A Report On Intelligence And Personality Psychology Essay

As a matter of fact, personality and intelligence theories can be divided up into high-factor (including more than 8 factors) and low-factor (including less than 8 factors) theories although it is debatable whether one over-generalises these constructs in doing so. Consequently, it remains questionable whether one will gain sufficient conclusions and benefits from this dissection.

Nevertheless the aim of this brief paper will be to give an account of some of the existing theories of personality and intelligence and assess and weigh up whether low-factor intelligence or personality have been more successful and whether high-factor intelligence or personality theories have been more successful. Success is assessed by looking at a theories effective usability in the world and by its power to predict and measure what it is claiming to measure and assess.

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INTELLIGENCE

Individual differences in intelligence represents one of the most intriguing existing topics investigated by psychologists (Jensen, 1998). There are two main theory types in the study of intelligence: theories propagating one uni-linear construct of general intelligence (g), and theories promoting multiple different intelligences. Intelligence research started basically with Binet and Simon (1905) who used intelligence test to differentiate between dull and bright students. In his eyes, intelligence quotient (IQ) was simply an average of numerous dissimilar abilities, not as a real thing with definite properties that could be studied. Galton in contrast believed that intelligence is a real faculty with a biological basis and could be studied using reaction times on simple cognitive tasks. Galton’s way of thinking led to Spearman’s (1904) invention of factor analysis which is a statistical strategy that assesses the inter-correlations among certain tests, and reduces the most highly linked independent dimensions to smaller groups, termed factors. Utilising factor analysis, Spearman discovered that all tests of intelligence have positive loadings on the general factor and called this factor general intelligence (g). He was, in other words, the first individual who believed that all individuals would possess to varying degrees a general intelligence factor (termed g).

This type of low-factor intelligence theories did not prove to be very successful in predicting for example important related factors such as future job performance and it was criticised that a general intelligence test (IQ test) does not assess all of the abilities that are essential for being successful in all important daily and life and business situations. Additionally, the concept of g does not answer conclusively whether and what intellectual performances and abilities do change or are modifiable over time. For instance, an individual’s intelligence quotient seems to be considerable stable and static over one’s different life stages, but at the same time one’s intellectual performances are regarded to be dynamic and prone to changes during one’s lifetime. In other words, infant’s reasoning skills and thus their performance on reasoning tests enhances continuously through childhood. This would mean however, that an infant’s IQ represents nothing more than his or her rank among peers as IQ is thought to remain static during one’s lifetime and there is no space for improvements (Garlick, 2003).

Therefore, Pearson’s theory was criticised by Thurstone (1938) who rotated the independent intelligence dimensions and who by doing so was able to question the predominance ascribed to g. Moreover, he discovered seven central mental abilities, contrasted to the one promoted by Spearman and devised with the help of these abilities the Test of Primary Mental Abilities. As a matter of fact, this test is still quite popular although its predictive power has been strongly disputed since it is not greater of that of g. In a similar vein, factor analysis was criticised as the central mental abilities identified by factor analysis rely heavily on the type of intelligence test items employed. Consequently, researchers who employed other test items and/or factor analyses presented a range of 20 to more than 150 factors which supposedly represent intellectual abilities (e.g. Guildford, 1982).

However, one of the most widely accepted theory of intelligence is Howard Gardner’s multiple intelligences theory (MI theory) (Gardner 1993). He proposed a seven (or eight) relatively independent intelligence dimensions including linguistic, inter- and intrapersonal, spatial, logical-mathematical, musical, (naturalist), and kinesthetic factors (Shearer, 2004). Gardner and his colleagues have been working on versions of new, more authentic assessment tools for the past 8 years. The results have been mixed and it is fairly difficult to decide whether this high-factor theory of intelligence has been successful or not in practice (Sternberg, 1991). The strength of this theory in contrast to other theories is that it allows for a diversity of abilities and talents of pupils and students and thus acknowledges that everyone might be an expert in one of the intelligence factors while being weaker in other dimensions. In other words, approaching and assessing learning in this manner allows a wider range of students to successfully participate in classroom learning. (Brualdi, 1996).

PERSONALITY

The concept of personality is an incredibly wide one and providing alone an extensive review of definitions for personality would expand this brief paper’s capacity and could fill more than the full space of a book chapter (e.g. Guilford, 1959). Atkinson and colleagues (2000) define personality in Hilgard’s introduction to Psychology as the distinctive and characteristic patterns of thought, emotion, and behavior that define an individual’s personal style of interacting with the physical and social environment (p.435).

Scientific theories in general represent an explanatory-predictive basis for explaining and illuminating existing dimensions of reality. A successful theory is therefore not an entirety of inter-linked sentiments and cognitions, but is, more comparable to a knowledge producing catalyst. Personality theories do not represent exceptions from the rule and in order for them to be regarded as effective or successful they must enable researchers to structure, define, measure and predict facets and facts relating the construct called personality (e.g. George & Christiani, 1990) As a consequence, many researchers have sought to devise reliable, valid and objective theories which successfully give an account of any individual’s personality. In a similar vein, an individual’s personality is described and tested with the help of so called personality traits (e.g. extroverted, intelligent, conscientious, etc). Researchers have attempted to develop theories and related inventories in order to identify and test the, for personality, most relevant factors and traits. As it was thought that through language most of the important distinctions among individuals’ personalities are conveyed Allport and Odbert (1936) were the first who investigated the dictionary and found around 4.500 terms in the dictionary that referred to characteristics of personality. Hence, Allport (1968), can be regarded as the pioneer who employed a factorial approach to illustrate and reveal more formalised and independent dimensions representing personality factors. Raymond Cattell (1966) pioneered in shortening Allport-Odbert’s (1936) list of personality related traits to significantly less than 200. He then identified 16 factors, with the help of factor analysis that apparently could account for the pattern of correlations among Allport-Odbert’s trait ratings.

In fact, not only Cattell but also Eysenck (1970) improved factor analysis in his own special way and empowered himself to research psychological data quantitatively, while extract and crystallise statistically essential factors which transform the abstract personality model to a tangible and measurable construct. While Cattell’s research led to the 16PF model, Eysenck created the PEN personality model with three different factors of personality, namely, neuroticism, extroversion and psychoticism after 1970. These three factors not only successfully demonstrated to possess considerable reliability and validity but also proved to be capable to identify different foundations in learning mechanisms and brain functions. (Golubkov, 2002).

Nevertheless, the factorial approach bore many problems and weaknesses. One of its weaknesses is that there appears to be an ample amount of diverse and distinct results. As a matter of fact, one cannot tell whether today there exist more sets of factors or more factorists. While Cattell extended for research purposes his initially stated 16 factors to 23 and even added 12 abnormal factors (Cattell, 1980) Eysenck’s EPQ (Eysenck and Eysenck, 1975) still possess solely the three mentioned factors. Howarth, another well-known research, in turn, has produced the ten-factor Howarth Personality Questionnaire (HPQ) (Howarth, 1980), which has to be, however, utilised in combination the Additional Personality Factor Inventory and Individuality Inventory. In addition to this work Browne and Howarth (1977) factor analysed over 1700 items from published personality questionnaires and their results regards 11 factors as static and stable factors which are most important assessors of people’s personality although it is yet not even obvious how these factors can be brought into meaningful relation to Howard’s ten HPQ factors.

One can go on and on with this list of mostly high-factor personality theories and include Guildford (1936) who continuously factor analysed face-valid items and over the years so that the amount of factors was not only not identifiable in the end but stood also in stark contrast to Cattell’s models of 16 personality factors (Guildford and Zimmerman, 1956). Comrey (1970) is another researcher who maintains to have done the best factor analysis and thus formulated the best model with eight ultimate factors. One can conclude that researchers concentrating on high-factor personality theories are far from reaching a consent agreement about the fundamental factors representing personality factors and stand in contrast to high-factor intelligence scientists who have at least agreed on certain existing types of intelligence and have identified one general form of intelligence (g) as being insufficient.

Zuckerman (e.g. 1974) is among those researchers who favours solely one factor but who has not been successful in establishing face, construct or predictive validity for his factor (Kline, 1987). Consequently, to date, there is no definite answer to the question how many basic personality factors exist even after having utilised such a rigorous analytic procedure like factor analysis. In fact, one can see similarities to the indefinite number of factors defining the concept of intelligence which could be possibly one (Spearman’s general intelligence factor, g), seven or eight (Thurstone’s primary mental abilities), or as many as 150 (Guildford, 1982).

Nonetheless, some of the disagreement is due to the fact that it is up to a certain degree a matter of subjective taste how many factors are propagated in one’s theory. A researcher who dislikes less differentiated or general descriptions of personality will choose fewer selective criterion for fundamental factors and as a consequence agree upon more independent dimensions in order to preserve important distinctions which would be probably lost if the selection criteria would have been expanded. Psychologists, like for instance Eysenck, on the other hand choose to merge several lower-level factors into more general ones, arguing that the resulting factors will be more consistent and powerful. In truth, all three of Eysenck’s traits proved to be superfactors of Cattell’s 16 traits when they were factor analysed. One can therefore think of a hierarchy of factors in which each and every ample general factor consists, in fact, of many subordinate, lower-level traits.

These findings led most scientists to agree on the psychometrical advantages of the Big Five model proposed by Costa and McCrae (1997), often concluding that the Five Factor model is present everywhere (McCrae & Costa, 1997). According to this low-factor model, five higher order personality factors which predominate are called OCEAN and include Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, Neuroticism. Openness (to experience) stands for the trend to seek intellectual activities in ideally new and stimulating settings. Conscientiousness is incarnated by someone who is determined, responsible, and persistently and effectively active while extraversion represents someone very sociable who possesses great amounts of energy, alertness and assertiveness. Agreeableness is also represented by someone who is extremely sociable, friendly, considerate and modest. Neuroticism can be translated to an insecure person who possesses predominantly bad feelings and negative emotions (e.g. anxiety, depression and anger). In fact, every individual differs alongside these five dimensions and assessing these will help to build a more precise personality map of someone while analogously predicting important behaviours in life (e.g. Conscientiousness predicts future job performance). In other words, these Big-Five represent behaviour patterns or predictions which can be successfully utilised in work, mental health, or everyday-life settings (Chamorro-Premuzic, Furnham, 2004, Costa & McCrae, 1992).

In sum, one can say that, despite these serious disagreements among many theorists, that there is a relative remarkable agreement among a growing amount of researchers about the actual number of personality factors as well as about their meaning: there are three to five factors (categories of personality traits) that have meaningful similarity in various conceptions such as, for example, the 16PF, the PEN and the B5. This similarity, as well as the fact that the main factors are universal for people of different cultures and languages (McCrae & Costa, 1997), supports the idea that theses factors embody some objective determination, independent of the preferences of a particular author (Golubkov, 2002).

Hence, for personality theories one can impossibly decide whether low- or high-factor theories should be favoured as most of them are inextricably linked and a distinction between them is although scientifically supported quite arbitrary. In terms of success one has to acknowledge that the BIG-Five personality theory is the most influential and utilised personality theory to predict personality as its factors stand in observable and meaningful correlation to other important constructs (e.g. conscientiousness predicts job performance).

CONCLUSION

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It is impossible to give a full account of all the existing low- or high-factor theories of either personality or intelligence and it is not said that generalising along these dimensions will do justice to the great variance of the different theories as it is possible that, for instance, a high-factor personality theory (Cattell’s 16 factor theory) have more in common with low-factor theories (Eysenck’s three factor theory) and the other way round. In a similar vein, it is also almost impossible to make a generalised statement about the success of low- or high-factor theories other than the value of the factorial approach has been questioned in both personality and intelligence theories (Atkinson et al., 2000), and other techniques have been said to be more fruitful for research purposes. However, one can still easily acknowledge that low-factor intelligence theories were not at all as successful as low-factor personality theories like the BIG-Five in establishing themselves in the science, business and everyday world whereas high-factor intelligence theories like the MI are to date regarded as much more influential and valid than overloaded high-factor personality theories.

REFERENCES

Binet, A. & Simon, T. (1905). New methods for the diagnosis of the intellectual level of subnormals. Annals of Psychology, 11, 191.

Brualdi, A. C. (1996). Multiple intelligences: gardner’s theory. Practical Assessment, Research & Evaluation, 5(10). Retrieved March 28, 2005 from http://PAREonline.net/getvn.asp?v=5&n=10

Cattell. R. B. (1966). The scientific analysis of personality. Chicago: Aldine.

Cattell, R. B. 1971. Abilities: Their Structure, Growth, and Action. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.

Cattell, R. B. (1987). Intelligence: Its structure, growth and action. New York: Springer.

Chamorro-Premuzic, T., Furnham, A.. A possible model for understanding the personality–intelligence interface. British Journal of Psychology, 95(2), p249-316.

Eysenck, H. J., & Eysenck, M. W. (1985). Personality and individual differences. New York: Plenum.

Gardner, H. 1983. Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences. New York: Basic Books.

Gardner, H. 1993. Creating Minds. New York: Basic Books

Garlick, D. (2003) Integrating brain science research with intelligence research. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 12(5), p185-195p.

Guilford, J. P. (1982). Cognitive psychology’s ambiguities; some suggested remedies. Psychological Review, 89, p.48-49.

Hunt, E. (1995a). Will We Be Smart Enough? A Cognitive Analysis of the Coming Workforce. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.

Hunt, E. (1995b) The role of intellegence in modern society. American Scientist, 83, 356-368

Jensen, A. R. (1969) How much can we boost IQ and scholastic achievement? Harvard Educational Review 39(1), p.111-123.

McCrae, R. R., & Costa, P. T., Jr. (1997). Personality trait structure as a human universal. American Psychologist, 52, 509-516.

Shearer, B. (2004). Multiple Intelligences Theory After 20 Years. Teachers College Record, 106(1), p2-15.

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Spearman, C. 1927. The Abilities of Man. London: MacMillan.

Thurstone, L. L. (1938). Primary mental abilities. Psychometric Monographs No.1, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

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