by Sandi Mann
Incidentally, The Bell Curve was also controversial because of its argument that women of low IQ (who, the authors claimed, are disproportionately represented in the lower socio-economic groups) should not be encouraged to reproduce: ‘We urge generally that these policies, represented by the extensive network of cash and services for low-income women who have babies, be ended’ (p. 548). Unsurprisingly, these and the rest of their assertions were subject to a great deal of criticism by later scholars.
THE FLYNN EFFECT
The Flynn Effect refers to the substantial increase in average scores on intelligence tests over time all over the world. When IQ tests are initially standardized using a standardization sample, the average result is set to 100. By convention, the standard deviation of the results is set to 15 points. When IQ tests are revised they are again standardized using a new standardization sample and the average result set to 100. However, if the new sample is tested using older tests, in almost every case they score substantially above 100. The effect has been observed in most parts of the world at different rates. The Flynn Effect is named for James R. Flynn, Emeritus Professor of Political Studies at the University of Otago in Dunedin, New Zealand, who did much to document it and promote awareness of its implications.
There are several proposed explanations of the Flynn Effect. These include improved nutrition, a trend towards smaller families, better education, greater environmental stimulation (e.g. from pictures on the wall and movies to video games to computers) and heterosis (the occurrence of genetically superior offspring from mixing the genes of its parents). Another explanation is that people are getting more experienced at taking IQ tests. It is unlikely that genetic selection is the cause as the increase has been too rapid to allow for this.
Emotional intelligence
Emotional intelligence (EI) is the ability to monitor one’s own and other people’s emotions, to discriminate between different emotions and label them appropriately, and to use emotional information to guide thinking and behaviour. The concept was born out of Howard Gardner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligences, which included both interpersonal intelligence (the capacity to understand the intentions, motivations and desires of other people) and intrapersonal intelligence (the capacity to understand oneself, to appreciate one’s feelings, fears and motivations). The first use of the term ‘emotional intelligence’ is usually attributed to Wayne Payne’s doctoral thesis ‘A Study of Emotion: Developing Emotional Intelligence’ from 1985, but the term became widely known with the 1996 publication of Daniel Goleman’s Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More than IQ.
Some experts believe that EI is more important than IQ because EI incorporates more of the skills that are really necessary to succeed in life. Latterly, however, Goleman has modified these claims in the light of sceptics who refute the suggestion that EI really does count more than IQ. This issue was clarified by Dr Goleman a few years ago when he commented that ‘in some life domains emotional intelligence seems to be more highly correlated with a positive outcome than is a measure of IQ. The domains where this can occur are “soft” – those where, e.g., emotional self-regulation or empathy may be more salient skills than are purely cognitive abilities, such as health or marital success.’
Notwithstanding the contention that EI matters more than IQ, Goleman’s early work has been criticized for assuming from the beginning that EI is a type of intelligence. For example, in 2000 Michael Eysenck asserted that Goleman’s description of EI contained unsubstantiated assumptions about intelligence in general, and that it even runs contrary to what researchers have come to expect when studying types of intelligence. Later, in 2005, Edwin A. Locke claimed that the concept of EI is in itself a misinterpretation of the intelligence construct, and asserted that it is not another form or type of intelligence, but intelligence applied to a particular life domain: emotions. He suggests that the concept should be referred to as a skill rather than a capacity.
Dig deeper
Newspaper article discussing the argument that IQ tests are ‘fundamentally flawed’:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/iq-tests-are-fundamentally-flawed-and-using-them-alone-to-measure-intelligence-is-a-fallacy-study-finds-8425911.html
Take the IQ test used in the above study:
http://www.cambridgebrainsciences.com/user/login/challenge/2
Daniel Goleman’s website:
http://www.danielgoleman.info/topics/emotional-intelligence/
Fact-check
1 Which one of the following is not known for their work on intelligence?
a Howard Gardner
b Alfred Binet
c David Wechsler
d Sigmund Freud
2 Spearman’s Two-Factor Theory of Intelligence stated that:
a Intelligence is located in the hypothalamus of the brain
b Intelligence is a single entity
c Intelligence is made up of a general factor and specific factors
d IQ tests cannot measure intelligence
3 For a behaviour to be classed as an intelligence, Gardner stated that it should:
a Have a clear evolutionary purpose
b Produce an emotion
c Be capable of being copied
d Be observable
4 Fluid intelligence is:
a The ability to understand liquids
b Another way of saying crystallized intelligence
c Also called ‘g’
d About being able to think logically
5 Mental age refers to:
a Chronological age
b The age we think we are
c The age we would like to be
d The age group that a person’s mental capacity equates to
6 Which of the following is not a subscale of the WAIS?
a Verbal comprehension
b Short-term memory
c Perceptual reasoning
d Working memory
7 Which of the following do IQ tests measure?
a Creativity
b Common sense
c Emotional intelligence
d Fluid intelligence
8 The Flynn Effect refers to:
a The fact that intelligence has been decreasing over the years
b The fact that intelligence has been increasing over the years
c The fact that intelligence is the same now on average that it was a generation ago
d None of the above
9 Explanations to account for the Flynn Effect do not include:
a Genetic selection
b Nutrition
c Education
d Exposure to testing
10 Emotional intelligence refers to:
a The ability to monitor one’s own emotions
b The ability to read other people’s emotions
c The ability to control one’s own emotions
d All of the above
9
Personality and motivation
We talk of people having a good personality and sometimes we hear of people taking a personality test, but what do we really mean by ‘personality’ and how does it develop? The word ‘personality’ derives from the Latin word persona, which referred to a theatrical mask worn by performers. According to the American Psychological Association, personality refers to individual differences in characteristic patterns of thinking, feeling and behaving.
Defining personality
‘Although no single definition is acceptable to all personality theorists, we can say that personality is a pattern of relatively permanent traits and unique characteristics that give both consistency and individuality to a person’s behavior.’
J. Feist and G. J. Feist, Theories of Personality, 7th edn (New York: McGraw-Hill, 2009), p. 4
Personality is made up of a range of factors individual to each person, including thoughts, values and emotions. Personality is thought to have an impact on behaviour and is relatively stable and generalizable in that people would be expected
to behave in similar ways across time and across situations. There are many approaches, or theories, that attempt to explain what personality is. These include trait, psychodynamic, behavioural, social-cognitive and humanistic theories.
Theories of personality
TRAIT THEORIES
These approaches view personality as made up of innate characteristics that have a genetic and/or biological basis (hence this is a biologically based approach to personality). Traits are relatively stable characteristics that cause people to behave in certain ways. It is the unique combination of these varied traits that make up an individual’s personality.
The German-born psychologist Hans Eysenck (1916–97) was one of the strongest proponents of this approach, arguing that brain systems were directly linked to personality traits. For example, he claimed that introversion was caused by high cortical arousal (leading introverts to avoid any extra stimulation), while extroversion was associated with such low levels of cortical arousal that extroverts feel the need to seek out extra stimulation from the environment. Similarly, Eysenck proposed that individual differences in the limbic system determined where a person lay on the neuroticism dimension (there’s more on Eysenck’s approach later in this chapter).
Trait theorists are interested in measuring and identifying the different traits that make up an individual’s personality. There are three main trait approaches:
• Cattell’s Sixteen Personality Factors
In 1949 the trait theorist Raymond Cattell (1905–98) identified more than 170 personality traits, which he used to measure a large sample of individuals. Using the statistical technique of factor analysis, he then reduced this list to 16 main dimensions of personality and later developed the 16PF Personality Inventory to measure these in individuals (see below). The 16 dimensions would each involve a scale so that people could see how they scored on that dimension compared with other people in the population. Their personality could then be described according to where they were on each dimension.
• Eysenck’s Three Dimensions of Personality
Prior to Cattell’s approach, Hans Eysenck believed that there were just three main personality traits. These were:
• Introversion/extraversion: introverted individuals tend to be quiet and reserved as they are likely to be preoccupied with directing attention on to their inner experiences, whereas extroverts tend to be more outgoing as they focus their energies more outwardly on to other people and the environment.
• Neuroticism/emotional stability: this dimension of Eysenck’s trait theory is concerned with the stability, or otherwise, of an individual’s mood. Neuroticism refers to an individual’s tendency to become upset or emotional, while stability refers to the tendency to remain more emotionally controlled.
• Psychoticism: Eysenck was influenced by his work with people who had mental health issues and he later added (in the 1970s) this personality dimension to his trait theory. Individuals with high psychoticism tend to have difficulty dealing with reality and may be antisocial, compared with those low on the scale.
Spotlight: The most-cited psychologist
By the time of his death in 1997 at the age of 81, Eysenck had been the living psychologist most frequently cited in science journals. In his lifetime he had written about 80 books and more than 1,600 journal articles.
• The Five-Factor Theory of Personality
Many researchers felt that while Cattell focused on too many personality traits, Eysenck focused on too few. This led to the development of a five-factor approach to personality traits, sometimes referred to as the ‘Big Five’. The initial five-factor model was advanced by Ernest Tupes and Raymond Christal in 1961 but it did not really make an impact until the 1980s, when Paul Costa and Robert McCrae in 1985 published the NEO Five-Factor Personality Inventory (of which more later).
The five factors are:
• Openness: this refers to how open a person is to new experiences and new ideas. It also depicts how imaginative and creative they are, and whether they prefer flexible rather than strict routines.
• Conscientiousness: this refers to how dutiful and disciplined a person is and whether they adopt planned or spontaneous behaviours.
• Extraversion: this includes the degree to which people are outgoing, sociable and chatty.
• Agreeableness: this describes the tendency to be compassionate and cooperative rather than hostile and suspicious.
• Neuroticism: this refers to emotional stability but also to the degree to which people experience the negative emotions such as anger and depression.
It should be noted that these are really dimensions not types, so that people fall somewhere within each pole on a scale, rather than either being one or the other.
PSYCHODYNAMIC THEORIES
These emphasize the influence of the unconscious on the development of personality. The Austrian neurologist Sigmund Freud (1856–1939) was one of the main drivers of this approach.
Spotlight: Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud (born Sigismund Schlomo Freud) was an Austrian neurologist born to Jewish parents in 1856. He became known as the founding father of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for treating psychopathology through dialogue between a patient and a psychoanalyst. Freud qualified as a doctor of medicine at the University of Vienna in 1881 and in 1886 he resigned his hospital post and entered private practice specializing in ‘nervous disorders’. In 1933 the Nazis publicly burned a number of Freud’s books and in 1938, shortly after the Nazis annexed Austria, Freud left Vienna for London with his wife and daughter Anna. Freud had been diagnosed with cancer of the jaw in 1923 (related to his heavy smoking), and underwent more than 30 operations. He died of cancer on 23 September 1939.
Freud’s theory states that personality is driven by several factors:
• Instinctual drives
• Unconscious processes
• Early childhood influences.
‘A child in its greed for love does not enjoy having to share the affection of its parents with its brothers and sisters; and it notices that the whole of their affection is lavished upon it once more whenever it arouses their anxiety by falling ill. It has now discovered a means of enticing out its parents’ love and will make use of that means as soon as it has the necessary psychical material at its disposal for producing an illness.’
Sigmund Freud, Fragments of an Analysis of a Case of Hysteria (1905 [1901]), Standard Edition, vol. 7, p. 37
These factors interact, especially in the first five years of life, to influence the developing personality. Freud believed that an individual’s personality is structured into three parts (which is why his theory is sometimes called the Tripartite Theory of Personality) – the id, ego and superego – all developing at different stages in our lives:
• The id is the primitive and instinctive component of personality and consists of all the inherited (i.e. biological) components of personality. It is driven by the pleasure principle, demanding immediate gratification. It is the id, then, that drives us towards food, water, sex and other basic needs.
• The ego is the decision-making part of personality that tries to control the more instinctive id. It operates not on a pleasure principle like the id, but on a reality principle as it tries to work out realistic ways of satisfying the needs of the id without attracting negative consequences; for example by trying to postpone the id’s drives to a more socially acceptable time. The ego takes into account the social expectations, norms, etiquette and rules of society.
• The superego acts like a conscience by incorporating values and morals that are learned from one’s parents and others. It acts on the ego through the use of guilt.
Thus, Freud claims, the three components are in constant conflict, each battling to exert their influence on actions and behaviour. To manage these internal conflicts and reduce anxiety, people may use defence mechanisms, which are usually automatic and unconscious. In 1936 Anna Freud (daughter of Sigmund) enumerated a total of t
en defence mechanisms that appeared in the works of her famous father.
‘A defence mechanism is a coping technique that reduces anxiety arising from unacceptable or potentially harmful impulses.’
D. L. Schacter, Psychology, 2nd edn (New York: Worth Publishers, 2011), pp. 482–3
These include:
• Repression: this is a subconscious attempt to keep unpleasant thoughts, memories and feelings out of mind and even memory.
• Projection: this is where, instead of acknowledging unacceptable thoughts or feelings, we attribute them to someone else.
• Reaction formation: here a person might attempt to distance themselves from unacceptable thoughts or feelings by behaving in a way that is directly opposite to their real inclinations.
• Rationalization: This is an attempt to use incorrect explanations to justify unacceptable behaviour, thoughts or feelings.
• Displacement: here we might transfer feelings about a person or event on to someone or something else.
• Denial: This is where a person refuses to acknowledge something that is obvious to most other people.
• Regression: here a person might revert back to a more immature state of psychological development that is felt to be safer and less demanding.
• Sublimation: this is the channelling of unacceptable thoughts and feelings into socially acceptable behaviour.
Other influential players in the psychoanalytical approaches to personality were Erik Erikson (1902–94), who emphasized the social elements of personality development, the identity crisis and how personality is shaped over the course of the entire lifespan, and Carl Jung (1875–1961), who focused on the role that concepts such as the collective unconscious (the reservoir of all the experience and knowledge of the human species) had on personality development. Jung also developed a theory of psychological types designed to categorize people in terms of various personality patterns. These types were: