REVIEW Contemporary Perspectives on Personality

Learning Objectives

Test Yourself by taking a moment to answer each of these Learning Objective Questions (repeated here from within the module). Research suggests that trying to answer these questions on your own will improve your long-term memory of the concepts (McDaniel et al., 2009).

Question

39-1 How do psychologists use traits to describe personality?
ANSWER: Trait theorists see personality as a stable and enduring pattern of behavior. They describe our differences rather than trying to explain them. Using factor analysis, they identify clusters of behavior tendencies that occur together. Genetic predispositions influence many traits.

Question

39-2 What are some common misunderstandings about introversion? Does extraversion lead to greater success than introversion?
ANSWER: Introversion is often misunderstood as shyness, but introverted people often simply seek low levels of stimulation from their environment. Introversion is also sometimes thought to be a barrier to success, but in fact introverts often experience great achievement, even in sales.

Question

39-3 What are personality inventories, and what are their strengths and weaknesses as trait-assessment tools?
ANSWER: Personality inventories (such as the MMPI) are questionnaires on which people respond to items designed to gauge a wide range of feelings and behaviors. Test items are empirically derived, and the tests are objectively scored. But people can fake their answers to create a good impression, and the ease of computerized testing may lead to misuse of the tests.

Question

39-4 Which traits seem to provide the most useful information about personality variation?
ANSWER: The Big Five personality factors—conscientiousness, agreeableness, neuroticism, openness, and extraversion (CANOE)—currently offer the clearest picture of personality. These factors are quite stable and appear to be found in all cultures.

Question

39-5 Does research support the consistency of personality traits over time and across situations?
ANSWER: A person's average traits persist over time and are predictable over many different situations. But traits cannot predict behavior in any one particular situation.

Question

39-6 How do social-cognitive theorists view personality development, and how do they explore behavior?
ANSWER: Albert Bandura first proposed the social-cognitive perspective, which emphasizes the interaction of our traits with our situations. Social-cognitive researchers apply principles of learning, cognition, and social behavior to personality. Reciprocal determinism is a term describing the interaction and mutual influence of behavior, internal personal factors, and environmental factors.

Question

39-7 What criticisms have social-cognitive theorists faced?
ANSWER: Social-cognitive theorists build on well-established concepts of learning and cognition. They tend to believe that the best way to predict someone's behavior in a given situation is to observe that person's behavior in similar situations. They have been faulted for underemphasizing the importance of unconscious motives, emotions, and biologically influenced traits.

Question

39-8 Why has psychology generated so much research on the self? How important is self-esteem to our well-being?
ANSWER: The self is the center of personality, organizing our thoughts, feelings, and actions. Considering possible selves helps motivate us toward positive development, but focusing too intensely on ourselves can lead to the spotlight effect. Self-esteem is our feeling of self-worth; self-efficacy is our sense of competence on a task. High self-esteem correlates with less pressure to conform, with persistence at difficult tasks, and with happiness. But the direction of the correlation is not clear. Psychologists caution against unrealistically promoting children's feelings of self-worth. It's better to reward their achievements, which leads to feelings of competence.

Question

39-9 What evidence reveals self-serving bias, and how do defensive and secure self-esteem differ?
ANSWER: Self-serving bias is our tendency to perceive ourselves favorably, as when viewing ourselves as better than average or when accepting credit for our successes but not blame for our failures. Narcissism is excessive self-love and self-absorption. Defensive self-esteem is fragile, focuses on sustaining itself, and views failure or criticism as a threat. Secure self-esteem enables us to feel accepted for who we are.

Question

39-10 How do individualist and collectivist cultures differ in their values and goals?
ANSWER: Within any culture, the degree of individualism or collectivism varies from person to person. Cultures based on self-reliant individualism, like those found in North America and Western Europe, tend to value personal independence and individual achievement. They define identity in terms of self-esteem, personal goals and attributes, and personal rights and liberties. Cultures based on socially connected collectivism, like those in many parts of Asia and Africa, tend to value interdependence, tradition, and harmony, and they define identity in terms of group goals, commitments, and belonging to one's group.

Terms and Concepts to Remember

Test yourself on these terms.

Question

trait (p. 505)
personality inventory (p. 508)
Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) (p. 508)
empirically derived test (p. 508)
social-cognitive perspective (p. 513)
reciprocal determinism (p. 513)
self (p. 516)
spotlight effect (p. 516)
self-esteem (p. 517)
self-efficacy (p. 517)
self-serving bias (p. 518)
narcissism (p. 519)
individualism (p. 521)
collectivism (p. 521)
one's feelings of high or low self-worth.
overestimating others' noticing and evaluating our appearance, performance, and blunders (as if we presume a spotlight shines on us).
a test (such as the MMPI) developed by testing a pool of items and then selecting those that discriminate between groups.
the most widely researched and clinically used of all personality tests. Originally developed to identify emotional disorders (still considered its most appropriate use), this test is now used for many other screening purposes.
the interacting influences of behavior, internal cognition, and environment.
views behavior as influenced by the interaction between people's traits (including their thinking) and their social context.
excessive self-love and self-absorption.
a questionnaire (often with true-false or agree-disagree items) on which people respond to items designed to gauge a wide range of feelings and behaviors; used to assess selected personality traits.
one's sense of competence and effectiveness.
giving priority to one's own goals over group goals and defining one's identity in terms of personal attributes rather than group identifications.
in contemporary psychology, assumed to be the center of personality, the organizer of our thoughts, feelings, and actions.
giving priority to the goals of one's group (often one's extended family or work group) and defining one's identity accordingly.
a readiness to perceive oneself favorably.
a characteristic pattern of behavior or a disposition to feel and act, as assessed by self-report inventories and peer reports.

Experience the Testing Effect

Test yourself repeatedly throughout your studies. This will not only help you figure out what you know and don’t know; the testing itself will help you learn and remember the information more effectively thanks to the testing effect.

Question 13.13

1. theories of personality focus on describing characteristic behavior patterns, such as agreeableness or extraversion.

Question 13.14

2. One famous personality inventory is the

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B.
C.
D.

Question 13.15

3. Which of the following is NOT one of the Big Five personality factors?

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B.
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D.

Question 13.16

4. Our scores on personality tests best predict

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D.

Question 13.17

5. The social-cognitive perspective proposes our personality is shaped by a process called reciprocal determinism, as personal factors, environmental factors, and behaviors interact. An example of an environmental factor is

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B.
C.
D.

Question 13.18

6. Critics say that personality theory is very sensitive to an individual's interactions with particular situations, but that it gives too little attention to the person's enduring traits.

Page 525

Question 13.19

7. Researchers have found that low self-esteem tends to be linked with life problems. How should this link be interpreted?

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B.
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Question 13.20

8. A fortune cookie advises, “Love yourself and happiness will follow.” Is this good advice?
ANSWER: Yes, if that self-love is of the secure type. Secure self-esteem promotes a focus beyond the self and a higher quality of life. Excessive self-love may promote artificially high or defensive self-esteem, which may lead to unhappiness if negative external feedback triggers anger or aggression.

Question 13.21

9. The tendency to overestimate others' attention to and evaluation of our appearance, performance, and blunders is called the .

Question 13.22

10. Individualist cultures tend to value ________; collectivist cultures tend to value________.

A.
B.
C.
D.

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