Studying Personality

Living with people is probably the best way to determine their personality, as many college roommates have found out. Unfortunately, living with someone, as a method of personality assessment, takes too long and is fraught with ethical implications. So, how do psychologists measure personality in a reasonable time and without ethical violations?

All of the methods below will be affected by one of the basic problems in any type of personality assessment, namely the discrepancy between self report and actual behavior. This problem may occur without subjects realizing it, and it highlights the fact the we are often unaware of the biases we possess about ourselves. We are often struck by the discrepancy in how others view us compared to how we see ourselves. For example, I was shocked to learn some years ago that students find me a fearful stimulus, because I consider myself as easy going and pleasant. My colleagues all laugh when I tell that story, so I guess they do not find me that easy going and pleasant either. Now, I take extra effort in the first few classes to appear less scary.

The problem of self-report and actual behavior may also be created intentionally. Often, we take pains to present a certain image to the rest of the world, and that image may not reflect our actual personality or behavior. Dating, for instance, has been criticized because people tend to try to project an image, rather than their true selves, while dating. When I have interviewed, for example, I wear a suit or a sport coat. But they are the only suit and sport coat I own. When I wear them on campus, jaws drop and people ask me why I am wearing them. More seriously, criminals and mental patients may have good reason to cover up their true natures and intentions in order to be discharged from prison or therapy, respectively. With the above in mind, let's examine a few methods for studying personality.

At first glance, an interview may not seem like a very sophisticated method for determining personality. However, a skilled interviewer may be able to determine and infer much from a short interview. Interviews come in two basic types. The structured interview treats all interviewees as similarly as possible in order to assess differences among them. Employment interviews or college admission interviews may be seen as structured interviews. Unstructured interviews are less rigid by definition. An interviewer conducting such interviews may allow each interview to follow its own unique path. Interviewees may be encouraged to pursue topics they have brought up. In the hands of practiced interviewers, unstructured interviews allow deeper penetration into the personality than do structured interviews. All serious decisions concerning therapy, admission to mental health in-patient therapy, or other such situations nearly always include one or more interviews.

Rating scales have been developed to provide a tool for quickly determining both your own personality and the personality of others. Rating scales of self are particularly subject to problems relating to self-knowledge. In other words, the better you know yourself, the better the rating will be. The same logic applies to ratings of others. An interesting problem with ratings, in general, is the halo effect. The halo effect states that extreme scores on one rating will affect nearby subsequent scores in the same direction. So, an extreme negative rating on an item will bias the next several items in a negative direction. The effect also holds for extreme positive ratings. In essay tests, you can exploit the halo effect by submitting your best answer first. Do not try it with me because I read essay tests by the question, not by the student, so that I may control for the halo effect.

Personality inventories have been discussed earlier. They include the 16 PF, the MMPI (Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory), the CPI (California Personality Inventory), and many others. All of these techniques ask subjects a great many questions in a pencil-and-paper format, and then the answers yield scores on a number of scales. Those scale scores are usually reported in a standard way with lines connecting them, thus, the "personality profile." The MMPI also includes scales designed to check for random responding and faking "tough" or "nice." One should not rely on scores on inventories as the only method of assessment. But when used correctly, they provide a valuable shortcut to a quick view into an individual's personality.

Projective techniques originally stemmed from psychoanalytic theory. They were designed to tap into a person's unconscious without that person being aware of such probing. The most famous such technique is the Rorschach Inkblot test (see Handout 17 4). Subjects are asked to describe all of the possible things they perceive a particular inkblot to be. Responses are analyzed according to a prescribed method. Another projective test is the TAT or Thematic Apperception Test. In the TAT, subjects are shown a series of pictures of ambiguous situations. They are then asked to tell a story about the people in the picture: Who are they, how did they get there, what are they doing, what is going to happen? Suppose, for example, a picture of two women walking down a country road at sunset toward a small house in the background, is shown. If a subject says that they live in the house, are mother and daughter, they just had dinner, and are enjoying a quiet evening's walk, that is one thing. But, if the story is that the two women's car broke down nearby, they are walking toward the house for help, but will not get it because they will be harmed, then those two stories might prove useful in further questioning of each subject. Finally, the Draw-a-person type of test asks subjects to draw themselves, their family members, or even their houses. Their drawings are then interpreted. One 6-year-old girl I tested drew her parents and siblings as huge, and herself as very small. I interpreted that as a reflection of her perception of her role in the family. Projective tests can be very useful in individual cases, but are usually not used in making comparisons between subjects.

URLs

* Personality Tests on the WWW--index, basic, short, links, graphics
o Offers 21 links to on-line personality tests. Includes tests for type-A personality, left or right brain, assertiveness, and others. http://www.2h.com/Tests/personality.phtml
* Spending Personality Self-Test--interactive, basic, medium, links
o Page contains on-line version of commercially available test users may take in order to analyze their spending habits. http://www.ns.net/cash/selftest/selftest.html
* Somatic Inkblot Series--index, adv., short, links, graphics
o Home page of the Somatic Inkblot Series, dedicated to the use of projective techniques. The page has links to sample inkblots, a journal, membership information, and others. http://www.owt.com/sis/
* Keirsey Temperament Sorter--interactive, interm., long, links
o Users may take this personality test based upon Jung's theories. The test yields 16 combinations of personality types. http://www.keirsey.com/cgi-bin/keirsey/newkts.cgi
* Axiom Software Ltd.--index, basic, short, links, graphics
o Home page of provider of personality-profiling test, DISC, page has links to information on personality profiling and other topics. http://www.axiomsoftware.com/default.htm
* The Personality Tests--index, basic, short, links, graphics, Java
o Links to on-line interactive personality tests includes: Keirsey Temperament Sorter, Enneagram, Personality Profile, Color Test, and the Maykorner Test (requires Java). http://www.freshy.com/personality/index2.html

Ego, Id, Super-Ego

The structure of the personality in psychoanalytic theory is threefold. Freud divided it into the id, the ego, and the superego. Only the ego was visible or on the surface, while the id and the superego remains below, but each has its own effects on the personality, nonetheless.

The id represents biological forces. It is also a constant in the personality as it is always present. The id is governed by the "pleasure principle", or the notion of hedonism (the seeking of pleasure). Early in the development of his theory Freud saw sexual energy only, or the libido, or the life instinct, as the only source of energy for the id. It was this notion that gave rise to the popular conception that psychoanalysis was all about sex, sex, sex. After the carnage of World War I, however, Freud felt it necessary to add another instinct, or source of energy, to the id. So, he proposed thanatos, the death instinct. Thanatos accounts for the instinctual violent urges of humankind. Obviously, the rest of the personality would have somehow to deal with these two instincts. Notice how Hollywood has capitalized on the id. Box office success is highly correlated with movies that stress either sex, violence, or both.

The ego is the surface of the personality, the part you show the world. The ego is governed by the "reality principle ," or a pragmatic approach to the world. For example, a child may want to snitch a cookie from the kitchen, but will not if a parent is present. Id desires are still present, but the ego realizes the consequences of brazen cookie theft. The ego develops with experience, and accounts for developmental differences in behavior. For example, parents expect 3-month infants to cry until fed, but, they also expect 3-year-olds to stop crying when told they will be fed.

The superego consists of two parts, the conscience and the ego-ideal. The conscience is the familiar metaphor of angel and devil on each shoulder. The conscience decides what course of action one should take. The ego-ideal is an idealized view of one's self. Comparisons are made between the ego-ideal and one's actual behavior. Both parts of the super-ego develop with experience with others, or via social interactions. According to Freud, a strong super-ego serves to inhibit the biological instincts of the id, while a weak super-ego gives in to the id's urgings. Further, the levels of guilt in the two cases above will be high and low, respectively.

The tripartite structure above was thought to be dynamic, changing with age and experience. Also, aspects of adult behavior such as smoking, neatness, and need for sexual behavior were linked to the various stages by fixation. To Freud, fixation is a measure of the effort required to travel through any particular stage, and great efforts in childhood were reflected in adult behavior. Fixation can also be interpreted as the learning of pattens or habits. Part of the criticism of psychoanalysis was that fixation could be interpreted in diametrically opposite fashion. For example, fixation in the anal stage could lead to excessive neatness or sloppiness. As noted earlier, Neil Simon's play, "The Odd Couple", is a celebration of anal fixation, with Oscar and Felix representing the two opposite ends of the fixation continuum (Oscar-sloppy, Felix-neat).

Source: http://peace.saumag.edu/faculty/Kardas/Courses/GPWeiten/C12Personality/EgoIDSuper.html

Ego Defense Mechanisms

We stated earlier that the ego's job was to satisfy the id's impulses, not offend the moralistic character of the superego, while still taking into consideration the reality of the situation. We also stated that this was not an easy job. Think of the id as the 'devil on your shoulder' and the superego as the 'angel of your shoulder.' We don't want either one to get too strong so we talk to both of them, hear their perspective and then make a decision. This decision is the ego talking, the one looking for that healthy balance.

Before we can talk more about this, we need to understand what drives the id, ego, and superego. According to Freud, we only have two drives; sex and aggression. In other words, everything we do is motivated by one of these two drives.

Sex, also called Eros or the Life force, represents our drive to live, prosper, and produce offspring. Aggression, also called Thanatos or our Death force, represents our need to stay alive and stave off threats to our existence, our power, and our prosperity.

Now the ego has a difficult time satisfying both the id and the superego, but it doesn't have to do so without help. The ego has some tools it can use in its job as the mediator, tools that help defend the ego. These are called Ego Defense Mechanisms or Defenses. When the ego has a difficult time making both the id and the superego happy, it will employ one or more of these defenses:

DEFENSE	DESCRIPTION	EXAMPLE
denial	arguing against an anxiety provoking stimuli by stating it doesn't exist	denying that your physician's diagnosis of cancer is correct and seeking a second opinion
displacement	taking out impulses on a less threatening target	slamming a door instead of hitting as person, yelling at your spouse after an argument with your boss
intellectualization	avoiding unacceptable emotions by focusing on the intellectual aspects	focusing on the details of a funeral as opposed to the sadness and grief
projection	placing unacceptable impulses in yourself onto someone else	when losing an argument, you state "You're just Stupid;" homophobia
rationalization	supplying a logical or rational reason as opposed to the real reason	stating that you were fired because you didn't kiss up the the boss, when the real reason was your poor performance
reaction formation	taking the opposite belief because the true belief causes anxiety	having a bias against a particular race or culture and then embracing that race or culture to the extreme
regression	returning to a previous stage of development	sitting in a corner and crying after hearing bad news; throwing a temper tantrum when you don't get your way
repression	pulling into the unconscious	forgetting sexual abuse from your childhood due to the trauma and anxiety
sublimation	acting out unacceptable impulses in a socially acceptable way	sublimating your aggressive impulses toward a career as a boxer; becoming a surgeon because of your desire to cut; lifting weights to release 'pent up' energy
suppression	pushing into the unconscious	trying to forget something that causes you anxiety

Ego defenses are not necessarily unhealthy as you can see by the examples above. In face, the lack of these defenses, or the inability to use them effectively can often lead to problems in life. However, we sometimes employ the defenses at the wrong time or overuse them, which can be equally destructive.

Freud's Structural and Topographical Models of Personality

Sigmund Freud's Theory is quite complex and although his writings on psychosexual development set the groundwork for how our personalities developed, it was only one of five parts to his overall theory of personality. He also believed that different driving forces develop during these stages which play an important role in how we interact with the world.

Structural Model (id, ego, superego)

According to Freud, we are born with our Id. The id is an important part of our personality because as newborns, it allows us to get our basic needs met. Freud believed that the id is based on our pleasure principle. In other words, the id wants whatever feels good at the time, with no consideration for the reality of the situation. When a child is hungry, the id wants food, and therefore the child cries. When the child needs to be changed, the id cries. When the child is uncomfortable, in pain, too hot, too cold, or just wants attention, the id speaks up until his or her needs are met.

The id doesn't care about reality, about the needs of anyone else, only its own satisfaction. If you think about it, babies are not real considerate of their parents' wishes. They have no care for time, whether their parents are sleeping, relaxing, eating dinner, or bathing. When the id wants something, nothing else is important.

Within the next three years, as the child interacts more and more with the world, the second part of the personality begins to develop. Freud called this part the Ego. The ego is based on the reality principle. The ego understands that other people have needs and desires and that sometimes being impulsive or selfish can hurt us in the long run. Its the ego's job to meet the needs of the id, while taking into consideration the reality of the situation.

By the age of five, or the end of the phallic stage of development, the Superego develops. The Superego is the moral part of us and develops due to the moral and ethical restraints placed on us by our caregivers. Many equate the superego with the conscience as it dictates our belief of right and wrong.

In a healthy person, according to Freud, the ego is the strongest so that it can satisfy the needs of the id, not upset the superego, and still take into consideration the reality of every situation. Not an easy job by any means, but if the id gets too strong, impulses and self gratification take over the person's life. If the superego becomes to strong, the person would be driven by rigid morals, would be judgmental and unbending in his or her interactions with the world. You'll learn how the ego maintains control as you continue to read.

Topographical Model

Freud believed that the majority of what we experience in our lives, the underlying emotions, beliefs, feelings, and impulses are not available to us at a conscious level. He believed that most of what drives us is buried in our unconscious. If you remember the Oedipus and Electra Complex, they were both pushed down into the unconscious, out of our awareness due to the extreme anxiety they caused. While buried there, however, they continue to impact us dramatically according to Freud.

The role of the unconscious is only one part of the model. Freud also believed that everything we are aware of is stored in our conscious. Our conscious makes up a very small part of who we are. In other words, at any given time, we are only aware of a very small part of what makes up our personality; most of what we are is buried and inaccessible.

The final part is the preconscious or subconscious. This is the part of us that we can access if prompted, but is not in our active conscious. Its right below the surface, but still buried somewhat unless we search for it. Information such as our telephone number, some childhood memories, or the name of your best childhood friend is stored in the preconscious.

Because the unconscious is so large, and because we are only aware of the very small conscious at any given time, this theory has been likened to an iceberg, where the vast majority is buried beneath the water's surface. The water, by the way, would represent everything that we are not aware of, have not experienced, and that has not been integrated into our personalities, referred to as the nonconscious.

Freud's Psychosexual Stages of Development

David B. Stevenson '96, Brown University

Freud advanced a theory of personality development that centered on the effects of the sexual pleasure drive on the individual psyche. At particular points in the developmental process, he claimed, a single body part is particularly sensitive to sexual, erotic stimulation. These erogenous zones are the mouth, the anus, and the genital region. The child's libido centers on behavior affecting the primary erogenous zone of his age; he cannot focus on the primary erogenous zone of the next stage without resolving the developmental conflict of the immediate one.

A child at a given stage of development has certain needs and demands, such as the need of the infant to nurse. Frustration occurs when these needs are not met; Overindulgence stems from such an ample meeting of these needs that the child is reluctant to progress beyond the stage. Both frustration and overindulgence lock some amount of the child's libido permanently into the stage in which they occur; both result in a fixation. If a child progresses normally through the stages, resolving each conflict and moving on, then little libido remains invested in each stage of development. But if he fixates at a particular stage, the method of obtaining satisfaction which characterized the stage will dominate and affect his adult personality.
The Oral Stage

The oral stage begins at birth, when the oral cavity is the primary focus of libidal energy. The child, of course, preoccupies himself with nursing, with the pleasure of sucking and accepting things into the mouth. The oral character who is frustrated at this stage, whose mother refused to nurse him on demand or who truncated nursing sessions early, is characterized by pessimism, envy, suspicion and sarcasm. The overindulged oral character, whose nursing urges were always and often excessively satisfied, is optimistic, gullible, and is full of admiration for others around him. The stage culminates in the primary conflict of weaning, which both deprives the child of the sensory pleasures of nursing and of the psychological pleasure of being cared for, mothered, and held. The stage lasts approximately one and one-half years.
The Anal Stage

At one and one-half years, the child enters the anal stage. With the advent of toilet training comes the child's obsession with the erogenous zone of the anus and with the retention or expulsion of the feces. This represents a classic conflict between the id, which derives pleasure from expulsion of bodily wastes, and the ego and superego, which represent the practical and societal pressures to control the bodily functions. The child meets the conflict between the parent's demands and the child's desires and physical capabilities in one of two ways: Either he puts up a fight or he simply refuses to go. The child who wants to fight takes pleasure in excreting maliciously, perhaps just before or just after being placed on the toilet. If the parents are too lenient and the child manages to derive pleasure and success from this expulsion, it will result in the formation of an anal expulsive character. This character is generally messy, disorganized, reckless, careless, and defiant. Conversely, a child may opt to retain feces, thereby spiting his parents while enjoying the pleasurable pressure of the built-up feces on his intestine. If this tactic succeeds and the child is overindulged, he will develop into an anal retentive character. This character is neat, precise, orderly, careful, stingy, withholding, obstinate, meticulous, and passive-aggressive. The resolution of the anal stage, proper toilet training, permanently affects the individual propensities to possession and attitudes towards authority. This stage lasts from one and one-half to two years.
The Phallic Stage

The phallic stage is the setting for the greatest, most crucial sexual conflict in Freud's model of development. In this stage, the child's erogenous zone is the genital region. As the child becomes more interested in his genitals, and in the genitals of others, conflict arises. The conflict, labeled the Oedipus complex (The Electra complex in women), involves the child's unconscious desire to possess the opposite-sexed parent and to eliminate the same-sexed one.

In the young male, the Oedipus conflict stems from his natural love for his mother, a love which becomes sexual as his libidal energy transfers from the anal region to his genitals. Unfortunately for the boy, his father stands in the way of this love. The boy therefore feels aggression and envy towards this rival, his father, and also feels fear that the father will strike back at him. As the boy has noticed that women, his mother in particular, have no penises, he is struck by a great fear that his father will remove his penis, too. The anxiety is aggravated by the threats and discipline he incurs when caught masturbating by his parents. This castration anxiety outstrips his desire for his mother, so he represses the desire. Moreover, although the boy sees that though he cannot posses his mother, because his father does, he can posses her vicariously by identifying with his father and becoming as much like him as possible: this identification indoctrinates the boy into his appropriate sexual role in life. A lasting trace of the Oedipal conflict is the superego, the voice of the father within the boy. By thus resolving his incestuous conundrum, the boy passes into the latency period, a period of libidal dormancy.

On the Electra complex, Freud was more vague. The complex has its roots in the little girl's discovery that she, along with her mother and all other women, lack the penis which her father and other men posses. Her love for her father then becomes both erotic and envious, as she yearns for a penis of her own. She comes to blame her mother for her perceived castration, and is struck by penis envy, the apparent counterpart to the boy's castration anxiety. The resolution of the Electra complex is far less clear-cut than the resolution of the Oedipus complex is in males; Freud stated that the resolution comes much later and is never truly complete. Just as the boy learned his sexual role by identifying with his father, so the girl learns her role by identifying with her mother in an attempt to posses her father vicariously. At the eventual resolution of the conflict, the girl passes into the latency period, though Freud implies that she always remains slightly fixated at the phallic stage.

Fixation at the phallic stage develops a phallic character, who is reckless, resolute, self-assured, and narcissistic--excessively vain and proud. The failure to resolve the conflict can also cause a person to be afraid or incapable of close love; As well, Freud postulated that fixation could be a root cause of homosexuality.
Latency Period

The resolution of the phallic stage leads to the latency period, which is not a psychosexual stage of development, but a period in which the sexual drive lies dormant. Freud saw latency as a period of unparalleled repression of sexual desires and erogenous impulses. During the latency period, children pour this repressed libidal energy into asexual pursuits such as school, athletics, and same-sex friendships. But soon puberty strikes, and the genitals once again become a central focus of libidal energy.
The Genital Stage

In the genital stage, as the child's energy once again focuses on his genitals, interest turns to heterosexual relationships. The less energy the child has left invested in unresolved psychosexual developments, the greater his capacity will be to develop normal relationships with the opposite sex. If, however, he remains fixated, particularly on the phallic stage, his development will be troubled as he struggles with further repression and defenses.

Source: http://www.victorianweb.org/science/freud/develop.html