Personality - AP Psychology

According to Freud, defense mechanisms are ways for the ego to protect the conscious mind from the anxiety that arises from unacceptable impulses.

Denial is when someone acts as if the negative feelings or events that cause negative emotions do not exist (e.g. Robs denial of his injury and inability to run in the marathon).

While intriguing, the other choices are incorrect. Rationalization is when someone decides or comes up with a seemingly logical explanation to justify an event and avoid the true explanation. Identification is when someone takes on the characteristics of someone else in order to give himself or herself more power. Projection is when someone attributes his or her own feelings to another person or group. Sublimation is when someone channels his or her unacceptable feelings toward a more productive, socially acceptable activity/goal.

According to Freud, defense mechanisms are ways for the ego to protect the conscious mind from the anxiety that arises from unacceptable impulses.

Identification is when someone takes on the characteristics of someone else in order to give himself or herself more power (e.g. dressing as a powerful figure).

While intriguing, the other choices are incorrect. Rationalization is when someone decides or comes up with a seemingly logical explanation to justify an event and avoid the true explanation. Displacement is when someone takes their negative emotions and focuses them on a different, safer target. Projection is when someone attributes his or her own feelings to another person or group. Sublimation is when someone channels his or her unacceptable feelings toward a more productive, socially acceptable activity/goal.

According to Freud, defense mechanisms are ways for the ego to protect the conscious mind from the anxiety that arises from unacceptable impulses.

Sublimation is when someone channels his or her unacceptable feelings toward a different, socially acceptable activity/goal (e.g. using after being fired a person puts more effort into caring for his or her family).

Rationalization is when someone decides or comes up with a seemingly logical explanation to justify an event and avoid the true explanation. Displacement is when someone takes their negative emotions and focuses them on a different, safer target. Reaction formation is when someone expresses an exaggerated, opposite version of how they actually feel. Denial is when someone acts as if the negative feelings or events that cause negative emotions do not exist.

The big five personality traits are openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. Use the acronym OCEAN to help you remember.

Freud postulated that there were three distinct parts of the psyche: the id, the ego, and the superego. These three parts develop at different times in a person's life. The id is the most basic, innate part of the psyche. It is the primitive and instinctive component of the personality. It consists of all biological instincts, such as sexual attraction and aggression. The id responds immediately and directly to its instincts, seeking pleasure and self-preservation.

Freud proposed that the psyche/personality is divided into three distinct sections: the id, the ego, and the superego. Each has a distinct role and function within the person. The ego is the mediator or regulator of the personality because it works out realistic ways of satisfying the id's demands, while also seeking to satisfy the superego by considering realities, norms, and etiquette and avoiding negative societal consequences.

Freud believed there were five psychosexual stages of development. In order of development from earliest to latest, these were the oral stage, the anal stage, the phallic stage, the latent stage, and the genital stage.

Freud believed there were five psychosexual stages that people went through as they matured into adults. Either frustration and overindulgence in a particular stage might lead a person to become fixated in that stage. The oral stage is the first stage that a person goes through, and is very mouth-oriented. A person in this stage will have a tendency to bite, suck, swallow, and generally explore the world with their mouth. The oral stage is typically experienced for the first year of life, during which infants are frequently seen to place unnatural objects like sand or plastic in their mouths.

Stagnation or fixation in the oral phase could lead these effects to linger into adulthood. The compulsion to chew metal or other items, as is common in pica, could be attributed to this phenomenon.

The five stages of Freud's psychosexual development are: oral, anal, phallic, latent, and genital. At each of these stages, he theorized that one could become "fixated" and thus have consequences on personality throughout the lifetime.

The Myers-Briggs Test classifies people into 16 different personality types based on four personality dimensions: extraversion-intraversion, intuition-sensation, thought-feeling, and judgment-perception

The "big five" personality traits are conscientiousness, agreeableness, neuroticism, openness, and extraversion. The acronym "CANOE" can aid you in remembering these empirically-supported personality trait continuums.

The MMPI (Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory) is the world's most widely used personality test for adults. In the modern day, it is used to screen job applicants, answer legal questions, and help psychologists make diagnoses and subsequent treatment plans.

Sublimination is the taking of a certain energy, which could be the product of fear or desire, and channeling it in socially appropriate ways. For example, one may have the impulse to be violent towards other people, but then challenge this impulse into a sport, a socially condoned form of violence.

Repression is generally considered slightly less healthy, in that the desire or fear is buried from conscious awareness and can manifest in certain psychotic tendencies.

Those with a fantasy-prone personality spend much time daydreaming, thus utilizing their vivid imagination. They are often able to recall their fantasies with near perfect accuracy.

The MMPI, the Rorschach inkblot test, the big five test, and self-reporting are all ways of measuring personality. The MMPI is a standardized test that gauges personality by asking questions that seem unrelated to personality traits; for example, "I enjoy breaking things" might be used as a measure of aggression. The Rorschach test determines personality traits by examining a way a person interprets ambiguous inkblot shapes. The big five test determines where a person falls on five main personality traits: agreeableness, extraversion, conscientiousness, neuroticism, and openness. Self-reporting is a larger concept that is defined as an individual answering questions about their own internal states; examples of this include the MMPI and the big five test.

Acquisition is a concept in classical conditioning that refers to the learning of the unconditioned stimulus and conditioned stimulus pairing.

An internal locus of control is when a person believes that his/her hard work (practicing free throws) leads to the consequences (scored on both of the free throws in the game). An external locus of control is when a person believes that his/her life is determined by external forces—such as luck, fate, and the other kids not trying hard—and often leads to a sense of hopelessness.

Conscientiousness is defined as the quality of being thorough, careful, and/or vigilant. Obviously, the ability to stay on schedule and keep track of deadlines meets this description. Each of the answers is a Big Five trait, but conscientiousness is the best fit for the traits described in the question.

People who score high on Extraversion in the Big Five personality traits tend to have a need for social interaction and attention. This is the counterpart to introversion, which correlates with a high need for alone time. While an extremely extraverted person may be more likely to have a high need for new experiences, this is not as directly relevant to the main aspects of extraversion, which have to do with the personal need for social interaction.

The other four of the Big Five personality traits are Openness, Conscientiousness, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism.

People who score high on Conscientiousness on the Big Five personality traits tend to have a strong need for completing tasks and following rules. These people tend to get along well in large groups as they have also tend to have a high regard for social norms.