INTELLIGENCE, THINKING AND PERSONALITY

1
INTELLIGENCE, THINKING AND PERSONALITY

• OVERVIEW OF PERSONALITY

2
WHAT IS PERSONALITY?

• Characteristics that make people different from
  one another
• In particular relatively stable characteristics
• Also important to consider person as a whole
  (or self)
• Could play a major role in explaining peoples
  behaviour (and hence in any psychological theory)
• in particular similarities and differences in
  behaviour from one person to another

3
APPROACHES CONSIDERED

• Psychometric
• Structured personality tests and trait theory
• Social-Cognitive
• cognitive version of social learning theory
• Phenomenological/Humanistic
• focus on individuals own experience and
  potential for self-actualisation
• Psychodynamic
• psychoanalytic theories

4
INTELLIGENCE, THINKING AND PERSONALITY

• THE PSYCHOMETIC APPROACH STRUCTURED PERSONALITY
  TESTS AND TRAIT THEORIES

5
PERSONALITY TESTS

• As with Intelligence, there is a long history of
  the development of personality tests
• However, controversy over e.g. racial differences
  or genetic factors is much less evident than with
  intelligence
• Some tests are tied to specific theories of
  personality (trait theories)
• The Maudsley Personality Inventory (MPI), Eysenck
  Personality Inventory (EPI), Eysenck Personality
  Questionnaire (EPQ) (Eysencks theory)
• the 16PF (Cattells theory)

6
PERSONALITY TESTS -cont

• Other tests have been developed as least to some
  extent independently of major theoretical
  positions
• The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory
  (MMPI)
• best known (US) test in clinical applications
• major categories are derived from major
  categories of mental illness (items that
  differentiate those so diagnosed from normals)
• The California Personality Inventory (CPI)
• major categories based on survey of normal
  people (items differentiate e.g. high and low
  dominance individuals in a peer group from others)

7
TRAIT THEORIES WHAT IS A TRAIT?

• A consistent pattern in the way an individual
  behaves, feels and thinks
• Consistency can be over
• situations
• times
• Can be used to
• summarise
• predict
• explain
• peoples behaviour

8
HIERARCHIES OF BEHAVIOUR DESCRIPTORS

• Traits, at the highest level (or levels)
• Below traits Eysenck recognises
• habits
• specific responses
• Above simple traits, he recognises superfactors

9
TRAIT THEORIES

• Allport
• Eysenck
• Cattell
• Five Factor Theory (The Big Five)
• Goldberg, McCrae and Costa, John and others

10
ALLPORT

• Emphasised the uniqueness of the individual (and
  the possibility of individual traits, not
  amenable to scientific study)
• proposed in-depth study of individuals
  (idiographic research)
• Distinguished cardinal (all pervasive), central
  and secondary traits
• Did not favour the use of factor analysis to
  identify traits
• Believed many traits were inherited

11
EYSENCK

• Relied on factor analysis to identify traits
• But also championed experimental tests of his
  theories
• Identified TWO (later THREE - PEN) superfactors
  that group lower level traits
• Psychoticism
• Extraversion-Introversion
• Neuroticism (Stable vs.Unstable)

12
EYSENCK AND THE GREEKS

• Eysenck suggested the following mapping
• Melancholic
• Introverted, Unstable
• Choleric
• Extraverted, Unstable
• Phlegmatic
• Introverted, Stable
• Sanguine
• Extraverted, Stable

13
EYSENCK - EXAMPLE TRAITS

• Neuroticism (high) Superfactor
• anxious
• depressed
• guilt feelings
• low self-esteem
• tense
• irrational
• shy
• moody
• emotional

14
EYSENCK - BIOLOGICAL UNDERPINNINGS

• Eysenck suggested that extraverts are less easily
  aroused than introverts
• He suggested that neurotic individuals respond
  quickly to stress but recover less quickly from
  stress that stable individuals
• More generally Eysenck thinks that the biological
  underpinnings of the superfactors are genetically
  controlled.

15
CATTELL

• Like Eysenck, favoured factor analysis, but was
  not so keen on secondary analyses identifying
  superfactors
• Argued that the same traits should be discovered
  from
• L-data (life record data, including the
  observations of a person by others)
• Q-data (questionnaires)
• OT-data (objective test data -experiments)

16
CATTELL - TYPES OF TRAIT

• Two distinctions among type of trait
• ability (includes intelligence), temperament and
  dynamic (related to motivation) traits
• surface and source traits

17
CATTELL - SPECIFIC TRAITS

• Factor analysis of L-data suggests 15 traits
• Q-data added a 16th

18
CATTELL - TRAITS cont

• reserved vs.
• less intelligent vs.
• stable vs.
• humble vs.
• sober vs.
• expendient vs.
• shy vs.
• tough-minded vs.

• outgoing
• more intelligent
• neurotic
• assertive
• happy-go-lucky
• conscientious
• venturesome
• tender-minded

19
CATTELL - TRAITS cont

• trusting vs.
• practical vs.
• forthright vs.
• placid vs.
• conservative vs.
• group-dependent vs.
• undisciplined vs.
• relaxed vs.

• suspicious
• imaginative
• shrewd
• apprehensive
• experimenting
• self-sufficient
• controlled
• tense

20
CATTELL - cont

• Developed the 16 PF (personality factors) test
• Later focused on OT-data and developed a 21 PF
  test
• However, he was unable to produce a satisfactory
  mapping between the 16 factors suggested by L-
  and Q-data and the 21 suggested by OT-data

21
THE BIG FIVE

• So far we have an apparent disagreement about the
  number and nature of basic personality dimensions
  (e.g. Eysenck 3, Cattell 16 or 21).
• Since the 1980s there has been a growing
  consensus that five major dimensions can be
  identified.

22
THE BIG FIVE - OCEAN

• O Openness
• C Conscientiousness
• E Extraversion
• A Agreeableness
• N Neuroticism

23
THE BIG FIVE - EVIDENCE

• Factor analysis of trait terms in natural
  language - e.g. in self-descriptions (Norman,
  1963, originally found a 5-factor solution)
• Cross-cultural research
• Openness is the most dubious, here
• Cheung et al. 1996 suggest an additional factor
  may be needed to describe Chinese personality
• Relation to other questionnaire data of Big Five
  tests such as Costa McCraes NEO-PI-R
  (Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness -
  Personality Inventory - Revised -- the revision
  added C and A)

24
THE BIG FIVE, EYSENCK AND CATTELL

• E and N map almost directly to E and N in the EPQ
  (Eysenck Personality Questionnaire)
• High P on the EPQ maps onto low A and low C in
  the Big Five model
• (remember O is the least universal of the Big
  Five)
• The 16 factors in the Cattell 16-PI map onto the
  Big Five, for example
• outgoing, venturesome and assertive map onto E
• trusting and tender-minded map onto A
• Results from the NEO-PI-R have also been related
  to other measures such as Q-sort (see later
  lecture)

25
THE BIG FIVE - NATURE VS NURTURE

• McCrae et al believe that the Big Five traits
  mature in people largely independently of
  environmental influences
• Environmental influences (e.g. particular choices
  available to a person) determine life choices
  (along with traits)

26
THE BIG FIVE - APPLICATIONS

• Proponents of the Big Five model suggest that it
  is accurate enough (and has a good enough measure
  - the NEO-PI-R) to have important applications in
  vocational guidance, diagnosis and treatment
• Friedman et al suggest that high C is a good
  predictor of longevity