5 Individual Differences, Personality & Guidance · 5.1 Individual differences, personality and guidance
5.1.2 Personality: types, traits and assessment
Personality is the whole, organised and fairly lasting pattern of a person's ways of thinking, feeling and behaving that makes him or her unique; type theories sort people into a few boxes, trait theories measure each person on several dimensions, and personality is assessed by non-projective (direct, structured: inventories, rating scales) and projective (indirect, ambiguous stimuli: Rorschach, TAT) methods.
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Core facts
- Word origin: Latin persona = the mask worn by actors in Greek and Roman theatre.
- Allport's definition (1937): personality is the dynamic organisation within the individual of the psychophysical systems that determine his unique adjustment to his environment. Allport is the most quoted definer.
- Intelligence and personality are psychological variables (2022 HWO theme).
- Type theories:
- Hippocrates (about 400 BC; later Galen): four body fluids (humours) give four temperaments: blood → sanguine (cheerful), yellow bile → choleric (irritable, quick-tempered), black bile → melancholic (sad, gloomy), phlegm → phlegmatic (calm, slow).
- Ernst Kretschmer (Physique and Character, 1921): pyknic (short, round; sociable, moody), asthenic / leptosome (tall, thin; shy, reserved), athletic (muscular; energetic, balanced), dysplastic (mixed).
- W.H. Sheldon (1940s, somatotypes): endomorph (soft, round; viscerotonic: relaxed, loves food and comfort), mesomorph (muscular; somatotonic: bold, active, assertive), ectomorph (thin, delicate; cerebrotonic: restrained, sensitive, thoughtful).
- Carl Jung (Psychological Types, 1921): introvert (turned inwards, shy, reflective) and extrovert (turned outwards, social, active); most people are mixtures, called ambiverts. Four functions: thinking, feeling, sensation, intuition.
- Eduard Spranger (Types of Men): six value types: theoretical, economic, aesthetic, social, political, religious.
- Indian (Sankhya / Bhagavad Gita): three gunas: sattva (purity, calm), rajas (activity, passion), tamas (inertia, dullness).
- Friedman and Rosenman (cardiologists, 1950s-70s): Type A (hurried, competitive, impatient; heart-disease risk) and Type B (relaxed, easy-going).
- Trait theories:
- Gordon Allport: father of trait theory; with Odbert (1936) found about 18,000 trait words in the dictionary. Three levels: cardinal (one master trait that dominates a whole life and makes the person unique, e.g. Gandhi's non-violence), central (5 to 10 main traits that describe a person), secondary (preferences shown only in some situations).
- Raymond B. Cattell: used factor analysis; surface traits (seen on the outside, cluster together) vs source traits (deep, underlying); 16 source traits measured by the 16 PF (Sixteen Personality Factor Questionnaire, 1949).
- Hans J. Eysenck: two, later three, broad dimensions: Extraversion–Introversion, Neuroticism–Emotional stability, Psychoticism (the PEN model); tests: MPI, EPI, EPQ.
- Big Five / Five Factor Model (OCEAN), Costa and McCrae (NEO-PI, 1985): Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, Neuroticism.
- Conscientiousness = thoughtful, good impulse control, organised, goal-directed (2025 HWO). Assertiveness belongs to extraverts (2022 HWO).
- Temperament: the inherited, biological part of personality (typical mood, energy, emotional reactions); seen from infancy (2022 HWO). Thomas and Chess (New York Longitudinal Study, from 1956): easy, difficult, slow-to-warm-up children.
- Character = the moral, acquired side of personality. Allport: "character is personality evaluated".
- Psychoanalytic structure (Freud): id (pleasure principle), ego (reality principle), superego (morality principle). Jung: analytical psychology, collective unconscious, archetypes (persona, shadow, anima/animus, self); art, myths and religion matter because they are symbols that appeal to archetypes (2025 HWO). Adler: individual psychology, inferiority complex, style of life.
- Freud's levels of mind (the iceberg): conscious, preconscious and unconscious (the large hidden part that holds repressed wishes and memories). Id: present at birth, wholly unconscious, wants instant satisfaction. Ego: the "executive" that balances id, superego and reality. Superego: formed last; two parts, conscience and ego-ideal. Instincts: life instinct Eros (its energy = libido) and death instinct Thanatos.
- Psychosexual stages (Freud): oral (0–1), anal (1–3), phallic (3–5/6; Oedipus complex in boys, Electra in girls), latency (6 to puberty), genital (from puberty). Fixation = getting stuck at a stage.
- Defence mechanisms: unconscious ways in which the ego cuts anxiety by bending reality; set out by Anna Freud (The Ego and the Mechanisms of Defence, 1936). Repression (motivated forgetting) is the most basic; regression = going back to childish behaviour (2019 HWO); rationalisation = a good-sounding excuse, the "sour grapes" reply (2019 HWO). Table in Explained.
- Jung's archetypes: persona (the social mask), shadow (the dark, animal-instinct side; 2019 HWO), anima (feminine side in a man), animus (masculine side in a woman), self (the centre that unites). The collective unconscious is Jung's idea (2019 HWO). Neo-Freudians: Jung, Adler, Karen Horney (basic anxiety), Erich Fromm, Erik Erikson.
- Allport's mature personality (2019 HWO): extension of the sense of self, warm relating to others, emotional security, realistic perception, self-objectification (insight and humour), a unifying philosophy of life.
- Transactional Analysis (TA): Eric Berne (2019 HWO); three ego states, Parent, Adult, Child (details in Explained).
- Leadership capacity is shown by trustworthiness (2022 HWO key).
- Assessment, two families:
- Non-projective (direct, structured): questionnaires and inventories (MMPI, 16 PF, EPQ, Bell's Adjustment Inventory), rating scales, interview, observation, situational tests, autobiography, case history.
- Projective (indirect, unstructured): Rorschach, TAT, CAT, sentence completion, word association, draw-a-person, play and doll techniques.
- MMPI = Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory: Hathaway and McKinley, University of Minnesota, 1943; true / false / cannot say; 10 clinical scales; MMPI-2 in 1989.
- Rorschach Inkblot Test: Hermann Rorschach, Swiss psychiatrist, 1921; 10 cards: 5 black/grey, 2 black and red, 3 multicoloured.
- TAT = Thematic Apperception Test: Henry Murray and Christiana Morgan, Harvard, 1935; 31 cards (30 pictures + 1 blank); the person tells a story about each picture; Murray's standard set was 20 cards given over two sessions, while clinicians today often use fewer (8 to 12).
- CAT = Children's Apperception Test: Leopold Bellak (with Sonya Bellak), 1949; 10 cards with animal figures, for children about 3 to 10 years.
- Sentence completion: incomplete stems ("I am afraid of ...") completed freely; best known: Rotter Incomplete Sentences Blank (1950, 40 stems).
- Word association test: started by Galton, made a clinical tool by Jung, who is named as its developer (2019 HWO) (100 stimulus words; delay or odd answers show "complexes").
- The term projective methods was coined by L.K. Frank (1939); the idea comes from Freud's defence mechanism of projection.
Explained
1. Main definitions to recognise
| Thinker | Key idea of the definition |
|---|---|
| Allport | dynamic organisation of psychophysical systems, unique adjustment |
| J.B. Watson | sum of activities seen by long observation; a sum of habits |
| Morton Prince | sum of innate dispositions plus acquired ones |
| Eysenck | stable organisation of character, temperament, intellect and physique |
2. Type vs trait approach
| Point | Type approach | Trait approach |
|---|---|---|
| Unit | category (introvert, pyknic) | dimension (more or less of a trait) |
| People are | put in a few boxes | placed on several scales |
| Strength | simple, easy to grasp | detailed, measurable |
| Weakness | oversimplifies; most people are mixed | long lists, less of the whole person |
3. Eysenck joins type and trait. He built a hierarchy: specific responses → habitual responses → traits → types (super-traits). His two dimensions also map the old four temperaments:
| Quadrant | Old temperament |
|---|---|
| stable + extravert | sanguine |
| unstable + extravert | choleric |
| unstable + introvert | melancholic |
| stable + introvert | phlegmatic |
He linked extraversion to a low level of cortical arousal: extraverts seek stimulation, introverts avoid too much of it.
4. The Big Five in plain words
| Factor | High scorer is | Low scorer is |
|---|---|---|
| Openness | curious, imaginative | practical, conventional |
| Conscientiousness | organised, self-disciplined | careless, impulsive |
| Extraversion | sociable, assertive, talkative | quiet, reserved |
| Agreeableness | kind, trusting, cooperative | critical, competitive |
| Neuroticism | anxious, moody | calm, emotionally stable |
Lewis Goldberg coined the name "Big Five" (1981). Extraversion's six facets (NEO-PI-R): warmth, gregariousness, assertiveness, activity, excitement-seeking, positive emotions.
5. Determinants of personality. Biological: heredity, physique, nervous system and the endocrine glands (thyroid: energy level; adrenal: emergency reactions; pituitary: the "master gland"; gonads: sex traits). Environmental: family (first and strongest), school and teachers, peers, culture, mass media, economic status. Personality, like development, is the product of both.
6. Other approaches in one line each. Psychoanalytic (Freud: unconscious, id-ego-superego, defence mechanisms); neo-Freudian (Jung, Adler, Horney, Erikson); humanistic (Carl Rogers: self-concept, client-centred; Maslow: self-actualisation); social-cognitive (Bandura: self-efficacy, a person's belief in his ability to succeed in a particular situation; Rotter: locus of control, internal vs external).
7. Projective vs non-projective tests
| Point | Projective | Non-projective |
|---|---|---|
| Stimulus | vague, unstructured | clear, structured questions |
| Purpose | hidden from the person | known to the person |
| Reveals | unconscious needs, conflicts | conscious, self-reported traits |
| Scoring | subjective, needs a trained clinician | objective, quick, often group |
Projective tests are hard to fake but low in reliability; inventories are reliable and easy to score but can be faked and need honest, literate answers.
8. Other assessment tools.
- Rating scales: an observer rates a trait on a scale (numerical, graphic, descriptive). Errors: halo effect (one good or bad trait colours all other ratings; named by E.L. Thorndike, 1920), generosity / leniency error, central tendency error (avoiding the extremes).
- Situational tests: behaviour in a set-up real situation; Hartshorne and May (Character Education Inquiry, 1928) tested children's honesty this way.
- Interview (structured / unstructured), case history, autobiography, anecdotal records, observation (participant / non-participant).
- Other inventories: Woodworth Personal Data Sheet (1917-19, for World War I soldiers: the first personality inventory); Bell's Adjustment Inventory (home, health, social, emotional adjustment); MBTI (Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, based on Jung's types); NEO-PI (Big Five); CPI (California Psychological Inventory, Gough).
- Other projective tools: Draw-a-Person (Karen Machover), House-Tree-Person (John Buck), Rosenzweig Picture-Frustration Study, Holtzman Inkblot Technique (45 cards).
9. Defence mechanisms
| Mechanism | What happens | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Repression | painful memory pushed out of awareness | forgets a frightening event |
| Regression | returns to an earlier, childish stage | 7-year-old sucks his thumb after a sibling's birth |
| Rationalisation | gives a good-sounding false reason | "the grapes are sour" after failing to get them |
| Projection | sees own faults or wishes in others | a cheat says everyone cheats |
| Displacement | shifts feelings to a safer target | scolded at work, shouts at home |
| Sublimation | turns an urge into a valued activity | aggression into boxing or football |
| Reaction formation | shows the opposite of the real feeling | too sweet to a disliked person |
| Denial | refuses to accept a fact | "I am not ill" |
| Compensation | makes up for a weakness in another field | weak at games, excels in studies |
| Identification | takes on the qualities of an admired person | copies a film hero |
10. Transactional Analysis (Eric Berne). Berne, a Canadian-born psychiatrist in the USA, wrote Transactional Analysis in Psychotherapy (1961) and Games People Play (1964). A transaction is the unit of social exchange: a stimulus from one person and a response from another.
| Ego state | Source | Shows as |
|---|---|---|
| Parent | taught by parents and elders | rules, "should", criticism (critical Parent) or care (nurturing Parent) |
| Adult | own reasoning in the present | facts, questions, calm problem solving |
| Child | feelings from childhood | fun, curiosity, fear (free Child) or obedience, sulking (adapted Child) |
- Kinds of transactions: complementary (the reply comes from the ego state that was addressed; talk goes on smoothly), crossed (the reply comes from an unexpected state; talk breaks down), ulterior (a hidden message under the open one; the basis of games).
- Strokes: units of recognition (praise, a smile, attention); everyone needs them. Life script: the life plan decided in childhood.
- Life positions (Berne; made famous by Thomas Harris, I'm OK – You're OK, 1967): I'm OK – You're OK (healthy), I'm OK – You're not OK, I'm not OK – You're OK, I'm not OK – You're not OK.
- In school and hostel: the teacher or warden speaks Adult to Adult, avoids a scolding Parent tone that provokes an adapted or rebellious Child, gives positive strokes, and works towards "I'm OK – You're OK".
11. Rogers' self theory. The self-concept is all that a person thinks and feels about himself; the real self is what he is, the ideal self what he wishes to be. Congruence between self-concept and experience (real close to ideal) brings good adjustment; incongruence brings anxiety. Unconditional positive regard from parents and teachers builds self-worth and helps the person become fully functioning. Maslow: needs rise from physiological, safety, love, esteem to self-actualisation. Skinner: personality is a set of learned responses shaped by reinforcement.
12. Rorschach scoring at a glance. Answers are scored for location (whole blot W, large detail D, small detail Dd, white space S), determinants (form, colour, movement, shading), content (human, animal, object) and popular vs original answers.
Common traps
- ✗ "Cardinal traits are the 5 to 10 traits everyone has." ✓ Those are central traits; a cardinal trait is one dominant trait that makes the person unique.
- ✗ "Surface and source traits are Allport's." ✓ They are Cattell's; cardinal, central and secondary are Allport's.
- ✗ "Introvert and extrovert were first named by Eysenck." ✓ Jung (1921) named them; Eysenck measured extraversion as a dimension.
- ✗ "Pyknic, asthenic, athletic are Sheldon's types." ✓ They are Kretschmer's; endomorph, mesomorph, ectomorph are Sheldon's.
- ✗ "Choleric comes from black bile." ✓ Choleric = yellow bile; melancholic = black bile.
- ✗ "Temperament is learned from the family." ✓ Temperament is mostly inherited; character is acquired.
- ✗ "MMPI = Minnesota Multiple Personality Inventory." ✓ Multiphasic, and it is non-projective.
- ✗ "The Rorschach test has 20 (or 31) cards." ✓ 10 inkblot cards; 31 is the TAT (with one blank card).
- ✗ "CAT uses pictures of children." ✓ The original CAT uses animal figures.
- ✗ "The ego works on the pleasure principle." ✓ Id = pleasure principle; ego = reality principle; superego = morality.
- ✗ "'Sour grapes' is projection." ✓ It is rationalisation; projection = seeing one's own faults in others.
- ✗ "Transactional Analysis was given by Carl Rogers." ✓ Eric Berne (Parent, Adult, Child); Rogers = client-centred therapy.
- ✗ "The shadow is the social mask." ✓ Persona = mask; shadow = the dark, animal side.
- ✗ "MAT is a projective test." ✓ TAT, CAT and Rorschach are projective; MAT is not (2019 HWO).
- ✗ "Assertiveness is a mark of agreeableness." ✓ It is a facet of extraversion.
- ✗ "Rating scales and inventories are projective." ✓ They are non-projective; projective tests use ambiguous stimuli.
Quick revision
- Persona = mask; Allport: dynamic organisation, psychophysical systems, unique adjustment.
- Hippocrates: sanguine (blood), choleric (yellow bile), melancholic (black bile), phlegmatic (phlegm).
- Kretschmer: pyknic, asthenic, athletic; Sheldon: endo-, meso-, ectomorph.
- Jung: introvert, extrovert (1921), collective unconscious, archetypes (shadow = animal side), word association.
- Allport: cardinal (unique), central, secondary; Cattell: 16 PF, source vs surface traits.
- Eysenck: E, N, P; Big Five: OCEAN (conscientiousness = impulse control, goal-directed).
- Freud: id (pleasure), ego (reality), superego (morality); regression, rationalisation (sour grapes).
- Projective: Rorschach 1921 (10 cards), TAT 1935 Murray-Morgan (31 cards), CAT 1949 Bellak (10, animals), sentence completion, word association.
- Non-projective: MMPI 1943 Hathaway-McKinley, 16 PF, EPQ, MBTI, rating scales.
- TA: Eric Berne, Parent-Adult-Child, I'm OK-You're OK; temperament inherited; Allport: mature personality.
Go deeper: Deeper (beyond what APPSC Paper I usually asks)
Deeper Advanced
1. Allport's idiographic view. Allport stressed the uniqueness of each person (idiographic study) over general laws for all (nomothetic). He also described functional autonomy: a habit that began for one motive (earning money) continues for its own sake (love of work). He separated common traits (shared within a culture) from personal dispositions (unique to one person).
2. Cattell's three data sources. L-data (life records, ratings by others), Q-data (questionnaires), T-data (objective test behaviour). Factor analysis of all three gave the 16 source traits.
3. Why the Big Five won. The same five factors keep appearing across languages, rating sources and cultures, they are fairly stable in adults and they predict real outcomes (conscientiousness predicts school and job performance). Critics say five broad factors miss finer traits and are only descriptions, not explanations.
4. Murray's need-press theory behind the TAT. Murray held that behaviour results from inner needs (achievement, affiliation, dominance) meeting outer press (forces in the environment). TAT stories are scored for the hero's needs and the press acting on the hero. David McClelland later used TAT-type pictures to measure need for achievement (n-Ach).
5. Limits of assessment. Every method has blind spots: self-reports are open to social desirability and faking; projective scoring depends on the clinician; ratings suffer from halo effects. Good practice uses several methods together and treats a single score with caution, especially with children.
Practise this topic. Questions on Personality: theories and assessment (projective and non-projective), with answers explained.
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