The Trait Perspective
What is a TRAIT?
A trait is a characteristic pattern of
behavior or a disposition to feel and act
Everyone has a combination of traits
Allport vs. Freud
Gordon Allport focused
more on describing
personality with traits
VS.
Freud tried to explain
individual traits with his
psychoanalytic theory
Trait Perspective
The concept of personality is used to explain the stability in a persons
behavior over time and across situations (consistency) and the behavioral
differences among people reacting to the same situation (distinctiveness).
A personality trait is a durable disposition to behave in a particular way in
a variety of situationsadjectives like honest, moody, impulsive, and
excitable describe dispositions that represent personality traits.
More recently, McCrae and Costa have used factor analysis to arrive at
an even simpler, five-factor model of personalitythe big five.
Trait Perspective
High Extraversion scores signify that a person is outgoing, sociable,
upbeat, friendly, assertive, and gregarious. Some trait models refer to
this as positive emotionality.
High Neuroticism scores signify that a person is anxious, hostile, self-
conscious, insecure, and vulnerablesome models call this negative
emotionality.
Openness to experience is associated with curiosity, flexibility, vivid
fantasy, imaginativeness, artistic sensitivity, and unconventional
attitudes.
Agreeableness is associated with people who are sympathetic, trusting,
cooperative, modest, and straightforwardmay have its roots in
temperament.
Conscientious people are diligent, disciplined, well organized, punctual,
and dependablesome models refer to this trait as constraintrelated
to high productivity in a variety of occupational areas.
Personality
The Five-Factor Model of Traits = best approximation
today of the basic trait dimensions. If you could ask 5
questions on a blind date about the personality of a stranger,
wondering where the person is on these 5 dimensions would
be most revealing
The Big Five
- Openness to experience
Conscientiousness
Extraversion
Agreeableness
Neuroticism (emotional stability)
Traits vs Behaviour
Traits do seem to be relatively stable over time
especially true in longitudinal studies of adults
Behaviors are less predictable
how someone behaves depends on the situation as
well as internal characteristics
Expressiveness does seem to be consistent in
various situations
Averaging behavior over a variety of situations
does reveal distinct traits
Biological Factors for Traits?
Genes contribute to temperament & behavioral
style
Differences in brain functioning e.g.
Extraverts seek stimulation due to low normal
brain arousal (less active in frontal lobe)
Introverts have higher normal-levels of arousal
than an extravert, so extraverts need to seek out
external stimulation to raise the level of arousal
in the brain to a more optimal level
Differences in childrens autonomic nervous system
Biological Theories of Personality
Temperaments do
seem to be stable from
infants to old age.
Heritablity seems to be at
about 50% or 0.5
Personality Assessment
The main uses of personality tests are to aid
in diagnosing people with problems,
counseling, and making personnel decisions
Personality
Personality
Inventories
Inventories
Projective
Projective
Tests
Tests
Personality Inventories
Are designed to measure multiple traits of personality, and in
some cases, disorders
Are a series of questions or statements for which the test taker must
indicate whether they apply to them or not
The MMPI (the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory) is
the most widely used, translated into more than 100
languages
Can be administered and scored by a computer
Assesses abnormal personality tendencies rather than normal
personality traits
Development of the MMPI
Used empirical (based on, concerned with, or verifiable by observation or
experience rather than theory or pure logic) approach to item selection
thus:
Test items were chosen based on their ability to discriminate
one group of people from another
Items were selected for a scale if the psychiatric group scored
higher than non-clinical test-takers
Example: Much of the time my head seems to hurt all over
Endorsed by 4% of non-clinical test-takers
Endorsed by 12% of Hypochondriasis group
Difference was statistically significant
Development of MMPI
Originally eight psychiatric patient groups were formed for
test development (about 50 in each group):
Hypochondriasis, Depression, Hysteria, Psychopathic
Deviate, Paranoia, Psychasthenia, Schizophrenia,
Hypomania
MMPI-2 published in 1989 was re-normed on more
representative sample
2600 people from across the country representative of 1980 U.S.
census data
Rewrote awkward or offensive items, some new items added, some
MMPI
Contains three validity scales, which
attempt to detect test takers who are
trying to cover up problems and fake
profiles or who were careless in their
responding
Its test construction method leads to
good predictive validity for its clinical
scales and its objective scoring
procedure leads to reliability in
interpretation
Evaluating the Trait
Perspective
The Person-Situation Controversy Consistency of Expressive Style
Behavior influenced by the interaction of Our traits are less constrained
our inner disposition with our environment in a familiar environment
(our personality is different in different
situations) First impressions are very
Look for genuine traits that persist overtime accurate in terms of
& across situations. Interests, careers, even expressiveness our
spouses may change but people recognize animation, manner of
their traits as their own and a persons speaking, and gestures are
recognition is the culminating wisdom of a consistent. In familiar
lifetime situations, were more likely to
Peoples scores on personality tests only leave a lasting first impression
mildly predict their behaviour
The Social-Cognitive
Perspective
Proposed by Bandura; emphasizes the interaction of persons
and their situations
Social-Cognitive theorists believe:
we learn behaviors through conditioning or by observing
others and copying them
our behavior is influenced by our thoughts about the situation
Bottom Line is the interaction between
environment and people
Banduras self system
The self-system is the set of cognitive processes by which a
person observes, evaluates, and regulates his/her social behavior
There is a conscious decision to choose what behavior to engage in,
acting in accordance with the assessment of whether the behavior will
be reinforced or not
Self-efficacy is a judgment of ones effectiveness in dealing with
particular situations and plays a major role in
determining our behavior
Low self-efficacy is associated with depression, anxiety, and
helplessness
High self-efficacy is associated with self-confidence, positive outlook,
and minimal self-doubt
Reciprocal Influences
Behavior, environment & internal personal factors
all operate as interlocking determinants of each
other
1) Different people choose different environments
2) Our personalities shape how we interpret and react to
events
3) Our personalities help create situations to which we
react
Reciprocal Influences
REMEMBER: behavior emerges from the interplay
of external and internal influences
Evaluating the Social-
Cognitive Perspective
How do situations affect individuals?
Builds on psychological research on
learning and cognition
Does this focus too much on situation
rather than the persons inner traits?
Biologically influenced traits still matter
The Spotlight Effect
Spotlight effect: overestimating other noticing
and evaluating our appearance, performance,
and mistakes (as if we assume a spotlight
shines on us)
However, people notice less than we think they
do, even after an embarrassing moment or a
mistake we made
We tend to remember information better if it is
encoded in terms of ourselves
Benefits of high self-esteem:
Fewer sleepless Less shy and lonely
nights
Less likely to see
Succumb less easily rejection where
to pressures to none exists
conform
Youre just plain
Less likely to use happier
drugs
More persistent
with difficult tasks
Jung classified people based on the
flow of their psychic energy
extraverts: energy is directed toward the
external world, are social and like working
with others (e.g. politicians)
whereas
introverts: psychic energy is focused
more inward on themselves and their
own thoughts and feelings (e.g. poets)
Prentice Hall, 1999
Low Self-Esteem
Comes in two
different forms:
Depression: people feel
they are falling short of
their hopes
Anxiety: people feel they
are falling short of what
they ought to be
Effect of Low Self-Esteem:
If you temporarily deflate peoples self-image (telling
them they did poorly on a test, etc.) they are more
likely to scorn others or express greater racial
prejudice
People negative about themselves tend to be easily
offended and judgmental
Those made to feel insecure often become excessively
critical, as if to impress others with their own brilliance
People who have faced discrimination maintain
their self-esteem in three ways:
They value the things at which they excel in
They attribute problems to prejudice
They do as everyone does, they compare
themselves to those in their own group
Despite the realities of prejudice, groups like these
report levels of happiness roughly comparable to
others
Self-Serving Bias
Self-serving bias: a readiness to perceive oneself
favourably
People accept more responsibility for good deeds than
for bad, and for successes than for failures
Most people see themselves as better than average
All of us have inferiority complexes, those who
seem not to have such a complex are only
pretending.
John Powell
We
Remember and Are quicker to
justify our past believe flattering
actions in self- comments about
enhancing ways ourselves than
Exhibit an inflated unflattering ones
confidence in our Overestimate how
beliefs and judgments much others support
Overestimate how our opinions
well we would act in a Underestimate the
situation commonality of our
Often seek our strengths
favourable, self- Exhibit group pride
enhancing our school, country,
information etc is always superior
Pride does go before the fall
Encouraging people to feel
good about themselves
when they haven't earned
it poses problems.
Conceited, self-important
individuals turn nasty
towards those who
puncture their bubbles of
self-love. (Roy Baumeister)
Culture and the Self
Individualism: giving
priority to ones own
goals over group
goals, and defining
ones identity in terms
of personal attributes
rather than group
identifications.
Collectivism: giving
priority to the goals
of ones group
(often ones
extended family or
work groups) and
defining ones
identity accordingly.
Value Contrasts Between
Individualism and
Concept Collectivism
Individualism Collectivism
Self Independent Interdependent
(identity from (identity from
individual traits) belonging)
Life task Discover & express Maintain
uniqueness connections, fit in
What matters Me personal Us group goals
achievement and and solidarity;
fulfillment; rights social
and liberties; self- responsibilities and
esteem relationships
Coping Change reality Accommodate to
reality
method
Concept Individualism Collectivism
Morality Defined by Defined by social
individuals (self- networks (duty-
based) based)
Relationships Many, often Few, close, and
temporary or enduring; harmony
casual; valued
confrontation
acceptable
Attributing Behaviour reflects Behavior reflects
ones personality social norms and
behaviour and attitudes roles
