Chpt 4 MCQ – Flashcards

5. The text compares the complexities and richness of human personality to the way a color wheel, consisting of a mere three colors, can create the entire spectrum of colors visible to the human eye. This analogy illustrates how A. the color spectrum varies with different human emotions. B. individuals are as unique and diverse as the range of color spectrum. C. a few basic and primary traits could be responsible for the idiosyncrasies of every personality. D. the use of color therapy over an extended period of time may change the amount of a trait in an individual.

If a trait changes over time, test-retest correlations A. will always be low. B. will always be high. C. are high if rank order remains the same. D. are low if rank order remains the same.

10. The concept of rank order consistency suggests that A. traits are not consistent over time within an individual. B. trait levels in an individual may decrease with age when compared to the general population. C. a person with more of a trait at one time will have a different trait score at another time. D. trait levels are unaffected by the chronological age of an individual

A study by Hartshorne and May (1928) found that children who cheated in games were A. much more likely to cheat on written exams. B. not much more likely to cheat on written exams. C. more likely to help strangers. D. more likely to be aggressive.

12. _____ challenged the idea that traits are consistent across situations. A. Cattell B. Eysenck C. Mischel D. Larson

Mischel thought that _____ were most important in determining behavior. A. situations B. attitudes C. traits D. intellectual abilities

14. The idea that traits are less important than immediate circumstances in determining behavior is known as A. aggregation. B. situationism. C. acquiescence. D. social desirability.

15. Most personality and social psychologists agree that actual behavior is based on A. constant interaction between the individual's personality and the situation. B. the consistent behavior across a multitude of situations. C. extremely strong situations that constantly change behavior. D. the need to disagree.

16. Vince is watching his school's team play in the championship basketball game. He is wildly cheering his team on to victory, talking to everyone around him, even though they are strangers, and shouting at the referees for making bad calls on his team. From psychologist Walter Mischel's perspective, Vince is primarily behaving due to A. his extremely strong competitiveness and extraversion. B. the extremely strong effects of the six tacos he ate for lunch. C. his extremely strong long-term commitment to the basketball team. D. the extremely strong effects of the immediate situation.

17. One result of Mischel's critique of trait approaches has been A. an increased interest in person-situation interactions. B. a decreased interest in person-situation interactions. C. a decrease in the practice of aggregation. D. that personality traits are no longer studied.

18. Mischel has pointed out that personality psychologists are NOT very good at predicting A. the effects of important situations on most individuals. B. how a particular individual will behave in a specific situation. C. how personality traits direct individuals to specific situations. D. the effects of personality test scores on an individual

23. Personality is likely to have the least effect on behavior A. in ambiguous situations. B. when people are older. C. in strong situations. D. when behaviors are aggregated.

24. After spending time in this class you notice the wide range of personalities in your family while attending a family gathering. During the gathering at Aunt Millie's home she insists on everyone singing traditional holiday songs together. The neurotic, the extraverted, the shy, the anxious, the open, and all of the other personality types in your family join in song at Aunt Millie's request. Her success at getting all of these personalities to join in song is due to the A. common family environment. B. social influence effect. C. strong situation. D. shared family environment.

25. You are in a traffic jam and are not able to discern the cause of the delay. While waiting you observe the behavior of the individuals in the cars around you. The angry woman is honking her horn. The narcissistic man is carefully combing his hair. A patient girl is sitting back calmly listening to music. And you're thinking your analytic skills are going to make you a great psychologist! The variety of behaviors being exhibited by the drivers in this situation are most likely due to the A. ambiguity of the situation. B. different cars the drivers own. C. your misinterpretation of the situation. D. differences of driver's personalities.

28. A study by Diener et al. discussed in the text did NOT find that A. people who scored high on the need for achievement spent more time working. B. extraverts spent more time engaging in social forms of recreation. C. individuals' personalities were related to the situations they were in. D. people selected different situations when wearing pagers then they usually selected.

32. The main difference between evocation and manipulation is that A. evocation is the result of personality but manipulation is not. B. manipulation is the result of personality by evocation is not. C. evocation is not intentional, but manipulation is. D. manipulation is not intentional but evocation is.

33. A person who intentionally charms others to get what he or she wants demonstrates the concept of A. situational selection. B. evocation. C. manipulation. D. aggregation.

44. The key issue in measuring traits is determining A. what causes traits. B. how much of a trait a person has. C. how many traits exist. D. how traits change over time.

45. Which of the following is NOT a concern in the measurement of traits? A. Faking B. Strong situations C. Acquiescence D. Social desirability

49. Josh has been required to complete an anger management course as part of his sentencing for his conviction in a road rage incident. He completes a personality test and answers the questions in a way that he believes will reduce the amount time he will spend in the course. In terms of psychological measurement issues Josh is A. faking good. B. faking bad. C. false negative. D. false positive.

50. If a psychologist thinks a truthful person is "faking good," the psychologists has A. demonstrated a false positive. B. demonstrated a false negative. C. created a response set. D. created a criterion problem.

52. _____ refers to the tendency to respond to questionnaire items based on something besides the content of the question. A. Faking B. Falsification C. Response sets D. Aggregation

54. A person who tends to agree with all items on a questionnaire is probably displaying the response set of A. extreme responding. B. acquiescence. C. social desirability. D. faking.

55. Items on a questionnaire might be reversed scored to avoid the problem of A. range restriction. B. acquiescence. C. social desirability. D. faking.

56. A person who only uses the endpoints of scales on questionnaire items is probably displaying the response set of A. extreme responding. B. acquiescence. C. social desirability. D. faking.

57. Which of the following response sets has received the most empirical attention? A. Extreme responding B. Acquiescence C. Social desirability D. Faking

59. Which of the following response sets has been viewed as a personality characteristic? A. Extreme responding B. Acquiescence C. Social desirability D. Forced choice

60. Socially desirable responding A. is always considered a form of faking. B. can occur without intent. C. cannot be controlled for statistically. D. is the same as "yea-saying."

69. In order to select personnel for a job, a psychologist would NOT A. determine the special challenges of the job. B. develop hypotheses about the kinds of personality traits best suited to the job. C. measure the traits of job applicants. D. use a series of Barnum statements to assess personality.

70. Federal guidelines require that personality tests used in selecting employees A. will be lower then the correlation using the full range of scores. B. must predict job performance. C. must not measure psychiatric symptoms. D. must be free from Barnum effects.