Psych Exam 3

Chapter 13: Personality

Personality: characteristic patterns of thinking, feeling, and behaving (has multiple perspectives)
Psychodynamic perspective: assumes various unconscious psychological processes interact to determine our thoughts,
feelings, and behavior
Freudian Personality Structure -> id, ego, and superego

 id represents the unconscious portion of personality where life and death instincts reside (life=positive,
constructive behavior, death=aggression and destructiveness). Id operates on the pleasure principle (seeks
immediate satisfaction from both instincts).
 Ego is responsible for organizing ways to get the satisfaction in the real world. Ego operates on the reality principle
which makes compromises, so the person gets what they want without risking punishment (also uses defense
mechanisms).
 Superego modulates between id and ego and tells people what they should and should not do (moral guide)
Repression Pushing threatening memories from conscious awareness
Rationalization Attempting to make mistakes seem reasonable
Projection Unconsciously attributing one’s own unacceptable
thoughts or impulses on another
Reaction Formation Defending against unacceptable impulses by acting
opposite to them
Sublimation Converting unacceptable impulses into socially acceptable
actions and symbolically expressing them
Displacement Deflecting an impulse from its original target to a less
threatening one
Denial Discounting the existence of a threatening impulse
Compensation Striving to make up for unconscious impulses
Psychosexual development: personality evolves through several stages but if a person doesn’t successfully make it through
a stage they will become fixated and it will reappear in adulthood ex: if you are not successfully weaned off breast/bottle
feeding, you make smoke as an adult

 Oral Stage (birth- 12 or 18 mos)- mouth is the center of pleasure

 Anal Stage (18 mos-3yrs)- ego forms to cope with societal norms, anal region is the center of pleasure (retention
and release of waste)
 Phallic Stage (3-6yrs)- genital area is the center of pleasure, Oedipal (boys have feelings for mom and competes w/
dad for attention) and Electra (girls suffer penis envy) Complex
 Latency Stage (5-puberty)- no center of pleasure, child focuses on school and friends
 Genital Stage (puberty-adulthood)- genitals are focus of pleasure
Neo-Freudians:
 Adler- Inferiority Complex, Overcompensation, Birth order (feelings of inferiority leave people to overcompensate,
 Jung- personal and collective unconscious (trauma and joys of ancestors in our DNA), individual differences (we are
different and the same as others), archetypes (certain clichés are the same amongst other cultures ex: wise old
man)
 Horney- penis envy is bs, men have womb envy and place pressure on women (women have higher anxiety)
Humanistic perspective- focuses on mental capabilities that set humans apart – self-actualization: the highest state
achieved by motivation and is the driver of personality
 Maslow- hierarchy of needs
 Rogers- self-actualization, congruence vs. incongruence, people need unconditioned positive regard that is
congruent with how the child feels about how what they did
Trait perspective- personality traits: the tendencies that help direct how a person thinks and behaves

 Allport- central traits (labels), secondary traits (specific to certain situations)

 Cattell- set traits opposing each other and made people answer certain questions to determine their personality
traits (factor analysis)
 Eysenk- two main personality dimensions (Introversion-Extroversion and Stable-Unsatble)
 Big Five= O.C.E.A.N.: Openness (artistic, curious, imaginitve), Conscientious (efficient, organized, reliable),
Extroversion (outgoing, assertive, talkative), Agreeableness (appreciative, forgiving, generous), Neuroticism
(anxious, self-pitying, tense)
 Genetic Contributions: temperament, neurotransmitter functioning
 Situational factors: person-situation interactions
Social Cognitive perspective- personality is a full set of behaviors that a person learns through experirnces
 Bandura- personality is shaped by thoughts, behaviors, and environment. Self-efficacy is the leanred expectation of
success; what we do and what we try to do are heavily affected by our perceptions of our chances of success
 Rotter- locus of control (external and internal). Internals expect most events are controlled by their own efforts
while Externals expect events to be controlled by external forces over which they have no control
Assessing personality
– Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (objective trait test because it includes observations from others)
Projective tests (much more objective and very ambiguous), Non-projective tests ask you directly your thoughts or
feelings
- Rorschach – inkblot test (focused on what draws your attention)
- Thematic apperception test