PY1SID L6 Introduction to Individual Differences PDF

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PY1SID Psychology Part 1 Social Psychology and Individual Differences - Week Seven, Introduction to Individual Differences lecture notes...

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PY1SID Lecture 6 – Introduction to Individual Differences

LECTURE 6 Individual differences 

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Branch of psychology that considers how and why people are psychologically different from each other, examines how people are similar/different in thinking, feeling and behaving, normally deal with personality and intelligence Importance - useful in applied psychology (e.g. Job recruitment, used as DV in other branches of psychology), prediction of behaviour is better when individual differences are considered Personality - from the word 'persona' which means mask/façade, relatively stable and enduring aspects of the individual that distinguish themselves from others and form the basis for predictions of their future behaviour o Emphasis on stability - forming and organised and consistent pattern

History of study of personality  

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The history of the study of personality dates back to ancient Greece Hippocrates - known to be one of the first to formalise that we could be defined by four temperaments: blood, phlegm, black/yellow bile, an imbalance or excess of one fluid would affect their health and personality o Blood = cheerful (show hopeful, optimistic, confident behaviour) o Phlegm = calm (listless, slow and apathetic behaviour) o Black bile = sombre (depressed, pessimistic, fearful behaviour) o Yellow bile = enthusiastic (irritable, anxious and aggressive behaviour) Galen - understood relationship between body characteristics and 'mood', same body humours (blood, phlegm, black/yellow bile) but they were thought to define different moods: sanguine, phlegmatic, melancholic and choleric o Sanguine - optimistic, positive o Phlegmatic - unemotional, calm o Melancholic - negative, sad o Choleric - bad-tempered, irritable Sheldon - notes three personalities based on their physical make-up (somatotypes): ectomorph, mesomorph and endomorph, he believed that people's body types determine their personalities o Ectomorph (small, lanky) - anxious, self-conscious, artistic, thoughtful, quiet, private o Mesomorph (m=middle) - adventurous, assertive, competitive, fearless o Endomorph (round, large) - relaxed, comfortable, good-humoured, even-tempered, sociable, tolerant

Psychological perspectives 

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Situationism - situationists argue that behaviours are artefacts of various situations we find ourselves in, as well as cultural and social environments, they challenge the position of dispositional approaches who view personality as something that doesn't change in different contexts Life experiences - significant events throughout our lives can affect our personality development (e.g. Traumatic situations like divorce/loss/abuse can alter our behaviour, often permanently) o Studied through twin studies (twins separated at birth and reared apart) and adoptive studies (similarities/differences between child and adoptive/biological parents)

PY1SID Lecture 6 – Introduction to Individual Differences 

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Nature vs nurture - 'intelligent genes' are discovered which may have an effect on our personality, interaction between heredity and environmental factors need to be examined to understand the development of personality Gene-environment correlation - said to occur when exposure to environmental conditions depends on an individual's genetic make-up o Passive interaction - different people exposed to the same environment experience, interpret and react to it differently o Evocative interaction - someone's personality evokes distinctive responses from others, other people behave towards us based on our behaviour towards them o Active interaction - people choose or create environments of their own (e.g. Extraverts select social situations more than introverts)

Methods of studying personality 

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Nomothetic method - emphasises the identification of universal personality traits, looks for systematic relationships between different aspects of personality o From the word 'nomothethein' in Greek which means to lay down a law o Uses data reduction techniques like factor analysis to study people's personalities Idiographic method - emphasises on the uniqueness of the individual, challenges assumptions that we can all be measure and compared on the same dimensions (i.e. Nomothetic method) o Comes from the word 'idios' in Greek which means one's own o Widely adopted by psychoanalytic and psychodynamic theories

Categories vs dimensions 

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Categorical systems - theorists proposed that some people belong to categories/types of personalities o Because certain constellations of thoughts and behaviours appear to co-occur regularly o E.g. Introverted vs extraverted personalities o The DSM uses a predominant categorical system - they categorise personalities that apply to personality disorders (not necessarily illnesses) Dimensional theories - argue that putting people into categories loses much of what may be important in understanding individual differences o They measure to what degree each individual possesses a trait or factor o E.g. Extraversion score of 49 instead of just 'extravert'...