Review Questions for Personality
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Multiple Choice Questions
1. Personality is thought to be ________.
- short term and easily changed
- a pattern of short-term characteristics
- unstable and short term
- long term, stable and not easily changed
2. The long-standing traits and patterns that propel individuals to consistently think, feel, and behave in specific ways are known as ________.
- psychodynamic
- temperament
- humors
- personality
3. ________ is credited with the first comprehensive theory of personality.
- Hippocrates
- Gall
- Wundt
- Freud
4. An early science that tried to correlate personality with measurements of parts of a person’s skull is known as ________.
- phrenology
- psychology
- physiology
- personality psychology
5. The id operates on the ________ principle.
- reality
- pleasure
- instant gratification
- guilt
6. The ego defense mechanism in which a person who is confronted with anxiety returns to a more immature behavioural stage is called ________.
- repression
- regression
- reaction formation
- rationalization
7. The Oedipus complex occurs in the ________ stage of psychosexual development.
- oral
- anal
- phallic
- latency
8. The universal bank of ideas, images, and concepts that have been passed down through the generations from our ancestors refers to ________.
- archetypes
- intuition
- collective unconscious
- personality types
9. Self-regulation is also known as ________.
- self-efficacy
- will power
- internal locus of control
- external locus of control
10. Your level of confidence in your own abilities is known as ________.
- self-efficacy
- self-concept
- self-control
- self-esteem
11. Giang believes that they got a bad grade on their psychology paper because their professor doesn’t like them. Giang most likely has an _______ locus of control.
- internal
- external
- intrinsic
- extrinsic
12. Self-concept refers to ________.
- our level of confidence in our own abilities
- all of our thoughts and feelings about ourselves
- the belief that we control our own outcomes
- the belief that our outcomes are outside of our control
13. The idea that people’s ideas about themselves should match their actions is called ________.
- confluence
- conscious
- conscientiousness
- congruence
14. The way a person reacts to the world, starting when they are very young, including the person’s activity level is known as ________.
- traits
- temperament
- heritability
- personality
15. Sandeep is 18 months old. Sandeep cries frequently, is hard to soothe, and wakes frequently during the night. According to Thomas and Chess, Sandeep would be considered ________.
- an easy baby
- a difficult baby
- a slow to warm up baby
- a colicky baby
16. According to the findings of the Minnesota Study of Twins Reared Apart, identical twins, whether raised together or apart have ________ personalities.
- slightly different
- very different
- slightly similar
- very similar
17. Temperament refers to ________.
- inborn, genetically based personality differences
- characteristic ways of behaving
- conscientiousness, agreeableness, neuroticism, openness, and extroversion
- degree of introversion-extroversion
18. According to the Eysencks’ theory, people who score high on neuroticism tend to be ________.
- calm
- stable
- outgoing
- anxious
19. The United States is considered a ________ culture.
- collectivistic
- individualist
- traditional
- nontraditional
20. The concept that people choose to move to places that are compatible with their personalities and needs is known as ________.
- selective migration
- personal oriented personality
- socially oriented personality
- individualism
21. Which of the following is NOT a projective test?
- Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI)
- Rorschach Inkblot Test
- Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)
- Rotter Incomplete Sentence Blank (RISB)
22. A personality assessment in which a person responds to ambiguous stimuli, revealing unconscious feelings, impulses, and desires ________.
- self-report inventory
- projective test
- Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI)
- Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI)
23. Which personality assessment employs a series of true/false questions?
- Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI)
- Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)
- Rotter Incomplete Sentence Blank (RISB)
- Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI)
Critical Thinking Questions
24. What makes a personal quality part of someone’s personality?
25. Describe the difference between extroverts and introverts in terms of what is energizing to each.
26. Discuss Horney’s perspective on Freud’s concept of penis envy.
27. Compare the personalities of someone who has high self-efficacy to someone who has low self-efficacy.
28. Compare and contrast Skinner’s perspective on personality development to Freud’s.
29. How might a temperament mix between parent and child affect family life?
30. How stable are the Big Five factors over one’s lifespan?
31. Compare the personality of someone who scores high on agreeableness to someone who scores low on agreeableness.
32. Why might it be important to consider cultural influences on personality?
33. Why might a prospective employer screen applicants using personality assessments?
34. Why would a clinician give someone a projective test?
Personal Application Questions
35. How would you describe your own personality? Do you think that friends and family would describe you in much the same way? Why or why not?
36. How would you describe your personality in an online dating profile?
37. What are some of your positive and negative personality qualities? How do you think these qualities will affect your choice of career?
38. What are some examples of defence mechanisms that you have used yourself or have witnessed others using?
39. What is your birth order? Do you agree or disagree with Adler’s description of your personality based on his birth order theory, as described in the Link to Learning? Provide examples for support.
40. Would you describe yourself as an extrovert or an introvert? Does this vary based on the situation? Provide examples to support your points.
41. Select an epic story that is popular in contemporary society (such as Harry Potter or Star Wars) and explain it terms of Jung’s concept of archetypes.
42. Do you have an internal or an external locus of control? Provide examples to support your answer.
43. Respond to the question, “Who am I?” Based on your response, do you have a negative or a positive self-concept? What are some experiences that led you to develop this particular self-concept?
44. Research suggests that many of our personality characteristics have a genetic component. What traits do you think you inherited from your parents? Provide examples. How might modelling (environment) influenced your characteristics as well?
45. Review the Big Five personality factors shown in Figure 11.14. On which areas would you expect you’d score high? In which areas does the low score more accurately describe you?
46. According to the work of Rentfrow and colleagues, personalities are not randomly distributed. Instead they fit into distinct geographic clusters. Based on where you live, do you agree or disagree with the traits associated with yourself and the residents of your area of the country? Why or why not?
47. How objective do you think you can be about yourself in answering questions on self-report personality assessment measures? What implications might this have for the validity of the personality test?