PSY 101 Exam 4 Notes Disclaimer All notes are my own taken from Dr Poulin s lecture material including written notes and visual aids images Introducing Personality 1 Overview Personality an individual s characteristic pattern of thinking feeling and acting who you are o Not defined by external factors Example everybody in the lecture hall will be taking notes Being able to predict this doesn t mean you are predicting personality it is just the fact that you are in a class o Enduring across situations o Strongly tied to notions of what it means to be a person i e human nature Must make some statements about how people act differently How do personality psychologists do this 2 Top down vs Bottom up Approaches Top down approach starting with a set of assumptions about human nature to identify important personality differences o e g attachment theory and attachment styles ambivalently securely insecurely attached o But assumptions can give an overly limiting view of human nature Fundamental problem with top down approaches regarding personality you must be completely sure that your set of assumptions about human nature are true and complete Example human nature is defined by attachment style this statement leaves out an enormous amount of information that is directly related to being human Bottom up approach sorting through many ways in which people differ to determine which are Top down approaches Not followed much by psychologists today but they have had great influence on pop culture and important for human nature 3 Two historical theories Freud and Humanistic popular understanding of psychology 4 Freud and Psychodynamic theory Background o Sigmund Freud 1856 1939 neurologist in Vienna Austria o Learned about treatment of Anna O Patient of his friend Josef Breuer about her life Recovered using talking cure Couldn t find a physical cure for her symptoms so Breuer just decided to speak to her The more she spoke about her difficult emotional issues the better her symptoms got It was a revolutionary idea that simple counseling could cure physical illnesses or symptoms o Convinced Freud of the power of the mind How could talking about emotional issues resolve a physical problem How could not talking about these issues prolong a physical problem o During the late 1800s early 1900s there was a newly growing interest in material influences on humans European Enlightenment late 1700s Karl Marx mid 1800s Darwin and evolution mid 1800s first view of humans as animals in essence o There was much growing resistance to these ideas as well anti religious immoral etc Eros and Thanatos Overview Human biological impulses part of human nature conflict with society Human nature boiled down to 2 basic impulses Eros and Thanatos Eros sex drive o Thanatos aggressive drive o Society also important for human nature regulates these impulses o Channels these drives into productive activities Individuals manage Eros and Thanatos by keeping them in the unconscious subconscious Reservoir of unacceptable thoughts feelings and desires The vast majority of the mind Similar to an iceberg Freud believed that only 10 of the mind was above the surface in the conscious while 90 was below in the subconscious o But sometimes these impulses leak out of unconscious Dreams Freudian slips when a sexual or aggressive impulse leaks into your speech Physical health problems o Effects of this can be managed through psychoanalysis talking about unconscious impulses that become conscious These impulses could be managed through talking about your emotional problems o Mental structures that balance biological desires with societal pressures o Id Unconscious represents eros and thanatos Operates on pleasure principle immediate gratification Doesn t care about societal expectations the id focuses on the impulse and gratification Id especially eros expressed through erogenous zones Pleasure giving parts of the body Freud s theory of psychosexual development With age pleasure is experienced through different erogenous zones Mouth anus genitals Freud didn t believe that children and infants experienced sexual pleasure but rather that the gratification and pleasure they did experience was the same as sexual pleasure they experienced as they went through puberty Id Superego and Ego o Superego Unconscious represents societal and personal rules like conscience Represents the powers that govern your behavior In opposition to the id The superego and id are constantly fighting over each other Example the angel on your shoulder is the superego while the id is the devil o Ego At least partly conscious balances messages from id and superego Operates according to the reality principle Best outcomes in the long run Example despite sexual impulses from the id the ego decides against acting on them in order to preserve socially acceptable behavior Manages the id through defense mechanisms More socially acceptable ways of expressing the id s desires Wide variety but they defend the ego from the negative effects of the id All defense mechanisms depend upon one key defense mechanism repression The primary job of the ego was to keep unacceptable impulses like eros and thanatos out of consciousness Examples of defense mechanisms defense mechanisms Repression banishing anxiety arousing thoughts from consciousness underlies the other Reaction formation making unacceptable impulses look like their opposites Example if you are attracted to your best friend s significant other you will act like you hate them Projection attributing threatening impulses to others Example saying another mutual friend is attracted to your best friend s significant other Rationalization offering self justifying explanations for behavior Example convincing yourself somehow why it is good to be attracted to your best friend s significant other and why it is a good idea to act on this impulse Displacement diverting impulses to a more acceptable object Example diverting your attraction to your friend s significant other to another person Sublimations channeling impulses into productive activity Example when you start feeling such impulses and you decide to go for a run instead to use up that energy o Id Superego and Ego Combinations of these can shape personality Strong id impulsive Strong superego conscientious avoids pleasure Strong ego achieves pleasure through acceptable means Modern View o Critiques Doesn t do justice to variety of human motivations So many needs like the need