PSYC 100 Chapter 12.1-12.3, 14.3: PSYC 100 Personality

• School: Queen's University
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSYC 100
• Professor: Jordan Poppenk

Document Summary

Explain research and identify personality traits by allport, cattell, and the five-factor model. Explain the psychobiological approach to personality: the effects of heredity and environment and the brain mechanisms that may be responsible for differences in personality traits. Personality lies on a continuum with multiple traits, not defined by a set of categories or absolutes. It is a pattern of thinking and interacting unique to each individual, remaining consistent over across situations. When interacting with others we are not acknowledging their personality but rather their constant characteristics. Essentially, it is a consistent pattern of thoughts, feelings, and behaviours that characterize each person as a unique individual. There are four major theories that attempt to explain personality: trait, psychodynamic, humanistic, and social-cognitive, each of which are multidimensional and lie on a bell curve (nothing is absolute). Sigmund freud introduced psychodynamics identifying three components of personality as ego (conscious), superego (preconscious), and id (unconscious), of which develop over five psychosexual stages.