Personality Midterm 2 (Ch. 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16)

Question 0

Behaviorist

Answer 0

1. Believe an operant conditioning association or habit has been strengthened by an earlier experience.

Question 1

Behaviorism

Answer 1

1. Classical conditioning and operant conditioning are used by behaviorists to explain the development and maintenance of behaviors.
2. Personality is described as the end result of one’s history of conditioning.

Question 2

Classical conditioning (5)

Answer 2

1. Class. Cond. occurs when a new stimulus is paired with an existing stimulus-response bond.
2. Reflexes (S-R association)
3. Stimulus response (cringing), upon seeing a spider (stimulus)/ (unconditioned)
4. stimulus response (dog salivating), upon seeing and smelling meat powder (stimulus) + A bell ring (conditioned stimulus)= Salivation in response to a ringing bell becomes a conditioned response.
5. Second order conditioning: building one conditioned S-R association on another (Bell + greenlight= Salivation).

Question 3

Operant conditioning pg. 348

Answer 3

1. Results when a behavior is followed by a reward or punishment.
2. Voluntary and spontaneous behaviors
3. Behaviors are more likely to be repeated if they lead to satisfying outcomes or rewards
4. Behaviors are less likely to be repeated if they lead to consequences or punishments
5. Positive reinforcement: behavior increases because it is followed by the presentation of a reward
6. Negative reinforcement: The removal or lessening of an unpleasant stimulus when the behavior occurs
7. Generalization: every situation does not require that we learn a new response, personality characteristics generalize across situations. If generalized response is met with reinforcement, the behavior is likely to continue.
8. Discriminate: if generalized response is not met with reinforcement the behavior is not likely to continue.

Question 4

Watson

Answer 4

1. Started the behavioral approach in 1920’s
2. Little Albert experiments
3. Behaviorism in extreme form limits psych. to the study of observable behaviors.

Question 5

Skinner (3)

Answer 5

1. Behaviorist: believed in the power of the environment.
2. Believed people do not know the reason for their behaviors
3. Rejected the use of inner states, such as anxiety, as explanations of behavior in favor of observable external events.

Question 6

Bandura

Answer 6

1. Social cognitive theory
2. Internal states, the environment, and behavior all affect one another. People often regulate their own behavior and we engaged in purposeful, future oriented thinking. We learned through observing others, but it depends on our expectancy for reward or punishment.

Question 7

Reciprocal determinism pg. 354

Answer 7

External determinants of behavior, such as rewards and punishments, and internal determinants, such as beliefs, thoughts, expectations, are part of a system of interacting influences that affect not only behavior but the various parts of the system as well. (behaviors, external factors, internal factors influences each of the other parts).

Question 8

Self regulation

Answer 8

The belief that daily actions are largely controlled by self-regulation, working toward self-imposed goals with internal rewards. (such as feelings of accomplishment and self worth).

Question 9

Observational learning pg. 356

Answer 9

1. We can learn by observing or reading or just hearing about other people’s actions.
2. Behaviors learned through observation need not be performed

Question 10

Rotter

Answer 10

1. Social learning theory (The probability of engaging in a behavior changes after rewards and punishments because our expectancies change).
2. Behavior potential: the likelihood that a given behavior will occur in a particular situation.
3. Expectancy: estimations of what you expect to happen
4. Believes we can be placed along a continuum called locus of control, in which one end is extreme internal and the other is external.
5. Reinforcement value: the degree to which we prefer one reinforcer over another

Question 11

Social learning theory

Answer 11

1. Behavior-environment-behavior interactions: environment influences behavior, behavior determines the environment we find ourselves in, which then influences behavior.
2. Bridged behaviorism and cognitive approaches to personality by incorporating concepts like unobservable ones.

Question 12

Internal orientation

Answer 12

Those who believe that most of what happens to them is the result of their own actions or attributes.

Question 13

External orientation

Answer 13

Those who maintain that much of what happens to them is the result of forces outside their control, such as chance or powerful others.

Question 14

Behavior modification pg. 360

Answer 14

1. A focus is on changing a few well defined behaviors rather than changing the entire personality of the client, problem behaviors can be changed through appropriate conditioning experiences.
2. Problem behavior is the result of unusual conditioning experiences.
3. Behaviorists are unconcerned with discovering where the problem behavior originated, their goal is simply to remove it or replace it would be more appropriate set of responses.

Question 15

Classical conditioning applications

Answer 15

1. Pairing one stimulus with another to create new stimulus response associations.
2. Systematic desensitization: treatment for phobias that pair images of the feared object with a relaxation response.
3. Aversion therapy: getting rid of undesirable behaviors by pairing aversive images with the behavior.

Question 16

Operant conditioning applications

Answer 16

1. Reinforcing desired behaviors and punishing undesirable ones
2. Determine a baseline of behavior frequency, through observation. If it’s a desired behavior, the environment is altered so the client is rewarded for it. If it’s an undesired behavior, punishment is introduced or reinforcement is reduced.
3. Token economy: therapists who want to change a large number of behaviors for a large number of people at once. People are given the opportunity to earn tokens worth a certain number of points, they can exchange these tokens for rewards such a snacks or privileges.
4. Biofeedback: special equipment that provides information about somatic processes.

Question 17

Self efficacy pg. 362

Answer 17

1. Altering behavior when one can make a clear decision to expand the necessary effort.
2. Outcome expectation: The extent to which people believe their actions will lead to a certain outcome.
3. Efficacy expectation: The extent to which people believe they can bring about a particular outcome

Question 18

Behavior assessment

Answer 18

1. Direct observation: observing a child on the play ground, role-play, recreating real world settings, two observers coding behavior.
2. Self-monitoring: clients observing themselves, forcing clients to pay attention may show improvement before treatment has started.
3. Observation by others: teachers or parents record behavior of children, nurses and aides record patients behavior.

Question 19

Discriminate pg. 350

Answer 19

.

Question 19

Strengths of behaviorism

Answer 19

1. Behaviorists relied on empirical research and data when developing their theories.
2. Behavioral modification procedures are found to be effective, especially children and disturbed patients,
3. Treatments are faster, more cost effective and can be taught to parents, teachers etc. who can also carry out therapy without the therapist.

Question 20

Generalization pg. 350

Answer 20

.

Question 20

Criticism of behaviorism

Answer 20

1. Too narrow in its description of human personality.
2. Human beings are more complex than lab animals
3. Therapists may be not treating the real problem, but instead temporarily diverting the clients attention.

Question 23

Individual differences in gender- role behavior

Answer 23

1. Behaviorists and social learning theorists point to a lifelong process of gender role socialization. Children and adults acquire and maintain gender appropriate behaviors largely through operant conditioning and observational learning.
2. By the time children enter kindergarten, they are well aware of gender role expectations. Children of this age select the toys traditionally associated with their gender.
3. Masculinity (agency), femininity (communion)
4. Androgyny: masculinity and femininity are seen as independent traits instead of opposites on a single continuum. (Women tend to increase in both masculinity and femininity as they move through the middle adult years). Androgynous individuals are the most well-adjusted. Feminine and androgynous people are preferred partners in relationships

Question 24

Unmitigated communion

Answer 24

1. Those who interact with others in a compassionate and caring manner are so concerned with taking care of others that they tend to sacrifice their own needs and interests.
2. People high in unmitigated Communion tent to score low on measures of well-being and self-esteem, and score high on measures of depression.

Question 25

Observational learning of aggression

Answer 25

1. Bandura’s answer to why individuals sometimes imitate aggression: 4 steps 1.attend to aggressive action 2. Remember the information 3. Enact what they have seen 4. Expect that rewards are coming.
2. Participants who watched a violent movie or program acted more aggressively afterword than those who saw a nonviolent clip.
3. The more TV an eight-year-old child had watch that was violent, the more serious their adult crimes 22 years later.
4. Participants who play violent videogames are more aggressive immediately afterward than participants who played nonviolent videogames.

Question 26

Learned helplessness

Answer 26

1. Occurs when one is exposed to repeated aversive stimulus that they cannot escape from. Eventually the individual stops trying to avoid the stimulus and behaves utterly helpless to change the situation. When opportunities to escape are presented, the learned helplessness prevents any action.
2. Humans are as susceptible to learned helplessness as laboratory animals.
3. When elderly people have a sense of control over their lives there are many advantages in comparison with those elderly individuals who don’t have a sense of control over the lives.
4. Learned helplessness is highly correlated with depression.

Question 27

Locus of control

Answer 27

1. The extent to which people believe they have control over their lives.
2. Developed by Rotter from the concept of generalized expectancies. In new situations we have no information upon which to draw an expectancy of what might happen, so we rely on general beliefs about our ability to influence events.
3. Internal locus of control: belief that the individual has control and can affect what happens to them.
4. External locus of control: belief that luck or external circumstances control and affect what happened to them.
5. Internals tend to be happier than external’s, and correlation between externals and depression.
6. Research studies show that internal students receive higher grades and better teacher evaluations that external’s.
7. Internals practice better health habits and are generally healthier than external’s.

Question 28

The cognitive approach

Answer 28

1. Explains differences in personality as differences in the way people process information. (consistent behavior).

Question 29

Personal construct theory

Answer 29

1. Kelly’ approach: Man the scientist perspective: people constantly generate and test hypothesis is about their world because we want to predict and control as many events in our lives as possible. To satisfy our need for predictability we engage in template matching or schemas.
2. Personal constructs: The cognitive structures we used to interpret and predict events. (Bipolar, organized in an either or fashion, ex. Shy or outgoing, intelligent or unintelligent).
3. Kelly believes differences in personality result largely from differences in the way people construe the world. The relatively stable patterns in our behavior are the result of the relatively stable ways we construe the world.
4. Kelly believes psychological disorders are a product of defects in their construct systems.

Question 30

Schemas

Answer 30

1. Hypothetical cognitive structures that help us proceed, organize, process, and use information

Question 31

Self-concept

Answer 31

1. Developed at an early age this is a cognitive representation of ourselves.
2. Relatively stable over time
3. The representation we have of ourselves plays a central role in the way we process information and how we interact with the world.

Question 32

Possible selves

Answer 32

1. cognitive representations of the kind of person we might become some day.
2. Fairly stable over time.
3. Provide incentives for future behavior.
4. We pay more attention to and have stronger emotional reactions to events that are relevant to our possible selves.

Question 33

Self discrepancy theory

Answer 33

1. Actual self: The information you have about the kind of person you are or believe you are.
2. Ideal self: The mental image of the kind of person you would like to be, your dreams, aspirations and your goals.
3. Ought self: The self you believe you should be, the kind of person who fulfills the duties and obligations set by various sources like your parents or religion.
4. Discrepancies between the actual self and the ought self lead to agitation, anxiety, guilt.

Question 34

Cognitive behavior psychotherapy

Answer 34

1. Cognitive therapists identify inappropriate thoughts as a cause of mood disorders and self defeating behavior, like depression and anxiety.
2. The goal of cognitive therapies is to help clients recognize inappropriate thoughts and replace them with more appropriate ones.
3. Therapists teach clients how to deal with future and reoccurring problems.
4. The cognitive approach is the best behavioral therapy for treating depression and anxiety.

Question 35

Self-defeating thinking

Answer 35

A cause of reoccurring problems in which one cognitively sets him or herself up to fail by thinking and expecting the worst.

Question 36

Rational emotive therapy

Answer 36

1. Developed by Albert Ellis
2. A theory in which the activating experience is not identified as the reason for the emotional consequence, but instead identify an irrational belief as the cause.
3. Treatment includes: patient must see that they rely on irrational beliefs and identify why they do this. The therapist then works with the client to replace irrational believes with rational ones.

Question 37

Repertory grid text me

Answer 37

1. Developed by George Kelly
2. A technique used by therapist and clinical psychologists to obtain a visual map of how clients and those suffering from various psychological disorders construe the world.
3. Limits: requires interpretation on part of the therapist, Limited only to constructs with whom the patient already knows, does not account for new people in new situations, therapists definitions and clients definitions may be quite different.

Question 38

Strengths of cognitive approach

Answer 38

1. Ideas were developed through empirical research.

2. The cognitive approach on the rise over the past few decades.

Question 39

Criticisms of cognitive approach

Answer 39

1. Concepts are sometimes too abstract for empirical research, it’s hard to agree on clear operational definitions.
2. No single model to organize or guide research, it’s not simple.

Question 40

George Kelly

Answer 40

1. Pioneer in cognitive approach who developed personal construct theory.
2. We are motivated to make sense out of our world, always striving for better predictions about what will happen to us.
3. Anxiety stems from a person’s inability to predict events.

Question 41

Cognition and aggression

Answer 41

1. Exposure to violent movies, violent videogames, and violent lyrics to music increases aggressive thoughts.
2. Boys are much more likely to engage in physical acts of aggression than girls.
3. Reactive aggression: angry hostile aggression in response to frustration or provocation.

Question 42

Gender, memory, and self construal

Answer 42

1. Women recall significantly more personal events than men, positive or negative emotional events.
2. Men recall better personal information about American history.
3. Women are more likely than men to define themselves in terms of their relationship.

Question 43

Cognitions and depression

Answer 43

1. Depressed people remember sad experiences more easily and have difficulty keeping themselves from generating one depressing thought after another.
2. Sad people dwell on their problems and worry about things that might go wrong, they recall embarrassing mishaps and things they wish they never said.
3. Cognitive theorists argue that one’s thoughts can cause depression.

Question 44

Depressive cognitive triad

Answer 44

1. Depressed people have negative thoughts about themselves, are pessimistic about the future, and interpret ongoing experiences in a negative manner.

Question 45

Depressive schemas

Answer 45

1. A cognitive structure containing memories about and associations with depressing events and thoughts.
2. Depressed people attend to negative information.
3. Depressed people ignore positive information.
4. Depressed people interpret ambiguous info. in a depressing way.

Question 46

Negative cognitive style

Answer 46

1. Attribute problems to stable (enduring) and global (widespread) causes.
2. Anticipate dreadful consequences they believe has resulted from their personal shortcomings.
3. Related to depression

Question 47

The humanistic approach

Answer 47

1. Emphasis on personal responsibility.
2. Emphasis on ‘here and now.’
3. Focus on phenomenology of the individual.
4. Emphasis on personal growth.
5. Believes loneliness might reflect existential anxiety and therefore needs to find meaning in ones life.

Question 48

Existential anxiety

Answer 48

The feelings of dread and panic that follows the realization that there is no meaning to one’s life.

Question 49

Self-actualization

Answer 49

An ultimately satisfying state of being.

Question 50

Rodgers

Answer 50

1. Pioneered humanistic psychology.
2. Popularized ‘person-centered’ approach
3. Expanded psychotherapy into a general theory of personality.
4. Believes anxiety results from coming into contact with info that is inconsistent with they way we think of ourselves.

Question 51

Fully functioning

Answer 51

1. A direction we naturally strive to reach, an optimal sense of satisfaction with our lives.
2. Open to experiences.
3. Live each moment as it comes.
4. Trust feelings and experience them deeply by expressing and accepting them, positive or negative.
5. Less prone to conform

Question 52

Subception

Answer 52

1. A level below consciousness that receives info.
2. If not threatening, info easily flows into awareness. If threatening, our defenses will keep info from entering consciousness and thereby keep anxiety at bay.

Question 53

Defenses

Answer 53

1. Distortion: most common, person who called you a jerk was in a bad mood.
2. Denial
3. Disorganization: the gap between self-concept and reality is so large that defenses are inadequate, results in anxiety.

Question 54

Conditional positive regard

Answer 54

1. Love that is conditional upon behavior, not unconditional.
2. Because of this, we deny weaknesses and faults and become less aware of ourselves, lose touch with feelings and become less fully functioning.

Question 55

Unconditional positive regard

Answer 55

1. Being accepted and loved no matter what we do, don’t approve of some behavior but always loved and accepted.
2. Won’t deny thoughts and feelings, enables one to experience all of themselves and experience all of life.

Question 56

Maslow

Answer 56

1. Father of humanistic psych.
2. The hierarchy of needs ware shaping our behavior (they are the same across cultures).
3. Behavior is the result of multiple motivations.

Question 57

Deficiency motives

Answer 57

1. Result from lack of needed objects, like food and water.

2. Stop directing behavior when needed objects are obtained.

Question 58

Growth needs

Answer 58

1. Not satisfied once object of need is found, but by expressing the motive.
2. Include: unselfish giving of love to others, development of ones unique potential

Question 59

Hierarchy of needs

Answer 59

1. Physiological needs: hunger, thirst…
2. Safety needs: security, stability, protection, freedom from fear…
3. Belongingness and love needs:
4. Esteem needs
5. Need for self-actualization

Question 60

Optimal experience

Answer 60

1. Intensely enjoyable but not restful, relaxing moments. Activities that are difficult, worthwhile and need much effort.

Question 61

Strengths of humanistic approach

Answer 61

1. Positive approach
2. Helped draw attention to positive psychology
3. Most therapist use rogerian theory of empathy and unconditional positive regard in therapy

Question 62

Criticisms of humanistic approach

Answer 62

1. Reliance on free will to predict behavior, how do we measure free will?
2. Key concepts are poorly defined, too vague-(self-actualization, fully functioning)
3. Relies too heavily on intuition.
4. Humanistic therapy can only be limited to a narrow band of problems.
5. Being destined to fulfill ones potential may contradict the free will emphasis
6. Generated less empirical research than researcher from other approaches

Question 63

Self-disclosure

Answer 63

1. People engage in self-disclosure when they reveal intimate and personal information about themselves to another person (works better with therapy too, if you self-disclose).
2. Rodgers maintains self-disclosure is necessary for understanding ones self.
3. Therapists who self-disclose to their patients had patients who had fewer symptoms of distress than clients who had a decrease in disclosure.

Question 64

Disclosure reciprocity

Answer 64

1. People involved in a get acquainted conversation reveal information about themselves at the same level of intimacy as the other person involved.
2. Most generally follow this rule even children as young as 8 seem to understand and follow this rule.
3. Why do we do it? Leads to feelings of attraction and trust. We disclose to people we like and we like who disclose to us (must be both ways).
4. We disclose more personal experiences to significant friends rather than acquaintances (more intimacy with friends).
5. College freshman who more willing to disclose their emotions to others developed more intimate social relationships than students who were not willing to reveal.
6. Self-disclosure in a marriage is a strong predictor of relationship satisfaction, the more couples talk to one another about personal information the better each of them feels about the marriage.
7. Women typically disclose more information than do men.
8. Men and women are more likely to be accepted when they disclose information within the appropriate societal roles for their gender (men-withhold info, women-be open but only about certain things).
9. Disclosure leads to better physical, emotional, and psychological well being health, even in the future.

Question 65

Loneliness

Answer 65

1. People are lonelier today than they were a few decades ago.
2. Loneliness occurs when a person’s network of social relationships is smaller or less satisfying than the person desires.
3. Can be a stable personality trait.
4. High scores on loneliness scales related to high scores on social anxiety and self-consciousness and low levels of self-esteem and assertiveness.
5. Lonely people more likely to be introverted, anxious, sensitive to rejection, pessimism and negative mood.
6. Lonely people have poorer health habits, experience more chronic stressors, less effective stress coping strategies, experience unhealthy changes in physiology, less likely to rely on natural restorative processes that improve health.

Question 66

Causes of loneliness

Answer 66

1. Negative expectations

2. Poorly developed social skills

Question 67

Self-esteem

Answer 67

1. Overall Evaluation of your self-concept, “I have these characteristics and these characteristics and overall I like myself.”
2. Does not refer to the ups and downs of fluctuating feelings of self-worth.
3. Self esteem is a Stable self evaluation.
4. Low esteem people become discouraged and unmotivated when they receive negative feedback, high esteem people use tactics to blunt effects of failure.
5. People base self esteem on how they perform in selected domains.

Question 68

Solitude

Answer 68

1. Healthy people report high preference for solitude.
2. Students who had moderate time alone were better adjusted and less depressed than students who spent little time alone. (Better grades too).

Question 69

Contingencies of self worth

Answer 69

1. Areas individuals identify as important to us and use them to determine our self worth. (Academic performance, acceptance from family, friends).
2. We form evaluations of ourselves, self esteem, on how we do in those selected areas.

Question 70

Self esteem and culture

Answer 70

1. American students share a universal tendency to view oneself in a better light than objective data suggest. We report superiority over peers on a variety of skills and altitudes.
2. Little evidence for this bias in collectivistic cultures.