affect and social inhibition - Have poorer disease progression and quality of life, increased depression and social inhibition - Type D’s with CVD are more likely to die early...