Personality tests Self report ask subjects direct questions about their behavior ex have you ever had this thought Have you ever thought of suicide Single trait measures one personality trait Multi trait measures multiple Projective tests ex say first word that comes to mind when I say this word or show you this picture present subjects with ambiguous stimuli and ask for some interpretation of them Ex Rorschach ink blot test show ink blot and say first thing that comes to mind way people respond tells about their personality o 10 ink blots TAT thermatic apperception test consists of a series of pictures derived from paintings drawings and magazine illustrations The Structure of personality Freuds theories Id innermost core of personality only structure present at birth source of all psychic energy Has no direct contact with reality and functions completely irrationally Operates according to the pleasure principle o Seeks immediate gratification or release regardless of rational considerations and environmental realities Ego has direct contact with reality and functions at conscious level is the executive of the personality Operates according to the reality principle o Testing reality to decide when and under what conditions the id can safely discharge its impulses and satisfy its needs o Ex The Id seeks sexual gratification ego would have sex with girlfriend however would not make decision to sexually assault the first person seen Superego the moral arm of the personality developed by age 4 or 5 contains traditional values and ideals of family and society Strives to control the instincts of the ID The moral part of thoughts moralistic goals take precedence over realistic ones Parts of the mind Conscious mind consists of mental events in current awareness Preconscious mind contains memories feelings thoughts and images that we are unaware of at the moment but that can be recalled Ex remembering a friends telephone number Unconscious mind freud believed this part to be the largest and most important part of the mind it is a dynamic realm of wishes feelings and impulses that lie beyond our awareness Impulses from the unconscious are discharged in various ways such as dreams slips of the tongue or some disguised behavior Psychosexual development Psychosexual stages children pass through a series of stages during which the ids pleasure seeking tendencies are focused on specific pleasure sensitive areas of the body the erogenous zones Oral stage the first stage occurs during infancy Infants gain primary satisfaction from taking in food and from sucking on breast thumb or other object Freud proposed either excessive gratification or frustration of oral needs can result in fixation on oral themes of self indulgence or dependency as adult o Ex biting your pen chewing gum oral sex Anal stage second stage entered into at age 2 or 3 pleasure becomes focused on the process of elimination toilet training According to Freud harsh training can produce compulsions and obsessive concerns with orderliness and extremely lax toilet training results in a messy negative and dominant adult personality Phallic stage most controversial stage age 4 5 this is the time when children begin to derive pleasure from their sexual organs Freud believed during this stage the male child experiences erotic feelings toward his mother desires to possess her sexually and views his father as a rival At the same time though these feelings arouse strong guilt and a fear the father will find out and castrate him castration anxiety o Oedipus complex this conflictual situation involving love for the mother and hostility towards father Electra complex the female counterpart of the Oedipus complex the female realizes she doesn t have a penis and blames the mother the female wishes to bear the fathers child as a substitute for what they lack Freud believed phallic stage to be a milestone in gender identity children typically identify with the same sex parent meaning boys take traits of their father and girls those of the mother Penis Envy the penis is the most desirable sexual organ demonstrated by electra complex Latency Stage sexuality becomes dominant for about 6 years fixation results in sexual repression Genital stage sexuality normally reemerges in adolescence as beginning of this lifelong stage erotic impulses find direct expression in sexual relationships Other Non Freudian personality theories Alfred Adler insisted that human beings are motivated by social interest the desire to advance the welfare of others They place general social welfare above selfish personal interests Freud viewed humans as savage animals caged by the bars of civilization Adler also believed in a general motive of striving for superiority where people try to compensate for real or imagined defects in themselves Carl Jung expanded Freud s notion of the unconscious Humans posess not only a personal unconsciousness but also a collective unconsciousness consists of memories accumulated through entire history of human race o These memories are represented by archetypes inherited tendencies to interpret experiences in certain ways Carl Rogers humanist believed the forces that direct behavior are within us and that when they are not distorted or blocked by our environment they can be trusted to direct us toward self actualization the highest realization of human potential The self an organized consistent set of perceptions of and beliefs about oneself o 2 facets it is an object of perception and an internal entity that directs behavior He also believed we are born with an innate need for positive regard for acceptance sympathy and love from others Minnesota twin studies genetics plays more of a role than people thought parents aren t too much to blame for childrens mental issues based on how they were raised Multi trait personalities
View Full Document
Unlocking...