Psychology DL 203

Introduction to Personality and Individual Differences

Course Introduction

This course introduces you to a broad range of theories and research methods in personality psychology. This link between theories and research methods will be a major theme throughout this course because the theories that personality psychologists hold greatly influence the types of research strategies they use.

We begin with an introduction to the field of personality psychology; turn to the research methods used to investigate theories of personality; and finally, cover a variety of theories that present diverse perspectives on personality.

Please Note

Psych 203 is a general education course for students who do not plan to major in Psychology. It does not fulfill specific departmental graduation requirements for students completing a Bachelors degree in Psychology. Psychology majors who wish to use Personality Psychology as one of the three required core courses for the major must take Psychology 303. Students may not receive academic credit for Psych 203 if they have completed Psych 303 previously. Contact the undergraduate advisors in the Department of Psychology if you have questions about requirements for the Psychology major at (206) 543-2698.

Course Objectives

At the end of this course, you will be able to

• recognize the domain of human behavior investigated by personality psychologists;
• describe the nature of individual differences in personality and how these differences change over time;
• articulate the different theoretical approaches offered by personality psychologists to account for human behavior, and identify the methods used to investigate these issues; and
• evaluate the limitations of the theoretical approaches and methods used by personality psychologists to examine human behavior.

About the Online Environment

Your online course offers several advantages to the traditional classroom, including the comprehensive Online Student Handbook, the ability to communicate electronically with students and with your instructor, and links to a rich array of online resources.

Online Student Handbook

This handbook answers questions about your online learning course, such as how to purchase your text, schedule an exam, obtain a transcript, and get technical help if you need it. The handbook also provides additional resources, such as how to order books or journals from the library and how to study for an online course.

Communication with Your Instructor and Student Peers

• You can use e-mail to communicate with your instructor, to ask questions or comment on your course work.
• Online Discussion Forums, designed by the University of Washington's award winning Catalyst team, allow you to communicate with other currently enrolled students. You are encouraged to use the forum to exchange ideas, resources, and comments about your course work with other students in this course. This unstructured forum is not monitored by your instructor.

Online Resources

As an online student, you have access to a wealth of Web resources compiled to provide fast, easy access to information that supports your online learning experience. Organized by subjects, Online Resources link you to sites with help for writing and research, study skills, language learning, and library reference materials. All links have been assessed for credibility and reliability, and they are regularly monitored to ensure their usability.

Course Overview

What is personality? How do we know personality when we see it? How do we distinguish one personality from another? These are reasonable questions, but it may help to start with a slightly different one: What is personality not? To begin with, personality is not something you can point your finger at. You can't see it, touch it, or smell it. Few of us doubt, however, that personality exists. In fact, there is general agreement that all people have a personality. We perceive others to have personality based on their behavior in the situations in which we observe them. When we see a child sharing her candy with her brother, we often conclude that she is a nice person. Based on this assumption, we may expect that she will be likely to act nicely towards others in the future.

We also use information about the situation to make this type of judgment. For instance, we might not assume that the little girl is a nice person if we hear her mother tell her she can't go to a movie unless she shares her candy. This example highlights that two distinct factors influence behavior: our personality and the situations in which we find ourselves. Personality psychologists focus on the role personality processes play in guiding our actions, but they use knowledge of the situation to infer when personality processes are operating.

Researchers and theorists have argued for centuries about the nature of personality. One ancient Greek theorist, Hippocrates, hypothesized that personality is the result of four bodily humors (or fluids), and that an overabundance of one type of humor leads to a particular personality. Following in this tradition, more modern researchers have identified other biological processes that influence personality. Other researchers believe the origins of personality reside in deep rooted psychological conflicts or prior learning experiences. The diversity of these theoretical perspectives is one of the things that makes personality psychology such a rich and interesting area of study.

Course Goals

This course has several goals. First and foremost, it is designed to introduce you to the broad range of topics examined by personality psychology. At the end of this course, you'll be familiar with the topics personality psychologists study, the methods they use to investigate these issues, and the theories they have developed to explain their findings. You'll also have a better understanding of what makes each of us different from one another, where these differences come from, and how these differences are likely to change over time. Finally, the skills you'll learn in this course will help you evaluate research outside of personality psychology. For example, you might read about a study in the field of medicine. You will be in a better position to assess the merits of this research once you have learned to evaluate research more generally.

One final point I'd like to make is that you will undoubtedly find this material to be challenging, exciting, and thought-provoking; I know I do. I think of personality psychology as a wonderful area of science in which I can begin to ask in a scientific way questions about others and myself that I have been asking in a very informal way since childhood. I hope you come to feel the same way.

About the Lessons

This course consists of eleven lessons and two proctored examinations. Most lessons consist of a reading assignment, a commentary, key terms, and a written assignment. The reading assignments include readings from the Carver and Scheier textbook, Perspectives On Personality, and from Hemingway's The Complete Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway. Hemingway's book gives you an opportunity to explore and apply ideas presented in the textbook chapters. For example, in the second reading assignment, you'll be reading a short story entitled "The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber." You'll be using the character of Francis Macomber as a starting point to discuss different approaches to conceptualizing personality.

Key Terms

Look for key terms in the assigned readings and in the lesson commentary. The end of each textbook chapter includes a glossary that defines terms listed in the Key Textbook Terms sidebar at the beginning of each lesson.

Online Activity

At the end of each lesson, you will find suggested online activities—links to Web sites with additional information, such as articles, videos, slide shows, and animations. These non-graded activities are provided to complement the lesson topic in your online learning course.

Lesson Overviews

Lesson One: Introduction to Theory and Research in Personality Psychology 

• Provides a general definition of personality.
• Describes the seven theoretical perspectives on personality presented in the text; discusses the advantages and disadvantages of the correlational method and the experimental method.
• Distinguishes reliability from validity, and identifies three types of each concept that are relevant to personality assessment.

Lesson Two: Structural and Motivational Properties of Dispositions

• Distinguishes between two groups of dispositional theories: ones that emphasize discrete (or discontinuous) types and ones that emphasize continuous traits.
• Identifies several data analytic strategies used by dispositional theorists.
• Explains the difference between traits, situationism, and interactionism as explanations for why people behave the way they do across situations.
• Explains the difference between the trait approach and a related approach that maintains that needs and motives determine behavior.

Lesson Three: Personality as a Biological Process

• Describes the biological approach to personality.
• Explains how twin studies and adoption studies are used to establish the heritability of personality.
• Distinguishes biological approaches to personality from sociobiological approaches to personality.
• Articulates several theoretical explanations regarding the manner in which neurological processes affect personality.
• Gives you the opportunity to identifiy how specific hormones influence social behavior.

Lesson Four: Freud's Psychoanalytic Theory

• Describes the key elements of Freud's psychoanalytic theory.
• Identifies some of the research strategies Freud used to gather evidence to develop and support his theory.
• Discusses the many contributions and limitations of Freud's work.
• Illustrates three defense mechanisms using examples from your own life.
• Explains Freud's approach to the development and treatment of behavioral problems.

Lesson Five: Preparing for the Midterm Examination

Prepares you for taking the midterm examination for the course.

Lesson Six: Ego Psychology and Psychosocial Theories

• Identifies ways in which Freud's followers extended and modified his theory.
• Explains how competence and mastery are considered basic ego functions that do not evolve from the id.
• Discusses the role "inferiority" plays in Alfred Adler's personality theory.
• Distinguishes four forms of attachment behavior and describes how the forms are measured.
• Describes Erik Erikson's eight-stage model of psychosocial development.
• Explains how neoanalytic theories conceptualize and treat problems of adjustment.

Lesson Seven: Personality as Patterns of Learned Behavior

• Identifies the role that association plays in classical conditioning, and discusses how classical conditioning explains the acquisition of emotions and attitudes.
• Describes the role that reinforcement plays in instrumental conditioning, and relates how instrumental conditioning explains the acquisition of behavior patterns.
• Explains how principles of learning have been used to treat phobias, addictions, and other unwanted behaviors, such as aggressiveness.
• Identifies the ways in which cognitive-social learning theorists have modified traditional learning theory.
• Discusses how observational learning can explain the detrimental effects of watching media violence.

Lesson Eight: The Self, Subjective Experience, and the Capacity for Growth

• Discusses the humanistic (phenomenological) perspective and its emphasis on subjective experience.
• Identifies some of the assumptions Carl Rogers made about how individuals grow and develop.
• Describes Abraham Maslow's theory of self-actualization, including the hierarchy of motives he developed.
• Analyzes Rogers' approach to psychotherapy.
• Defines personal constructs and identify some of the constructs that influence your interpretation of situations.

Lesson Nine: The Cognitive Perspective in Personality Psychology

• Explains what schemas are and describe the functions they serve.
• Identifies five variables that comprise Walter Mischel's theory of personality.
• Describes the self-regulation approach to understanding personality.
• Analyzes aspects of your own personality using concepts from the cognitive perspective in personality psychology.

Lesson Ten: What Have We Learned and Where Do We Go from Here?

• Identifies some of the similarities among the different theories we have examined.
• Describes some of the strengths offered by an integration of several of the different theoretical viewpoints.
• Evaluates and describe how this course has influenced your thinking.

Lesson Eleven: Preparing for the Final Examination

Prepares you for taking the final examination for the course.

About the Assignments

Each lesson includes an assignment in the form of an online quiz that is linked from your Course Syllabus. Assignments are designed to help you understand and apply the issues discussed in the readings. Becoming a critical thinker takes practice; therefore, the assignments are designed to exercise your critical thinking skills. You will find Multiple-Choice, Project, and Essay questions.

The Project questions are designed to get you to think more about the topics you've read about and apply them to your own life (or to a Hemingway story), as well as to prepare you for your exams. Project questions will not have clear-cut "right" or "wrong" answers that can be found in the text, and answers to these questions will require some thought on your part to support your ideas and express your ideas clearly. Answers to Essay questions, on the other hand, refer directly back to the material in the text and can be graded for their "correctness. 

This course is a "W" course, and I will therefore weigh heavily the quality of your written work when evaluating your assignments.

You should submit your assignments after you have completed all parts of the lesson.

Submitting Assignments

The easiest way to submit assignments is to complete them online. Multiple Choice questions can be answered directly. The Project and Essay questions can also be answered online or, if you prefer, you can compose your these answers offline (using your own word processor) and then paste the content into the spaces provided on the quiz form. (Note: The quiz form does not have a spell check, so you may prefer this latter option to ensure that your spelling is correct.) After you have completed your assignment, click on the "SUBMIT" button. Your assignment will be sent directly to me, and you will receive a copy for your records. Please save this copy as a back-up and to use as a study guide.

I grade my assignments every Sunday (unless Monday is a holiday, in which case I grade them on Monday). If I receive your assignment before 10 am Sunday morning, I will return it to you later that day.

If you are uncomfortable using the Internet or do not have access to a computer, you can contact me to arrange for another means of submitting your assignments.

About Examinations

There will be two proctored examinations—a midterm and a final. You will have two hours to complete each. Exams will cover information in the readings, commentary, written assignments, and self-study exercise. They are designed to assess your knowledge and application of the concepts.

I will evaluate your ability to define, differentiate, and apply concepts and techniques presented in the lessons. Both examinations will consist of multiple choice questions, short-answer, and long-answer essay questions. The final examination will emphasize material covered in the last half of the course. You will not be permitted to use textbooks or any other supplemental notes during the exam.

Short-answer Essay questions refer directly back to the material in the text and can be graded for their "correctness."  However, like the assignment Project questions, Essay questions on the exam will not always have clear-cut "right" or "wrong" answers that can be found in the text, and answers to these questions will require a good deal of thought on your part. Remember, you must support your position with facts and good reasoning. It is important that you use your own words to answer these questions, and that you express your ideas clearly.

Finally, at the end of each chapter in the text, there are key words that will be helpful in assessing how much of the chapter you have absorbed. I highly recommend that you take some time to review the concepts listed. These will be especially useful as you review for your exams.

Evaluation and Grading

Evaluation Criteria

The following criteria will be used to evaluate your written work:

• Is your answer clear and to the point? (Extraneous information will cloud the point you are trying to make. Be clear and concise.) Have you addressed the question appropriately and completely?
• Does your answer reflect serious thinking about the question asked?
• Are your arguments well-developed and organized? Are they supported by facts as well as opinions?
• Are your sentences logically connected and do they follow from one to the other? Are sentences grammatical?
• Have you made spelling or typographical errors? (Sloppiness detracts from the quality of your work.)

Grading

Written assignments constitute 60 percent of your grade. Each assignment carries equal weight. Exams count 20 percent each. You must complete all assignments and exams before you can receive a final grade for the course.

Study Tips

Because this is an online course, the amount of personal interaction between you, the student, and me, the instructor, is limited. Our communication will be primarily through written assignments and notes, and I will try to make my comments clear and personable. I will keep close track of the assignments you turn in, and, if I observe an unusually long delay between assignments, I will drop you a note to see how you are doing. Your success in this course will depend primarily on self-discipline and clarity in your written assignments.

When approaching a new lesson, briefly review the study guide materials to get a feeling for the topic you will be studying. Look ahead to the self-study questions and the written assignment to get an idea of what to think about when you read the text. Also, while reading the text you might consider other sources of information about personality and its role in human behavior. Newspapers, movies, and novels can be good sources of ideas for thinking about the concepts we'll be discussing. You should use the "material" you encounter from these sources to test your understanding of key concepts. For example, how would the different theoretical perspectives account for Hannibal Lecter's behavior in the movie The Silence of the Lambs?

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