MAIN PERSPECTIVES:Psychometrics, observation, Behavioral Coding Systems

<< PERSONALITY MEASUREMENT:Observational Procedures, Rating Scales

SIGMUND FREUD: A PSYCHOANALYTIC THEORY OF PERSONALITY >>

Personality Psychology PSY 405

Lesson 03

MAIN PERSPECTIVES

Personality is a commonly used term with no universally accepted definition. It refers generally to the

pattern of psychological and behavioral characteristics that distinguishes each person from everyone else.

Personality can be approached or studied using the four perspectives:

1-Psychodynamic

2-Dispositional

3-Behavioral

4-Humanistic

Personality assessment is done by following tools:

Observation

Interview

Tests

Objective Tests (e.g. MMPI-2)

Projective Tests

Projective tests include:

Rorschach inkblot test

Thematic Apperception test-TAT

Rotter's incomplete sentence blank-RISB

word association test- WAT

House Tree Person-HTP

Psychometrics:

Psychometrics, or psychological measurement, has significantly helped to make Psychology a science.

Before the advent of psychometrics, it was not possible, to measure aspects of human psychological

functioning, e.g., intelligence, aptitudes, interests, motives, personality traits. Now, within certain

limitations, such measurements can be obtained. When psychological testing was introduced, the field of

personality acquired the potential for quantification and measurement of its concepts. In brief,

psychometrics made possible meaningful research in personality.

Why does a friendly person get nasty and mean?

What makes a person confident and optimistic even under stressful situation?

To address these questions Psychologists employ assessment methods.

Personality measurement and assessment procedures are useful in understanding the person.

Personality assessment is done by following tools:

Observation

Interview

Tests

Objective Tests (e.g. MMPI-2)

Projective Tests

Projective tests include:

Personality Psychology PSY 405

Rorschach inkblot test

Thematic Apperception test-TAT

Rotter's incomplete sentence blank-RISB

word association test- WAT

House Tree Person-HTP

1- observation:

The observation of people's behavior can be done with their permission

Observation

Home

Visiting a home to observe family interactions at meal time

School

Watching children at play ground

Self

Asking people to keep a track of or monitor themselves by keeping a record

Hospital

The hospital nurse or a family member is to observe the patient's behavior related to taking medicine, food

and responding to people

The clinician observes the person's behavior and the environment in which it occurs without attempting to

change the frequency or intensity of specific responses.

Although observations are often conducted in the natural environment, there are times when it is useful to

observe the person's behavior in a situation that the psychologist can arrange and control (laboratory).

Observational Procedures:

Observational skills play an important part in most assessment procedures.

Sometimes the things that we observe confirm the person's self-report, and at other times the person's overt

behavior appears to be at odds with what he or she says.

2. Interviews:

The interview is the most commonly used procedure in psychological assessment. Interviews provide an

opportunity to ask people for their own descriptions of their problems or personality. Interviews also allow

clinicians to observe important features of a person's appearance and nonverbal behavior. Interviews vary

with regard to the amount of structure that is imposed by the clinician.

1-Some are relatively open-ended, or nondirective.

2- some are directive

Structured interviews, in which the clinician must ask each patient a specific list of detailed questions, are

frequently employed for collecting information that will be used to make diagnostic decisions and to rate

the extent to which a person is impaired by psychopathology. Structured interviews list a series of specific

questions that lead to a detailed description of the person's behavior and experiences. Structured interview

schedules provide a systematic framework for the collection of important diagnostic information, but they

don't eliminate the need for an experienced clinician

3. Behavioral Coding Systems:

Rather than making judgments about where the person falls on a particular dimension, behavioral coding

systems focus on the frequency of specific behavioral events. Some adult clients are able to make records

and keep track of their own behavior--a procedure known as self-monitoring.

Personality Psychology PSY 405

4. Personality Inventories/ personality tests (objective tests):

Personality inventories present an elaborate picture of an individual's overall personality including the

traits, the characteristics, the tendency and the styles that are thought to underlie behavior. The questions in

personality inventories are presented in form of statements. These statements are the items of personality

test. Many personality inventories are available such as MMPI Minnesota Multiphasic Personality

Inventory. This test was develop in 1940 and published in 1943. It is based on empirical approach i.e. the

collection and evaluation of data. The individual is presented with statements and the answers have options

like true, false and cannot say. Some of the statements from MMPI are following:

I cry easily

I am happy most of the time.

I believe, I am being followed

MMPI consisted of 550 items. MMPI consists of ten clinical scales, meaning that it diagnosis people on

ten clinical disorders. It has got four validity scales,

Which include:

Lie scale

The F Scale Infrequency scale

K scale-Defensiveness Scale

The Can not say scale

The most extensively used personality Inventory is the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory

(MMPI). The inventory was revised several years ago, and it is currently known as the MMPI-2.The

MMPI-2 is based on 567 statements that cover topics ranging from physical complaints and psychological

states to occupational preferences and social attitudes. Scoring of the MMPI-2 is objective.

6. Projective Personality Tests:

Psychoanalytic personality theorists have developed several assessment measures known as projective

tests. They include a variety of methods in which ambiguous stimuli, such as pictures of people, or things

are presented to a person who is asked to describe what he or she sees. The theory here is that people

`project' their own personality, their needs, their wishes, their desires and their unconscious fears on other

people and things such as ink blots, pictures, sometimes vague and sometimes structure. Projective tests are

based on psychoanalytic theory. They have been and they still remain, controversial. Some of the most

widely used projective tests are Rorschach Ink Blot Test, the Thematic Apperception Test (TAT), House

Tree Person (HTP) and the Rotter's Incomplete Sentence Blank (RISB).

In projective tests, the person is presented with a series of ambiguous stimuli.

The known projective test, introduced in 1921 by Hermann Rorschach, a Swiss psychiatrist, is

based on the use of inkblots.

Projective techniques such as the Rorschach test were originally based on psychodynamic

assumptions about the nature of personality and psychopathology.

Considerable emphasis was placed on the importance of unconscious motivations --conflicts and

impulses of which the person is largely unaware.

More recent approaches to the use of projective tests view the person's descriptions of the cards as

a sample of his or her perceptual and cognitive styles. This test consists of ten standardized ink blot

cards. That serves as ambiguous stimuli. The examiner presents the inkblots cards one by one to

the person being examined, who responds by telling what he or she sees.

The therapists may encourage the subject to give more detailed answers and you may get different

responses on the same inkblot. Exner's system of administering and scoring the Rorschach inkblot

test specifies how the card should be presented, what should the examiner say and how the

responses should be recorded.

Personality Psychology PSY 405

The Thematic Apperception Test (TAT): consists of a series of drawings that depict human figures in

various ambiguous situations.

The person is asked to describe the identities of the people in the cards and to make up a story about what is

happening. Morgan and Murray at the Harvard Psychological Clinic developed the TAT. It consists of 31

cards, 30 with pictures on them and one blank card. The picture card is shown to the subject and the

therapist asks the subject to tell a dramatic story about the picture. The instructions of the test begin `this is

a test of imagination, one form of intelligence. Let your imaginations have its way as in a fairy story and

tell what the people in the picture card are doing.' The story should have a title, a beginning, a middle part

and an end. The basic assumption is that most of the subjects will reveal their unconscious mental

processes, their needs, desires on the characters of their stories about the pictures. There have been several

variations of the TAT for different groups e.g. CAT- Children Apperception Test and SAT A Senior

Apperception Technique.

Rotter's Incomplete Sentence Blank Test

This test consists of a series unfinished sentences that people are asked to complete, usually it is considered

a good spring board to explore and pinpoint areas of an individual's life that are problematic or conflicting.

The sentences are usually, I wish _____. My father is ______. Girls are _____. Home is a place ________.

This test explores an individual's social, familial and general attitudes towards life. This test has 40 items

which are in form of incomplete sentences. This test has qualitative and quantitative scoring procedures.

House Tree and Person (HTP)

This is a test which tells us about the evaluations of the drawings based on the quality and shape of the

drawing, solidity of a pencil line, location of the drawing on the paper, the size of the figure, features of the

figures, use of the background and comments made by the respondent during the drawing task. The house

reflects individual's interpersonal relationships, the tree reflects ego development and functioning and the

Person reflects the individual self perception and perception of the other gender.

Advantages of Projective Tests: Some people may feel more comfortable talking in an

unstructured situation than they would if they were required to participate in a structured interview

or to complete the lengthy MMPI. Projective tests can provide an interesting source of information

regarding the person's unique view of the world, and they can be a useful supplement to

information obtained with other assessment tools. To whatever extent a person's relationships with

other people are governed by unconscious cognitive and emotional events, projective tests may

provide information that cannot be obtained through direct interviewing methods or observational

procedures.

Limitations of Projective Tests: Lack of standardization in administration and scoring is a serious

problem. Little information is available on which to base comparisons to normal adults or children.

Some projective procedures, such as the Rorschach, can be very time-consuming. The reliability of

scoring and interpretation tends to be low.

Personality can be approached or studied using the four perspectives:

1-Psychodynamic

2-Dispositional

3-Behavioral

4-Humanistic

Perspectives of psychology

1- The psychodynamics approach was founded by Freud, who assumes that a human personality is

formed out of conflicts between basic needs and demands of the society. Most of these conflicts are at the

unconscious level and they affect our everyday behavior

Freud believed that personality has three components-id, ego and super ego. He also emphasized on the

role of ego defense mechanisms which keep these conflicts at the unconscious level. He further talked

about psycho sexual stages of development-such as oral, anal, phallic, latency and genital stage.

Personality Psychology PSY 405

There are other psychodynamic theorists who differed from Freud such as:

Jung

Adler

Karen Horney

2- The dispositional Approach:

This Approach assumes that personality is made up of a set of stable internal characteristics that guide

behavior. These characteristics are described as personality types but more often each person's unique

combination of traits, factors or needs. These inherited tendencies or traits are the raw material which is

molded into a unique personality by the environment.

3- The Behavioral Approach:

This Approach assumes that personality is a unique pattern of learned behavior that people display in

various situations. This perception is advocated by Watson and Skinner. There are certain behaviorists who

include the role of learned patterns of thinking as well-such ad cognitive-behavioral approach whish

emphasizes on behavior as the outcome of person-situation interactions.

4- The Humanistic Approach

It is based on the assumption that personality is determined by the unique ways in which each individual

views the world. These perceptions of the person form a personal vision of reality and guides behavior of

the person to reach its fullest human potential. This Approach is represented in the theories of Carl Rogers

and Maslow.

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