13. MEMORY-REMEMBERING AND FORGETTING 14. INTELLIGENCE 15. APTITUDES 16. PERSONALITY
Chapter 13
MEMORY—REMEMBERING AND FORGETTING
What is memory?
Learning occupies a very important place in one’s life. It is the basis of our survival as well as the development and progress of society. However, our best efforts in learning may turn into a futile exercise if the products of learning are not utilised by us soon after or at a later stage. For making use of the material learnt it must remain in our mind, stored up somehow, to be used when the need arises. In the world of psychology this ability or power of our mind to store the past experiences of learning and utilising them (by re producing) at a later stage is known as Memory.
Ryburn agrees to the above meaning of the term memory when he says ‘The power that we have to ‘store’ our experiences, and to bring them into the field of consciousness some time after the experiences have occurred, is termed, memory”. (1956, p. 220).
In this way, memory is regarded as a special ability of our mind to conserve or store what has been previously experienced or acquired through learning and then. at some later stage to enable us to make use of its reproduction or revival. The judgment about the strength of this power or quality of this ability can be made through performance in terms of the quality of the revival or reproduction of what has been learned and stored up. In thts sense, a good memory must reflect ‘‘an ideal revival’? as Stout puts it, “‘So far as ideal revival is merely reproductive—this productive aspect of ideal revival requires the object of past experiences to be reinstated as far as possible in the order and manner of their original occurrence” (1938. p. 521).
However, the term memory or the process of memorization cannot be termed in so simple a manner as to be viewed merely in terms of reproduction or revival of past experiences or learning. It 1s quite a complex process which involves factors like learning, retention, recall and recognition as explained below in the mechanism of the process of memorization.
Mechanism of the process of memorization
Our mind possesses a special ability by virtue of which every experience or learning leaves behind memory images or traces which are conserved in the form of ‘engrams’. Thus what is learned leaves its after-effect which is conserved in the form of engrams composed of memory traces. This preservation of the memory traces by our central nervous system or brain is known as retaining of the learned or experienced act. How long we can retain depends upon the strength and quality of the memory traces. When we try to recollect or repeat our past experiences or learning, we make use of the memory traces. If we are successful in the revival of our memory traces, Our memory is said to be good. But if, somehow or the other, the memory traces have died out, we will not be able to reproduce or make use of our past experiences or learning. In this case it 1s said that we are not able to retain what has been learned or in other words we have forgotten.
In this way, for memorization, learning is the primary condltion. If there is no learning there will be no remembering. At the second stage we should see that these learning experiences are retained properly in the form of mental impressions or images so that they can be revived when the need arises. The third and the fourth stage in the process of memorization can be called Recognition and Recall. Recognition is a much easier and simpler psychological process than recall. The difference between these two terms can be explained by the following example:
Suppose, Mr. Ram Nath has been your class mate. You have passed happy times with him. The old experiences have been retained in the form of memory traces. Now if you are told only the name of the gencleman and you can recollect all what you have experienced im his company and can describe his personality, it is said that you have been able to recall your past experience. In this case memory traces are said to be retained in a proper form. But if the memory traces are very weak and therefore, retention is poor, then recall (perfect revival of the past experiences) may not be possible.
In such cases ‘recognition’ is possible. Recognition is nothing but the awareness of an object or situation as having been known to the person. Here the presence of the already experienced object or thing makes the task of recollection easy. In the above example, the photographs or the actual presence of Mr. Ram Nath may facilitate the task of recollecting past experiences.
From the above discussion it can be easily concluded that the process of memorization begins with learning or experiencing something and ends with its revival and reproduction. Therefore memory is Said to involve four stages i.e., learning or experiencing something. its retention and finally its recognition and recall.
Remembering and memory
As emphasized above, memory denotes the ability or power of our mind to retain and reproduce cur learning. This power or
ability thus helps in the process of memorization. Many times wd use the word ‘remembering’ in place of ‘memorization’. Both of these terms carry the same meaning. While differentiating between memory and remembering Levin says “Memory can be likened ta a giant filling cabinet in the brain, with data sorted, classified and cross-filed for future reference. Remembering depends on how the brain goes about coding its input.” (1978, p. 297).
In this way while memory is a noun denoting the power or ability of our mind, memorization or remembering is a verb that processes aut the directives of the memory i.e., power or ability of our mind.
However, in a practical sense, when we say that a person has a good or poor memory we always weigh it in terms of “remembering what has previously been learned” (Woodworth and Marquis 1948 p. 42-43).
It is in this sense that the terms memory and remembering, in spite of their being as noun and verb, are used as synonymous terms. In the present text, as the reader will find, we would be using these terms interchangeably.
Types of memory
Psychologists have tried to classify memory into certain types according to their nature and purposes served. The broad classification consists of immediate memory, short-term memory and longterm memory. Let us see what we mean by these types:
Immediate Memory: Immediate memory or sensory memory is that memory which helps an individual to recall something a split second after having perceived it. In such type of memory retentive time is extremely brief/generally from a fraction of a second to several seconds. Old sensory impressicns disappear as they are “erased’ by new information.
Immediate memory is needed when we want to remember a thing for a short time and then forget it. We enter the cinema hall, see the seat number given on our ticket. After occupying the seat, we forget the seat number. We look up a telephone number from the directory and remember it. But after making the call, we usually forget it. In all cases of a similar nature immediate memory is needed which helps us to learn a thing immediately with speed and accuracy, remembering it for a short time and forgetting it rapidly after use.
Short-Term Memory. This type of memory is also temporary, though not nearly as short-lived as the immediate memory. For further distinguishing it from short-term memory the things given below should also be taken into account:
i) Where the retention time is less than one second in immediate memory, the information temporarily stored up in shortterm memory may endure as long as thirty seconds or so, even if the material is not being rehearsed.
(ii) Whereas the sensory image in immediate memory decays regardless of the learner’s action, rehearsal by the learner can keep material in short-term memory indefinitely.
(iii) The span of immediate memory exceeds the short-term memory span. Whereas five to nine items (‘‘the magical number, seven plus or minus two’’) can be held in shortterm memory at any one time, about eleven to thirteen items are available for recall in immediate memory for at least a half second. However, some people are able to retain much more information in their short-term memories by a process called chunking, which groups information by coding it e.g. the number 143254376 can be remembered by listing under three heads: 143, 254, 376.
Long-Term Memory: Unlike short-term memory, long-term memory has a seemingly limitless capacity to store information, undergoes little or no decay, and requires little, if any, rehearsal. In addition to these characteristics, long-term memory codes informasion according to meaning, pattern and other characteristics. It is this memory that helps us to remember a number of things on a relatively permanent basis. Remembering our identifying data like our name, father’s name, date of birth, date of marriage, etc., is the simplest example of our long-term memory. With the help of our long-term memory we can store, retain and remember at our ease at record notice most of the things in our life and can thus make things in our life quite easy.
The study of memory
The experimental study of memory is done to know the facts about the process and nature of memorization, the individual differences in memory, and learning about the economical methods and best possible outcomes of the process of memorization. Let us discuss the materials, apparatus and techniques used for the studies of memory.
1. Material: Materials used in most experiments on human memory consist of simple verbal materials like serial list, paired associate lists and connected discourse.
2. A serial list is composed words (for example RAT, CAP, TENT, PAINT, etc). or number (e.g. 29, 57, 36, 72, etc.) or meaningless nonsense syllables (e.g. NAL, SOK, PAB, KAZ, etc.)
3. A paired-associate list consists of a series of paired (but not necessarily related) words, digits or non-sense syllables presented sequentially (e.g. CORN-MUSIC, BOX-CAT; FOOD-BOOK, etc).
In the materiat called connected discourse, we may include excerpts of actual blocks of language, either written or spoken. These might be entire sentences, paragraphs or longer passages from any piece of literature or lecture.
Apparatus: Various techniques are used for the presentation of the memorization material before the learner. The experimenter himself may simply read it loud or may use a tape-recorder for this purpose and the subjects may then be required to say or write what they remembered. In most of the experiments, however, the verbal material is presented visually with the help of an instrument called memory drum. For example, the words of a serial list may be presented one at a time for a specified duration through a window-like opening of this drum to be operated systematically. The subjects are asked to recall as many words as possible. The list is presented again and again while the experimenter plots how long and how many trials it takes to learn a task. Recent technological developments have replaced the age-old memory drum apraratus with sophisticated electronic computers.
Measures und Criteria: Memory—good or bad—can be inferred through retentivity and the amount of retention may be measured directly if we know how much material was learnt originally by using the formula:
Amount of Retention=Amount learnt—Amount forgotten.
What is actually retained by the learner can be made known to the experimenter by testing the performance of the learner through reproduction i.e., in terms of recognition and recall. Therefore, tests of recognition and recall make the usual direct measures of one’s retentive power or memory.
Two most commonly used procedures for measuring recognition are tests of simple recognition and multiple-alternative recognition.
In simple recognition tests, the learner may be presented with a photograph or an item to decide whether or not he has seen it before. In a multiple alternate recognition test one has to recognize a particular person or item seen before out of several pictures or items presented to him.
The important methods employed in the measurement of recalls are free recall, probed recall and serial recall.
In free recall methods we ask a subject to recall in any order as many items as possible from the list they have seen or recall anything in any wav from a stanza or poem read. In probed recall, we may provide the subject with a cue for suggesting the appropriate item. For example, in a paired-associate list consisting of a BOX-CAT, we may ask: tell us what word appeared with BOX in the list seen by you? For the items of a serial list, this cue may be in the shape of the location of the item in the list: top, bottom, middle and so forth. In the method of serial recall, we ask the subject to repeat the items in exactly the same order as was previously presented to him during the experiment.
In addition to emploving tests of recognition and recall for measuring one’s retention power; we may employ certain other methods. Two of such important methods devised by the psychologist Ebbinghaus are known as Learning Method and Saving Method.
In the learning method, the subjects are shown a list of verbal material (words or nonsense syllables). They try hard to remember this material by taking the syllables one by one over some trials. After each trial they are required to write down the words or syllables they remembered. The subjects will differ in terms of having more or less trials in learning the lst correctly. One’s power of retention may then be judged in terms of the number of trials required to reproduce a standard list of verbal material (e.g. 12 nonsense syllables like NAL, SOK, BAP, etc., in the Ebbinghaus’s study). The better the retentive power, the less will be the trials required for remembering the complete list.
Saving method comes into the picture after making the subjects learn all the words or syllables correctly after certain trials. The subject may then be given a period of rest. Naturally during this period, they are sure to forget. more or less material. For relearning they are provided with trials. The individuals will differ in requiring more or less trials for such relearning and reproducing the complete list. The number of trials or repetition saved in the second learning (relearning) are then considered as a measure of the power of retention. If, for example, a subject had 10 trials to learn all the 12 non-sense syllables correctly in the first learning and took 7 trials to learn again in the second learning session he had a saving of 3 trials. His retention power will definitely be better than that of another who needed.8 trials again or had only 1 saving, assuming of course, that het had 10 trials in the first learning.
Economy in memorizing
The problem of having economy in memorizing something has persuaded many psychologists to devise various methods of memorization. All these methods aim at pointing out the way of utilizing the available time to best advantage. Some of these methods are described below:
1. Recitation method: In this method the learner first reads the matter once or twice and then tries to recite and recall that without Jooking at that material. In this way, the recitation method provides continuous self-appraisal. The learner evaluates himself from time to time and notes the points which he has been unable to recall. To these points due attention can be paid and thus he is saved from unnecessarily repeating the already memorized material Moreover, the recitation method is more stimulating than the continued rereading of the same material. It helps in detecting errors earlier and avoid them by close attention.
2. Whole and part methods: There are two methods of memorizing a thing. for example take a poem. One is to read the poem again and again from the beginning till the end as a whole. This is called whole method of memorization. In the other method—part method, the poem is divided into parts and each part is memorized separately.
Both these methods have advantages as well as disadvantages. Which of the two would prove suitable and economical depends upon the prevailing conditions and nature of the thing to be memorized. The whole method is found better than the part method in case of memorizing a thing requiring less time, say, a short poem; while the part method proves more advantageous if the poem is a longer one. In some cases a combination of these two methods has been found most suitable. In this combined method, the learner Starts initially by the whole method and tries to locate the areas of difficulty. These difficult portions are attended through the part method. After that the subject once again comes to the whole method and is able to remember it successfully.
3. Spaced and unspaced methods (methods of distributed and massed practice)
In the spaced or distributed practice method of memorization, the subject is not required to memorize the assigned material in one continuous sitting. After memorizing it for some time, some rest is provided and in this way the principle of ‘work and rest’ is followed in this method. For example, if one has to memorize a piece of poetry by this method. then in the beginning he will be advised to go on repeating it. After some time he will be given some rest. Again he will memorize it and take rest. In this way with repeated intervals of work and rest he will be able to have mastery over the assigned piece.
On the other hand, in unspaced or massed practice method of memorization the subject has to memorize the assigned material at one sitting without any interval or rest. Hence in this method the memorization work is done continuously without interruption til it as mastered.
Many experimental studies have beon done to assess the selative value of these two methods. Although in the case of short lessons it has been thought not to have any interval vet in general, the results have been in favour of the spaced method. It has been observed that instead ot working continuously without taking rest, itis better to distribute the hours of work in few sittings and introduce the periods of rest in between these sittings. This helps m removing the monotony caused by long periods of study. Attention also does not flag and fatigue is avoided. Tho subject gets a fresh start after a period of rest and thus his interest can be maintained in the task.
Which of these methods is the best and appropriate is a difficult question to be answered. Definitely, all these above methods are known as economical and can be found fruitful on one of the other occasion. But wecannot say for certain that any method can be necessarily advantageous under all circumstances. In fact the economy an the use of a particular method depends more on the abilities of the individual und the nature and extent of the matenat to be memorized than the method itself. Besides the adoption of a partcular method of memorization there are so many external and internal factors lying within the environment and individual himself which affects the process of memorization and consequently helps or obstructs the progress of an individual on the path of memonzation. Therefore, care should also be taken to secure the appropnate conditions and situations for getting best results in memorization
Training in memory
Whether memory can be improved by training or not is a controversial sssue. But its improvement or training w & Commonly expressed desire on the part of every individual. Every one of us s keen to improve his sense organs and muscles etc. But the improve ment of memory a6 such is not possible In this connectwa the advice given by Mr. Morgan and Gilhtand seems to be quite valueable. They write that Memory training is not like muscle training. You can make a muscle develop by any kind of use. Memory s svt helped by any kind of exercise.” (1942, p. 210).
Therefore, mere repetition of materials for the sake of a memorr zation in the form of mental exercise does not yreld enduring and etfective results. Now again wecome to our basic question—can It be possible through any mean to have some improvement in our memory? If possible, what are the specific. points which should be kept in mind io order to achieve best results in the task of memorization?
As emphasized earlier, memory consists of four factors—learning, retention, recognition and recall. Improvement in any one or more of the constituents is likely to improve the memory as a whole. Therefore, the question regarding the improvement of memory, for its logical answer can be broken into the following four questions.
Can learning be improved ?
Can the power of retention be improved ?
Can recall be improved ? and lastly,
Can recognition be improved ?
Let us try to answer these questions.
For the retention it is said that it is, by all means, native and inherited and therefore, cannot be improved by training. At the most we can try to protect retentiveness by some hygienic measures but it is hardly possible to improve it by trainimg. In the case of “recognition” also it is difficult to say whether it can be improved by training as it happens to be a very prompt and spontaneous act.
The remaining two constituents—learning and recall, have been observed to be improved by training. Let us see how theycan be improved. First of all we will consider the improvement of recall. The following suggestions may bring fruitful results in this direction:
1. While trying to recall something, have yourself free from excessive anxiety, fear and other emotional factors that try to block memory.
2. Never think that you would not be able to recall something. Have confidence in yourself. Be quite normal and avoid nervousness. After that, apply your energies to the task of recalling with full concentration.
3. Remember that association of ideas, connection and systematic thinking, help very much in the task of recalling. For example, if you need to recall the place where you put the key of your lock, then try to think systematically by seeking help from the principle of association. Where was I just before this time, What was I doing, Oh, I was taking my bath, sol may have put it in the cup-board of me bath room; andso on, you can ultimately recall the exact plaoe.
4. Do not engage yourself in fighting to recall a thing for a long time. If you find it difficult to recall, then give it up for the timebeing and attempt it afresh, after you have relaxed for some time.
After having given due consideration to the process of recall we come to the most important factor of memory i.e., learning. Improvement of memory to a large extent rests upon this factor which can be improved by training. Now, how can learning be improved? In trying to answer this question, we come to the conclusion that improvement in the task of learning or memorizing demands the necessary improvements in:
(i) the techniques and methods of Jearning. (ii) the learning situations and environment. (iii) the learner's state of mind
Improvement in all these aspects demands a lot of seriousness on the part of a learner. The following suggestions can prove helpful in this direction:
I. Will to learn: There must be firm determination or strong will to learn in order to achieve success. Where there is a will there is a way. Materials read, heard or seen without the mood to concentrate are difficult to remember later on.
2. Interest and attention: Interest as well as close attention are essential for effective learning and memorization. One who has no interest in what one learns, cannot give due attention to it and consequently will not be able to Jearn it. Mr. Bhatia emphasizes this fact in the following words:
“Interest is the mother of attention and attention is the mother of memory; if you would secure memory. vou must first catch the mother and the grandmother.” (1964. p. 194)
Therefore, every care should be taken to create the desired interest in material by making its purpose clear and linking it with one’s natural instincts and urges. Again all the factors causing distraction should be reduced to a minimum so that full attention can be paid to the material in hand.
3. Adopting proper methods of memorization: There are So many economical methods of memorization but all are not suitable on all occasions for all individuals. Therefore a judicious selection should be made in choosing a particular method in a given situation.
4. To follow principle of Association: It is always good to follow the principle of association in learning. A thing should never be learnt ina complete water-tight compartment. Attempts should be made to connect it with one’s previous learning on the one hand and with so many related things on the other. Sometimes for association of ideas special techniques and devices are used that facilitate learning and recall. The letter VIBGYOR has proved an effective aid in remembering the colours of the spectrum. In a similar way many associations may be formed and material to be learned can be easily remembered.
5. Grouping and Rhythm: Grouping and Rhythm also facilitate learning and help in remembering. For example a telephone no. 567345234 can be easily memorized and recalled if we try ta group it as 567 345 234.
Similarly, rhythm also proves as an aid in learning and memorizing. Children learn effectively the multiplication tables in the sing song fashion. The arrangement of the material in the form of a verse with rhythm and rhyme is found very useful in this direction. As an illustration the following verse is worth quoting:
Thirty days has September, April, June, and November, All the rest have thirty-one, Excepting February alone,
To which they twenty-eight assign, Till leap year gives it twenty-nine.
6. Utilizing as many senses as possible: Senses are said to be the gateways of knowledge and it has also been found that things are better learned and remembered when presented through more than one of the senses. Therefore attempts should be made to take the help of audio-visual aid material and receive impressions through as many Senses as possible.
7. Arranging better learning situations: Environmental factors also effect the learning process. Therefore, due care should be taken to arrange better learning situation and environment. A calm and quiet atmosphere and stimulating environment proves effective when learning.
8. Internal factors within the learner: Besides the external factors there are the things within the learner which affects his learning and reproduction. His physical and mental health and environmental state of his mind atthe time of learning as well as reproduction counts a Jot to improve his memory. Therefore, due attention should be given to the improvement of student’s health-physical as well as mental. Their emotions should also be trained and emotional tensions should be removed as far as possible.
9. Provision for change and proper rest: Adequate provision for change of work, rest and sleep should be made as it helps in remove ing fatigue and monotony. A fresh mind is necessarily able to learn more and retain it for a long time than a tired and dull one.
10. Repetition and Practice: Last but not least is the repetition and continuous practice which adds to effective memorization. An intelligent repetition with full understanding always helps in making learning effective and enduring. The things repeated and practised frequently are remembered for a long time. Therefore due care should be taken for drill work, practice and review etc., in the process of memorization and learning.
What is forgetting?
As a matter of lame-excuse we often hear the comments “Excuse me. I have really forgotten it.” A student complains and repents over forgetting the material he remembered. A house-wife feels ashamed of her forgetting when she forgets to add salt in the vegetable cooked. Therefore, in general, the term forgetting seems to be a part Of our day-to-day speech. But in order to be more specific and scientific in our approach, let us study’ some of the definitions given by eminent writers-
I. Munn. ‘Forgetting is the loss, permanent or temporary, of the ability to recall or recognize something learned earlier.” (1967 p. 425).
2. Drever. “Forgetting means failure at any time to recall an experience, when attempting to do so, or to pertorim an action previously learned.’’4 1952, p. 99).
3. Bhatia. “‘Forgetting is the failure of the individual to revive in consciousness 2n tea or group af ideas without the help of the Original stimulus.” (1968, p. 203).
In all these definitions, forgetting is termed as failure. Let us see how it affects the failure of an individual.
The power of long retention and rapid reproduction (recall and recognition) makes a good memory. It counts towards the success of an individual in the task of learning or memorizing. Forgetting on the other hand, counts towards the’ failure. ‘I have forgotten implies that I have failed to retain or to be able to recall what was learned or experienced by me earlier.’ In ‘this way forgetting is just the opposite side of remembering and essentially a failure in the ability of reproducing.
Ebbinghaus's curve of forgetting.
The studies made by the psychologist Ebbinghaus (1885) present the earliest systematic work in studying the phenomenon of forgetting. He himself worked as a subject for the studies and described his results by sketching a curve of forgetting.
What he did was memorize a list of his nonsense syllables and then test himself at intervals from 20 minutes to a month to see how much of the list he remembered. The results in terms of the percentage of material forgotten with the lapse’ of time were found in the following order:
Time elapsed
Amount forgotten
20 minutes
47%
One day
66%
2 days
72%
6 days
75%
31 days
79%
The curve obtained on the graph paper by plotting the amount forgotten asa function of time was named by him as curve of for gettirg. Through his experimental data and the presentation in the form if the above curve of forgetting, Ebbinghaus concluded that:
(i) amount of learnt material forgotten depends upon the time lapsed after learning, and
(ii) the rate of forgetting is very rapid at first and then gradually diminishes proportionately as the interval lengthens.
Types of forgetting
There are certain types of forgetting and these may be described in a number of ways based on its nature and functioning. In one way, it is classified as Natural and Morbid forgetting. In Natural forgetting, forgetting occurs with the lapse of time in a quite normal way without any intention of forgetting on the part of the individual whereas in Morbid or abnormal forgetting one deliberately tries to forget something. This type of forgetfulness, as Freud explains, results from repression and is wishful as one happens to forget the things which he does not wish to remember.
According to some other view, forgetting may be classified as general or specific. In general forgetfulness one suffers a total loss in one’s recalling some previous learning while in specific forgetfulness the individual forgets only one or the other specific part of bis earlier learning.
Still another view related to the cause of occurring, classifies forgetfulness as physical or psychological. In case one loses his memory on account of the factors of age, diseases, biological mal-functioning of the braia and nervous system, accidents, consumption of liquor or other intoxicating materials, etc., it is said to be physical or organic forgetting. But, in case, loss of memory occurs due to psychological factors like stress, anxiety, conflicts, temper provocation, lack of interest, aversion, apathy, repression or similar other emotional and psychic difficulties, the resulting forgetfulness is termed as psychological.
Theories of forgetting
As to the nature and types of forgetting, it occurs universally, to a lesser or greater extent, with all human beings. How and why it does happen, has been a subject of extensive research and investigation resulting in a number of theories. Some of the main theories are described below in brief.
The trace decay theory: According to many psychologists, time is the cause of much forgetting. What is learnt or experienced is forgotten with the lapse of time. The cause of such natural forgetting can be explained through a process known as decay of the memory trace. It says that learning results in neurological changes leaving certain types of memory traces or engrams in the brain. With the passage of time through disuse, these memory traces of learning impressions get weaker and weaker and finally fade away. It leads us to conclude that the older an experience, the weaker its memory and as time passes, the amount of forgetting goes on increasing.
The experimental results as well as day-to-day functioning in the field of learning and remembering have come in the way of the validity of the above mentioned trace decay theory. Thus the theory has proved a failure in many instances of forgetting in long-term memory such as learning to ride a bicycle where forgetting does not occur even after years of neglect. Similarly, the trace decay theory through its disuse mechanism has proved a failure in explaining morbid or abnormal forgetting. However, this theory has provided good results in explaining forgetfulness in the case of short-term memory. Drill, practice, rehearsal or repetition of a learning always results in preventing decay. The reverse is also true as reading a poem one, for example, without repeating it or thinking about it, is likely to result in the death of his memory trace before coding in long-term memory can occur.
The interference theory: The second major theory of forgetting holds the mechanism of interference responsible for forgetting. Interference is caused on account of the negative inhibiting effects of one learning experience on another. We forget things because of such interference. The interfering effects of things previously learnt and retained in our memory with the things of our recent memory can work both ways, backward and forward. The psychological term used for these types of interference are retroactive inhibition and proactive inhibition.
In Retroactive inhibition the acquisition of new learning works backward to impair the retention of the previously learned material. For example a second list of words, formulae or equation may impair the retention of a first list. Proactive inhibition is just the reverse of retroactive inhibition. Here the old learning or experiences retained in our memory works forward to disrupt the memory of what we acquire or learn afterwards. For example, one may experience great difficulty in learning a second language when vocabulary from the first interferes or learning a new formula may be hampered on account of the previously learned formulae in one’s memory.
In both types of the above inhibitions, it can be easily seen that similar experiences when they follow each other produce more interference than dissimilar experiences. Because in this case all experiences are so intermingled that a state of utter confusion prevails in the mind of an individual and consequently he faces a difficulty in retention and recall.
Interference, theory as a whole has been proved quite successful in providing adequate explanation for natural and normal forgetting for both the short-term and long term memory. However, for explaining the cases of abnormal or morbid forgetting we should search for some other explanation.
The Repression theory: The explanation for the abnormal or morbid forgetting may be given with the help of the repression theory as put forward by the Freud’s psychoanalytic school of psychology. Repression, according to this school, is a mental function that safeguards the mind from the impact of paintul experiences. As a result of this function we actually push the unpleasant and painful memories into the unconscious and thus try to avoid at least consciously the conflicts that bother us. This kind of forgetfulness ts well motivated and intentional. We usually intend to see ourselves and to some extent, the world around us as quite pleasant and reasonable. The memories that are in harmony with this view are acceptable to us, but those that oppose it are often blotted out and this explains why our forgetting like attention, is selective. Thus as a result of the repression we forget the things which we do not want to remember. We forget about our dearest relatives and friends who are dead and gone. We forget to attend a marriage party which we do not want to attend. Similarly, most of us tend to forget the names of the people we do not like. In such forgetting we can come across some serious mental cases. People under a heavy emotional shock are seen to forget n their names, homes, wives and children.
Apart from causing abnormal forgetting, an impaired emotional behaviour of an individual does also play its part in disrupting his normal memory process. For example a sudden rise of emotions in excess may completely block the process or recall. When one is taken over by emotions like fear, anger or love, one may forget all he has experienced. learned or thought before hand. During these emotions
one becomes so self-conscious that his thinking is paralysed. That is why a child fails to recal! the answer toa question in the presence of a teacher whom he fears very much. Similarly, many of us cannot do well before the interview board or in an examination due to interview or test phobia. An actor, orator or musician may also fail miserably in his performance on the stage as he becomes panicky and forgets his prepared dialogue, speech or art.
SUMMARY
Memory refers toa special ability of our mind to conserve or retain what has been previously experienced or acquired through learning and then at some later stage to enable us to make use of it by its reproduction or revival (in the form of recall or recognition).
Human memory can be classified into certain types like immediate memory, shor-term memory and long-term memory. Immediate memory or sensory memory helps an individual to recall something a split second after having perceived it. It has an extremely brief retention time (i.e. trom a fraction of a second to severa] seconds). Short term memory is also temporary, though not nearly as short lived as immediate memory. Here the time of retention may endure upto thirty seconds and may so be further increased through rehearsal. Long-term memory, unlike short-term memory, has a seemingly limitless capacity to store information, undergoes little or no decay, and requires little if any rehearsal. It is also able to code information according to meaning, pattern and other characteristics.
For performing experiments to study memory one needs the use of simple verbal materials in the form of serial list, paired associate list and connected discourse. For the visual presentation of memorizing verbal material an apparatus named memory drum is generally employed in laboratories. The material can be exhibited through the window-like opening df the drum to be operated systematically. Memory—good or bad—can be inferred through the amount actually retained by the learner which in turn can be directly measured through some tests of recognition and recall. Special methods like learning and saving methods devised by Ebbinghaus may also be used for this purpose.
Economy in memorizing may be achieved by utilising proper methods of memorization like recitation method in place of ccntinued re-reading of the same material. Similarly, one has to make a judicious choice out of the whole v/s part methods and distributed v/s massed practice methods.
Training in memory aims to achieve a good memory. We can bring improvement in our recall process by freeing ourselves from harmful emotional factors, build our self-confidence and make use of different associations with a cool and patient mind. Moreover, proper memorization always results in long retention and easy reproduction. Therefore, the factors like learner’s will, his interest and attention,
learning methods, utilization of the principle of association, grouping and rhythm, suitable learning environment, repetition and practice, emotional and mental state of the learner, etc., always need to be attended carefully for getting better results of the process of memorization.
Forgetting is the temporary or long-term loss in our ability to reproduce the things that have been previously learned. Depending upon its nature and intensity, it may be classified as natural and morbid (abnormal), general and specific, physical and psychological.
The psychologist Ebbinghaus is known to be the first man to do an experimental study of forgetting. He put the results of his study on the graph paper by plotting the amount forgotten as a function of
time elapsed. The curve so obtained was named as “‘curve of forgetting’’.
Natural forgetting can be properly cxplained through the theory of Trace decay which holds that we forget on account of decay of the memory traces with the lapse of time.
The repression theory is held better in explaining morbid forgetting. According to this theory, we forget the thing, we do not want to remember by pressing them in our unconscious mind.
The theory of interference is able to explain all types of forgetting. According to this theory, we forget things because of the interference of other things. Proactive inhibition occurs when earlier learning interferes with the Jater learning. Retro-active inhibition is the result of later learning coming in the way of earlier learning.
References and Suggested Readings
Adams, J.A., Learning and Memory: An Introduction, Homewood, Ulinois: Dorsey Press, 1976.
Bartlett, F.C., Remembering: A Study in Experimental and Social Psychology, New York: Cambridge, 1932.
Bhatia, H.R., Elements of Ecucational Psychology (3rd Indian reprint) Calcutta: Orient Longman, 1968.
Cermak, L.S., Human Memory—Research and Theory, New York: Ronald Press, 1972.
Collins. M and James, Drever (Ed.), Experimental Psychology, London: Methuen,
Deese, J. & Hulse, S.H., The Psychology of Learning (3rd ed.) New York: McGraw Hill, 1967 (Chapter 8—111).
Drever, James, A Dictionary of Psychology, Middlesex: Penguin Books, 952. Ebbinghaus, H , On Memory, New York: Dover, 1964,
Higbee, K.L., Your Memory: How it works and How to Improve it, Eaglewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1977.
Hunter, lan M.R., Memory, London: Penguin Books, 1964.
Klatsky, R.L., Human Memory, San Francisco: Freeman, 1976. Levin. M.., Psychology A Biographical Approach, New York: McGraw-Hill,
Morgan, J.B.. and Gilliland, A.R., Aa Introducti ; Macmillan, 1942. roduction to Psychology, New York:
Mung N.L.. An Introduction to Psychology (2nd Ed.) Delhi: Oxford & IBH,
Ryburn, W.M., Introduction to Educational Psychology (Reprint . University Press, 1956. vchology (Reprint) London: Oxferd
Skinner, B.F., Verbal Behaviour, New York: Appleton Century, Crofts, 1957.
Stout, G.E., A Manual of Psychology, London: University Tutorial Press, 1938.
Wickelgren, W.A., Learning and Memory, Engl ; . Prentice-Hall, 1977. J emory, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey:
Woodworth, R.S., and Marquis, D.G., P. . . Holt, 1948. qui sychology (5th ed.) New York: Henry
Chapter 14
INTELLIGENCE
In our day to-day conversation we often comment that a parti‘cular child or individual is very intelligent or possesses more or less intelligence. Our all such comments are based on the observation of the performance or. behaviour of the individual concerned prefer ably in comparison with others of his own group. The question arises what makes an individual behave or perform so well or poorly. No doubt interest, attitude, desired knowledge skill and similar other attributes count toward such performance or behaviour but still there is something left that can weigh more. In psychology the term used is intelligence. In ancient India our great rishis named it Viveka.
Defining intelligence
Intelligence as a concept has been understood in different ways by the different psychologists and consequently there stands a wide variety of definitions. Let us start with the reproduction of a few.
Woodworth and Marquis: “‘Intelligence means intellect put to use. It is the use of intellectual abilities for handling a situation or accomplishing any task.”’ (1948, p. 33)
Stern: “‘Intelligence is a general capacity of an individual consciously to adjust his thinking to new requirements. It is general mental adaptability to new problems and conditions of life.”’ (1914, p. 3).
Terman: “‘An individual is intelligent in proportion as he is able to carry on abstract thinking.” (1921).
Wagnon: “Intelligence is the capacity to learn and adjust to relatively new and changing conditions.”’ (1937, p. 401).
Thorndike: Intelligence may be defined as “the power of good responses from the point of view of truth or fact.’’ (1914).
Apart from the above given definitions, more of such definitions can further be cited. All these definitions, when taken separately, give an incomplete picture because they partly emphasize that:
– intelligence is the ability to learn.
—it is the ability to deal with abstraction.
— it is the ability to make adjustment or to adapt to new situations.
—it is the ability or power of making appropriate responses ta certain stimuli in a given situation.
In view of the weaknesses of the existing definitions, David Wechsler, author of the adult intelligence test, tried to providea somewhat comprehensive definition of the term intelligence by saying that ““Intelligence is the aggregate or global capacity of an individual to act purposefully, to think rationally, and to deal effectively with his environment.”’ (1944, p. 3). In his further attempt Wechsler also provided a criterion for defining intelligent behaviour in terms of the four characteristics 1.e., intelligence involves awareness, it is goaldirected, it is rational, and it has value. Taking the cue from this. criterion Stoddard tried to define intelligence as “the ability to undertake activities that are difficult, complex and abstract and which are adaptive to a goal, and are done quickly and which have social value and which lead to the creation of something new and different.” (1943, p. 4).
However, both these so-called comprehensive definitions have also come under severe criticism due to difference of opinion among psychologists.
However, leaving aside the nature of the terminology and language used in defining intelligence, there seems to be some agreement among the psychologists as below:
—Intelligence must be understood as the mental capacity or mental energy available with an individual at a particular time in a particular situation.
—This mental capacity helps him in the task of theoretical as well as practical manipulation of the things, objects or events present in one’s environment in order to adapt or face new challenges and problems of life as successfully as possible.
—Judgment about one’s capacity or fund of mental energy available with him can only be considered in terms of the quality of his behaviour or performance.
Keeping in view all these basic factors, we may have some workable definition of the term intelligence as under:
Intelligence may be regarded as a sort of mental energy (in the form of mental or cognitive abilities) available with an individual to enable him to handle his environment in terms of adaptation and facing novel situations as effectively as possible.
Evaluating on the basis of the above workable definition we can call a person intelligent in proportion to his being able to use his mental energy in handling his actual life problems and leading a happy and well contented life.
Theories of intelligence
With the help of definitions, we are able to understand how intelligence operates—what type of behaviour of an individual makes him intelligent or unintelligent. But it does not explain what is the structure of intelligence or in other words, what are the different components or, elements of intelligence. The theories of intelligence propagated by psychologists from time to time have tried to answer this question. Below we examine some of these theories:
1. Unitary theory or monarchic theory. This theory, oldest in origin, holds the view that intelligence consists of one factor namely a fund of intellectual competence, which is universal for all the activities of the individual.
A man who has vigour can move as much to the east as to the west. In a similar way if one has a fund of intelligence he can utilize It to cover any area of his life and can be as successful in one area asin the other depending upon his fund of intelligence. But in actual life situations, the ideas propagated by this theory do not seem to fit well. We find that children who are bright in mathematics may, despite serious interest and hard work, not be so good in Civics. A student very good in conducting science experiments does not find himself equally competent in learning languages. This brings us to the conclusion that there is nothing like one single unitary factor in intelligence. Therefore the unitary theory stands rejected.
2. Anarchic theory or multifactor theory: The main propagator of this theory was E.L. Thorndike. As the name suggests, this theory, also named as atomistic theory of intelligence, considers intelligence a combination of numerous separate elements of factors, each one being a minute element of an ability. So there is no such thing as general intelligence (a single factor) but there are many highly independent specific abilities which go into different tasks.
In this way Monarchic and Anarchic theories hold two extremes. Just as We cannot assume good intelligence a guarantee of success in all the fields of human life so also we cannot say which certain specific type of abilities one will be entirely successful in a particular area and completely unsuccessful in another. Actually Gardner Murphy puts it, “there isa certain positive relationship between brightness in one field and brightness in another and so on.” (1968, p. 358). This brings us to the conclusion that there should be a common factor running through all tasks. The failure to explain such phenomenon gave birth to another theory named Spearman’s two factor theory.
3. Spearman's two factor theory: This theory was advocated by Spearman. According to him every different intellectual activity involves a general factor ‘g’ which is shared with all intellectual activities and a specific factor ‘s’ which it shares with none. In this way, he suggested that there is something which might be called general intelligence—a sort of general mental energy, running,
through all different tasks but in addition to this general factor there are specific abilities, which make an individual able to deal with particular kinds of problems. For example, an individual’s performance in Hindi is partly due to his general intelligence and partly to some kind of specific ability in language which he might possess i.e. g+s1 Or in mathematics his performance will be due to g+s2; in drawing it will be due to g+s3 and so on and so forth. The factor g (in lesser or greater degree) will enter in all specific activities. The total ability or intelligence of such an individual (symbolized as A), thus, will be expressed by the following: g+s1 +s2 + s3+ ....=A
This two-factor theory of Spearman has been criticized on various grounds. The main reasons are given below:
(i) Spearman said that there are only two factors expressing intelligence but as we have seen above there are not only two but several factors (g, s1, s2, s3.... etc.).
(ii) According to Spearman each job requires some specific ability. This view was not proper as it implied that there was nothing common in the jobs except a general factor and professions such as those of nurses, compounders and doctors could not be put in a group. In fact the factors s1, s2, s3, so4....etc., are not mutually exclusive. They overlap and give birth to certain common factors.
This idea of overlapping and grouping consequently led to a new theory called Group Factor theory.
4. Group factor theory: For the factors not common to all of the intellectual abilities, but common to certain activities comprising a group, the term ‘group factor’ was suggested. Prominent among the propagators of this theory is L.L. Thurstone an American psychologist. While working on a test of primary mental abilities. he came to the conclusion that certain mental operations have in common a primary factor which gives them psychological and functional unity and which differentiates them from other mental oferations. These mental operations constitute a group factor. So there are a number of groups of mental abilities each of which has its own primary factor. Thurstone and his associates have differentiated nine such factors. They are.
(i) Verbal factor (V); concerns comprehension of verbal relations, words and ideas.
(ii) Spatial factor (S): involved in any task in which the subject . manipulates an object imaginatively in space.
(iii) Numerical factor (N): ability to do numerical calculations, rapidly and accurately.
(iv) Memory factor (M): involving the ability to memorize quickly.
(v) Word Fluency Factor (W): involved whenever the subject is asked to think of the isolated words at a rapid rate.
vi) Inductive reasoning factor (RI): ability to draw inferences on conclusions on the basis of specific instances.
(vii) Deductive reasoning factor (RD): ability to make use of generalized results.
(viii) Perceptual factor (P): ability to perceive objects accurately.
(ix) Problem-solving ability factor (PS): ability to solve problems with independent efforts.
The weakest link in the group factor theory was that it discarded the concept of common factor. [t did not take Thurstone very long to realise his mistake and to reveal a general factor in addition to group factors.
5. This theory was propagated by G.H. Thompson, a British psychologist. It assumes that the mind is made up of many independent bonds or elements. Any specific test-or school activity samples some of these bonds. It is possible that two or more tests sample and utilize some bonds, then a general common factor can be said to exist among them. It is also possible that some other tests sample different bonds, then the tests have nothing in common and each is specific.
The sampling theory seems to combine various theoretical viewpoints as:
(i) It appears to be similar to Thorndike’s multifactor theory except that he concedes to the practical usefulness of a concept like ‘g’.
(ii) At the same time Thompson seems to maintain that the concept of group factor (G) is of equal practical usefulness.
Vernon’s Hierarchical Theory: British psychologist P.E. Vernon
suggested a hierarchical structure for the organisation of one’s intelligence.
Consequently, as Vernon (1950) suggested we could think of mind as a kind of hierarchy where ‘G’ is the most prominent mental ability. (i.e. an overall factor measured through intelligence tests). Under ‘G’ we have two major group factors, called Ved and KM, representing two main types of mental abilities. Where the first major group factor, Ved, is concerned with the verbal numerical and educational abilities, the other major group factor KM is related with practical, mechanical, spatial and physical abilities. These two major factors can be divided into minor group factors and ultimateiy these minor factors may be further sub-divided into various specific factors related with minute specific mental abilities.
Guilford's theory involving a model of intellect
J. P. Guilford and his associates while working in the psychological Jaboratory at the University of Southern California developed a model of intelligence on the basis of the factor analytical research studies conducted by them with the help of a number of intelligence tests. They arrived at the conclusion that every mental process or intellectual activity can be described in terms of three different basic dimensions or parameters known as Operations—the act of thinking; contents—the terms in which we think (such as words or symbols); and products—the ideas we come up with (Guilford, 1961).
Each of these parameters—operations, contents and productscan be further sub-divided into some specific factors or elements as described below:
I operations
Il contents
lll products
Evaluation E
Convergent thinking C
Divergent thinking D
Memory C
Cognition C
Figural factor (F) ( i.e. concrete material perceived through senses.
Symbolic (S) ( i.e. material in the form of sign and symbols
Semantic M (i.e. material in the form of verbal meaning or ideas)
Units U
Classes C
Relation R
System S
Transformation T
Implication I
The above classification in terms of the parameters and specific factors can be represented diagrammatically as given on the next article.
In this way, according to the model of intellect presented by Guilford, structure of human intelligence can be viewed in terms of the three basic parameters along with their divisions into specific number of factors. There could be 4x 5x 6=120 factors in all which may constitute the human intelligence. Each one of these factors has trigram symbol i.e., at least one factor from each category of the three parameters must be necessarily present in any specific intellectual activity or mental task.
Conclusion about theories of intelligence
Each of the above theories of intelligence tries to provide a Structure of intelligence in terms of its constituents or factors in its own way. The Unitary theory is right in claiming that intelligence in its functional form is always used as a whole in the form of a total fund of mental energy. However, for understanding what works inside one’s intelligence we must try to build an eclectic view by mcorporating the essence of all the workable theories of intelligence. Consequently, any intellectual activity or mental task may be adjudged to involve the factors given below. These factors could be arranged in hierarchical order as suggested by Vernon or in the form of some model as designed by Guilford.
(i) General factor g (common to all tasks) as advocated by Spearman in his two factor theory.
(ii) Group factor “G’ (common to the tasks belonging to a specific group) as advocated by Thurstone and others in the Group factor theory.
(iii) Specific factors s,, s2, etc. (Very specific to the task as advocated by Thorndike in his multifactor theory).
Nature of intelligence
The problem regarding the identification of the true nature of intelligence can be solved by taking into consideration the different aspects given below:
— Defining intelligence for the understanding of its meaning.
—Discussing vatious theories explaining its structure in terms of various Constitutes or factors.
—Describing various other aspects and characteristics related to intelligence and its functioning.
We have already covered the first two points, above in the present chapter, let us now concentrate briefly on the last point through the headings mentioned below:
The effect of heredity and environment on intelligence
The relative importance of nature and nurture has been investigated by different sociologists and psychologists. The conclusion of their studies reveals that intelligence is the product of heredity and environment. Both are necessary for the intellectual growth of an individual, and one cannot be considered more essential than the other.
Distribution of Intelligence: The distribution of intelligence is not uniform among the human beings. It resembles the distribution of health, wealth, beauty and similar otber characteristics. It is a normal distribution that is governed by a definite principle which states that the majority of the people are at the average, a few very bright and a few very dull.
Individual Difference in intelligence: There exists wide individual differences among individuals with regard to intelligence. Truly speaking, no one of us even the identical twins or the individuals nurtured almost in similar environments have equal amount of mental energy flowing inthem. The assessment of intelligence through various tests has given us enough ground to believe that not only the intelligence varies from individual to individual but in the same individual from age to age and Situation to situation.
Intelligence and Changes in age: As the child grows in age, so does the intelligence as shown by intelligence tests. Now the question arises—at what age does this increase cease? The age of cessation of mental growth varies from individual to individual. However in a majority of cases, intelligence reaches its maximum, somewhat at the age of 16 to 20 in the individual. After that the vertical growth of intelligence ceases. But the horizontal growth—accumulation of knowledge and acquisition of skills—continues throughout the lifespan of an iodividual.
Intelligence and Sex differences. Various studies have been conducted to find out whether women are less mtelligent than men and vice versa. The result of these researches hanes in one way or the other. In some of the cases no significant difference has been found. Therefore, it is proper to think that difference in sex does not ¢ontribute towards difference in intelligence,
Intelligence and racial or cultural differences: Whether a particular race, caste, or cultural group is superior to another in intelligencethe hypothesis has been examined by so many research workers. In the U.S A. it has been a burning problem for centuries. Tho results of earlier studies which take the Whites to be a superior race in comparison with the Negroes have been questioned. Now it has been established that intelligence is not the birthright of a particular race or group. The ‘bright’ and ‘dull’ can be found in any race, caste or cultural group and the differences which are found can be explained in terms of environmental influences.
Assessment of intelligence
We are familiar only with that intelligence of an individual which is manifested by him through an intelligence test or tests. Psychologists have devised so many such tests for the measurement of intelligence. However, the term assessment, is preferred to be used in place of measurement as measurement of intelligence is not possible im the same way as we use the term measurement in measuring a piece of cloth or temperature of our body. In is because. intelligence in all its meaning and application is not a thing, it is only an idea, an abstraction. Therefure, we can only have its assessment and not the measurement in physical terms. Moreover, in the case of measuring intelligence we cannot have such absolute scales as are otherwise available for measuring physical entities i.e., piece of cloth or temperature. Here as Griffiths observes “‘the standard of measurement is a group performance’”’ (1983, p. 138). Therefore, when we measure intelligence of an individual with the help of an intelligence test we try to interpret the resulting score in the light of the norms established (group performance) by the author of the test. In this way one’s intelligence is determined relatively to the classified group to which he belongs. So where in the case of a piece of cloth absolute measurement is possible, we have relative measurement in the case of intelligence measurement.
Classification of intelligence tests
1. As far as the administrative point of view is concerned the intelligence tests can be classified into two broad categories namely:
(A) Individual tests: In which only one individual is tested at a time.
(B) Group tests: Ia which a group of individuals is tested at the same time.
2. Another way of classifying the intelligence tests is based on the form of the test. Accordingly there are two types of tests:
(2.1) Verbal Test or Language tests
(2.2) Non-verbal tests or Non-Lauguage tests
(a) Verbal or Language tests: These tests make use of language. Here the instructions are given in words (either in written or oral form or both). Individuals are required to uSe language as well us paper and pencil for giving the responses. The test content is loaded with verbal material.
(b) Non-Verbal and Non-Language tests: These tests involve such activities in which the use of language is not necessary. The use of language is eliminated from test content and response except in giving directions.
The typical examples of such non-verbal tests are Performance Tests. The principal characteristics of these are given below:
(i) Test contents of these tests are in the form of material objects.
(ii) What an individual has to do is indicated by the tester either through oral instructions or by pantomime or signs,
(iti) Individual’s responses depend upon what he does or performs rather than by anything he says or writes.
(iv) Generally these tests are individual tests. As Dr. Pillai observes, “These cannot be used as group tests, chiefly because it is necessary to supervise the individual testee at work and give him necessary direction.”
If we try to have a final picture of all types of tests in intelligence we will have to keep in view both the ways of classifying them as mentioned above. All these types of intelligence tests can be represented diagrammatically as follows:
Intelligence test
1. Individual test
A. Verbal test
B. Performance test ( a typical form of nonverbal test)
2. Group test
A verbal test
B. Non-verbal test
Individual verbal tests
The tests involving the use of language and administered to an individual at a time belong to this category. As an example, of such tests we can quote Stanford-Binet Scale. It is the revised form of the original Binet-Simon test. Actually, French Psychologist, Alfred Binet is the father of intelligence tests construction movement. He, along with Theodore Simon prepared a test as early as in 1905, consisting of 30 items (arranged in order of increasing difficulty) graded for different levels. The.test included such items as:
At age 3 —Point out to nose, eyes and mouth. At age 7—Tell what is missing in the unfinished picture.
In 1931, the first American revision of this test was published by Terman at Standford University and in 1937 another revision was carried on with the help of Maud A. Merril. This as well as 1960's revision is called the Stanford Binet Scale and widely used as an individual intelligence test.
The tests in this scale are grouped into age levels, extending from age 2 to 22 years. The tasks to be performed by the testee in these various tests range from simple manipulation to abstract reasoning.
Binet Tests have been adopted in India too. The first such attempt was made by Dr. C.H. Rice in 1922 when he published his “‘Hindustan: Binet Performance Point Scale’. This was an adaptation of the Binet test along with some performance tests in addition. The State Man ovigyan Shala of Uttar Pradesh has made a Hindi Version of Standford Binet test. This test is divided into several age-groups and named as Budhi Pariksha Anooshilan.
The other common Verbal Individual Intelligence test (used in India) is Samanya Budhi Pariksha (Pt. 1 and 2). This test is an Indian adaptation of the well known test of William Stephenson. It has been prepared by State Bureau of Educational and Vocational Guidance, Gwalior (M.P.)
Individual performance tests
As mentioned earlier, the complete non-verbal or non-language tests of intelligence for testing an individual one at a time come into this classification. In these tests the contents and responses are in the form of performance and language is not used at all. In these tests the items which require responses in terms of motor activities are included. Generally the activities, on which the performance of an individual is tested are of the following types:
(i) Block building or cube construction: Where the subject is asked to make a structure or design by means of blocks or cubes supplied to him. The examples of the tests, involving such type of activities are Merril Palmer Block Building, Koh’s Block Design Test, Alexander’s Pass-along test, etc.
(ii) To fit the blocks in the holes: Test material of such types provides numerous blocks and a board in which there are holes corresponding to these blocks. The subjéct has to fit the blocks in these corresponding holes (in the board). Examples are Seguin Form Board Test and Goddard Form Board Test.
(iii) Tracing a maze: Test material consists of a series of mazes of increasing difficulty, each printed on a separate sheet. The subject is required to trace with pencil, the path from entrance to exit. Porteus Maze Test is an example involving such type of activities.
(iv) Picture arrangement or picture completion. In picture arrangement tests the task is to arrange in series the given pictures whereas in picture completion test the subject is required to complete the picture with the help of given pieces cut out of each picture. ‘The Healy pictorial completion test is a good example of such test which provides a good estimate of the intelligence of the subject without making use of language.
As seen above, these tests try to lay stress on one or the other types of performance. Instead of using one or two tests a group of performance tests, organised either into a scale or battery, are used for a comprehensive picture of an individual’s mental ability. Some of the popularly known scales are:
(i) The Pinter Patterson Scale.
(ii) The Arthur Point Scale.
(iii) Alexander’s Battery of Performance Tests.
The Pinter Patterson Scale: This scale quite popular in U.S.A., was designed in 1917 mainly for use with deaf children and with linguistically backward children. It is quite a comprehensive scale which includes 15 sub-tests: Mare, Foal Picture Board, Seguin Form Board, the Five Figure Board, the Two Figure Board, the Casuist Board, the Triangle Test, the Diagonal Test, the Healy Form Board, Puzzle Test, Manikin Test, the Feature Profiletest, the Adaptation Board, and the Cube Test. The performance on this scale is timed and the marks are given for the performance which are added up and compared with the established norms given ip the manual to interpret the subject’s general intelligence.
The Arthur’s Point Scale: This scale has been developed by Madam Grace Arthur by adopting a point scale rather than the median mental age for the method of scoring. Its new revised version includes the following sub-tests:
(i) Know cubes.
(ii) Seguin Form Board.
(iii) Two Form Figure Board.
(iv) Casuist Form Board,
(v) Manikin,
(vi)Feature Profile,
(vii) Mare and Foal,
(viii) Heaty Picture Completion, and
(ix) Koh’s Block Design Test.
The Alexander's Battery of Performance Tests: This scale has beon designed in Edinburgh University by W-P. Alexander. It consists of three tests—Passalong. Block designs and Cube construction, Passalong test consists of small coloured cubes, blue and red put in differing numbers in small wooden shallow boxes and the position of these cubes is to be reversed without lifting them from the boxes by removing them this way or that There are nine such patterns printed on cards and the subject is to manipulate the cubes within the space in the wooden box without lifting so that their position ts in reversed order i.e, if placed towards one side indicating blue colour, they have to be shifted to the opposite side indicated by red colour. The performance is evaluated in terms of the success in the task and the time taken.
The Koh's Block design test, at present consists of 17 graded patterns which are printed on cards and there are coloured cubes mitching the colour of the patterns but the cubes are coloured half blue and half vellow, red or white. The subject is required to manipulate the cubes to match with the pattern one by one within the time limit to earn the maximum marks or to get deductions in the marks if the time limit is exceeded.
The cube construction test consists of 26 cubes, some coloured on three sides, some On two, some on one and only one on none. With the help of these cubes. the subject is required to make a square block consisting of nine cubes so that three sides are coloured and the top side is colourless. Similarly, there is another square block consisting of nine cubes in which alJ the sides are coloured but the top and the bottom are to be colourless and the third block consists of eight cubes of which all the four sides are colourless. The subject is to use his judgment to place the cubes at the right positions to construct the square blocks with the help of the cubes as quickly as possible and the scoring is done in terms of points in accordance with the time taken.
In India too, attempts for constructing such batteries have been made. Dr. Chander Mohan Bhatia’s work, in this regard, deserves special mention. He has developed a battery of performance tests known as ‘Bhatia’s Battery of Performance Tests’.
It contains the following five sub-tests:
(i) Koh’s Block Design Test.
(ii) Alexander’s Pass-along Test.
(iii) Pattern Drawing Test.
(iv) Immediate memory test for digits (with an alternative form suitable for illiterates).
(v) Picture construction test.
The last three tests in this battery have been constructed by Mr. Bhatia himself while the former two represent adaptation of the Scale available in Alexander's Battery.
Wechsler Bellevue Intelligence Scale. This scale is available in two forms. The one form WISC is used for children and the other WAIS for adults. It is an individual test which has a unique quality of being named as verbal and performance scale simultaneously.
The scale consists of eleven sub-tests, Six sub-tests make up a verbal scale and five performance scale. These tests are listed below in the order in which they are administered.
Verbal Scale:
1. Test of General information.
2. Test of General comprehension.
3. Test of Arithmetic reasoning.
4. Test of distinction between similarities.
5. Test of Digit span.
6. Test of vocabulary.
Performance Scale:
7. Digit symbol Test.
8. Picture completion Test
9. Block Design test.
10. Picture arrangement test.
11. Object assembly test.
The scores on these sub-tests are added to give an idea of an incividual’s intelligence. .
The group verbal intelligence tests
The tests which necessitate the use of language and are applied to a group of individuals at a time come under this category. Some of the earlier tests belonging to this category are:
(i) Army Alpha Test (developed in World War I).
(ii) Army General Classification Test (developed in World War II),
Today we have so many group verbal tests. In India too, attempts have been made to construct such tests. Some of the popular tests of this nature are:
1. C. I. E. verbal Group Test of Intelligence (Hindi) constructed by Prof. Uday Shankar.
2. The Group Test of General Mental Ability (Samuhik Mansik Yogyata Pariksha) constructed by Dr. S. Jalota (Hindi).
3. Group test of intelligence, prepared by Bureau af Psychology, Allahabad (Hindi).
4. Prayag Metha’s Grouped [Intelligence Test (Samubik Budhi Pariksha, Hindi). This test has been published by Mansayan, Delhi,
5. General Mental Abilities Test, prepared by Dr. P.S. Hundal of Panjab University (Punjabi).
6. Group verbal intelligence test prepared by Dr. P. Gopala Pillai of the Kerala University (Malayalam).
7. Samuhik Budhi Pariksha (Hindi), prepared by Shri P.L. Shrimali, Vidya Bhavan G.S. Teachers College, Udaipur.
8. Samuhik Budhi Ki Jaanch (Hindi), prepared by Shri S.M. Mohsin, Educational and Vocational Guidance Bureau, Bihar, Patna.
The group non-verbal intelligence tests
These tests do not necessitate the use of language and are applicable to the group of individuals at a time.
The difference between performance tests (used for an individual) and non-verbal tests (used for a group) is up to a degree as far as their non-verbal nature is concerned. The performance tests require the manipulation of concrete objects or materials, supplied in the test, by the subject. Responses are purely motor in character and seldom require the use of paper and pencil by testee (except in a case like Maze Test etc.) Where the test material in the non-verbal tests. used for group testing, is provided in a booklet and requires the use of pencil by the testee.
Still in these tests, material does not contain words of numerical figures. It contains pictures, diagrams and geometrical figures etc., printed in a booklet. The subject is required to do such activities as to fill in some empty spaces, to draw some simple figures, to point out similarities and dissimilarities etc. In this way although the subject uses paper and pencil he does not need to know words or numerical figures. What he hasto do is explained clearly by the examiner usually through clear demonstrations so as to make tho Jeast possible use of language.
The examples of such type of tests are:
(i) Army Beta Test: It was developed in World War I? in U.S.A. for testing the intelligence of those soldiers who were either illiterates or were not used to English language.
(ii) Chicago Non-verbal Test: This non-verbal test has been proved most useful for the young children aged 12 and 13 years.
(iii) Raven’s Progressive Matrices Test: This test was developed in the U.K. Itis a very popular non-verbal group test -of intelligence. The test has been designed to evaluate the subjects’ ability:
(a) to see relationship between geometrical figures or designs.
(b) to perceive the structure of the design in order to select the appropriate part for completion of each pattern.
C.I.E. non-verbal group test of intelligence
Originally prepared by J.W. Jenkins, the test is printed by C.I.E. for adaptation into Hindi medium schools. The test contains such items as instructed below.
Below in the figure there are three designs on the left hand side which are similar, but on the right hand side there are five designs of which only one resembles the three designs given on the left hand side. Please underline that design.
Concept of mental age and I.Q.
Intelligence, assessed through the various intelligence tests, mentioned in the preceding pages, is always expressed in terms of I.Q. i.e. Intelligence Quotient. It was the German psychologist William Sterm who first initiated this term in the form of a ratio i.e. mental Age divided by Chronological Age or MA/CA, measure of the rate of mental development of Chronological Age an individual. To do away with the decimal point the ratio was again multiplied by 100 and thus the formula to calculate I.Q. was given as: I.Q.=MA/CAx100 (where MA stands for the mental age and CA for chronological age of the individual whose intelligence is being tested).
The concept of mental age was introduced earlier by a French psychologist Alfred Binnet. It was based upon the principle of the normal distribution of intelligence i.e., majority of the children of particular age are of normal intelligence and that they have a mental level approximating that age, which mental level could be termed as their ‘‘mental age’’, If some child excels in his performance of certain tasks from the performance of the majority of the children of his age, he is said to possess a higher mental age. If, for instance, a child of eight years has his performance on certain adequately determined tasks equa! to that of the majority of the ten-year-olds, then he had the mental age (MA) of 10 years, whereas, another child of eight years showing his performance equal to that of the majority of the 6-year-olds, on the same tasks could be said to possess the mental age of 6 years.
In any standard test of intelligence, there is a provision of a certain table which shows the conversion of actual scores obtained on the test into respective mental age (in months). What one has to do is only to read the mental age of his subject from this table on the basis of the scores earned by him on that test. This mental age divided by the chronological age in months (known from the identifying data) and multiplied by 100, then yields his intelligence in terms of I.Q.
The constancy of I.Q.
As mentioned earlier, intelligence goes on growing upto 16—20 years of age, but I.Q. for most individuals remains constant. Primarily I.Q. provides a ratio for knowing how bright an individual is as compared to some of his own age. Actually, it is an index which is independent not only of the particular score which an individual makes on a particular scale but also of the particular age at which he happens to make it. It is thus a measure which acquaints us with the relative brightness or intellectual possibilities of an individual, more or less permanently.
It is true that an individual grows in intelligence but the whole group (the other individuals of his own age) also grow at the same rate as that particular individual does. Thus I.Q., a measure of defining relative brightness or intellectual possibilities of an individual remains practically constant. Under ordinary circumstances accident or disease excepted) an individual’s I[.Q. is supposed to remain constant throughout life or at least throughout the age limits covered by the scale. This property of I.Q. is referred to as constancy of I.Q. by psychologists.
The classification of I.Q.
In accordance with the individual’s mental level as expressed in terms of I.Q. attempts have been made by different investigators to classify them under different categories. In the revised Standford edition of the Terman Merril test this classification has been presented as follows:
I.Q.
Category
Below 70
Mentally defectives
70 - 75
Borderline or Feeble minded
75 - 90
Dull and Backward
90 - 95
Low average
95 - 105
Average
105 - 125
Superior
125 - 140
Very superior
140 and above
Genius
However in Indian conditions, based on the Indian made intelligence tests or adaptations and found on the basis of researches in this area, the following classification seems to be more acceptable (Shanker Udai, 1984, p. 15)
I. Q.
Categories
0 - 25
Idiots
25 - 50
Imbeciles
50 - 75
Morons or Feeble minded
75 - 90
Borderline or dull
90 - 110
Average
110 - 125
Superior
125 - 140
Very Superior
140 and above
Genius
In the above classification, children having I.Q. range upto 90 and labelled as idiots, imbeciles, morons (Feeble minded) and dull (excepting a few borderline cases) are termed Mentally retarded children, while those possessing I.Q. 140 or more are termed genius or gifted. Judging in this way all the mentally retarded children essentially possess sub-normal intellectual capacities i.e., they are basically less capable of intelligent behaviour than normal! children.
Diagnosis of such sub-normal intellectual capacities is not a simple task. Intelligence testing alone does not suffice. For better results, the findings of these tests should be further supported on the basis of the observations of the following typical symptoms or characteristics found in such children.
1. They are dependent and find it difficult to manage themselves or their affairs. In some of them mental deficiency is so great that they are incapable of protecting themselves against common physical dangers. . In comparison with children of their own age their rate of intellectual development is too slow.
3. They find it difficult to shift from one type of activity to another and are not easily bored with a routine job. They are very poor at following general verbal instructions unless these are repeated at frequent intervals. They are essentially slow learners. Experimentally it has been proved they take longer to learn a skill. They are very poor at abstraction. They can only think in terms of concrete objects and situations. They lack too much in the power of observation, thinking and reasoning and ability to generalize.
8. The areas of their interest, aptitudes and choices are too limited.
9. Some of them have constitutional defects and in many cases physical symptoms give indications of their sub-normality One may have one’s lips fairly apart with tongue visible in between the teeth and saliva coming out. Another has vacant looks and clumsy gait. In other cases the children may possess usually large or small heads etc. But such types of symptoms may even be found in normal and bright children, therefore, they are not valid and reliable in labelling a child mentally deficient or retarded.
10. They are socially as well as emotionally maladjusted personalities. They do not quite realize their rights and obligations towards others and often have deficient moral judgment.
11. They are essentially tncurable in the sense that they cannot be endowed with more intelligence and made normal. Similarly, in the case of genius or gifted, the results of the intelligence tests in terms of I.Q. can provide a workable base for segregating the gifted from the averages. Further support may be provided by making use of the results of other related and useful tests and devices like aptitude tests, interest inventory, naturalistic observation, anecdotal records, opinions and reports of friends and teachers, self analysis, sociometric techniques and personality tests involving overall assessment of the behaviour.
SUMMARY
Intelligence may be understood as a sort of mental energy available to an individual to enable him to handle his environment in terms of adaptation and facing novel situations as effectively as possible.
The theories of intelligence try to throw light on the structure of intelligence. Unitary theory holds that intelligence consists of only one factor i.e., a fund of intellectual competence. Quite contrary to this, multi-factor theory considers intelligence a combination of numerous separate elements or factors, each being a minute element of an ability. Spearman’s two factor theory advocates that all the intellectual tasks can be categorized into certain definite groups. Each group has a unique common factor known as group factor. Thurstone and his associates had discovered nine of such group factors. Vernon's hierarchical theory suggests a hierarchical structure for the organisation of intelligence in the shape of G, an overall factor branching into two major group factors and various specific factors. Guilford tried to illustrate his viewpoint through a model of intellect involving three interrelated and interacted basic parameters—operations, contents and products.
We may have a more comprehensive picture of the concept of intelligence by knowing certain important facts about its nature like intelligence is normally distributed in nature it is a joint product of both heredity and environment; it grows with age and is vertical growth ceases at the age of 16 to 20, it shows vide variety of individual differences but however the differences in sex, races, culture, caste and colours etc., are not found to be a factor in causing differences in intelligence.
Intelligence cannot be measured in the same way as we measure a piece of cloth or temperature of our body. It can only be assessed. This assessment is carried out through intelligence tests categorized as individual and group tests involving the use of verbal or non-verbal material. In individual tests, we test an individual at a time where in group tests, a group of individuals may be tested at the same time. We have a large variety of such individual or group tests, some of which are paper pencil tests and thus require the essential use of language, the others are language free tests. The typical examples of such nonJanguage tests are performance tests. In such tests an assessment of one’s intelligence is made through the evaluation of his performance on some tests involving intellectual abilities. These tests are most useful in the cases of individuals who have language handicaps such as foreign language speaking groups, illiterates, deaf and dumb, mentally retarded or culturally deprived individuals.
For interpreting the scores earned on intelligence tests we make use of the concept of mental age and l.Q. Mental age of a child signifies a particular mental level which is normal for the majority of children of his age. In a standardized test of intelligence, we can read the mental age of an individual (in months) directly from the table provided in the manual on the basis of the score earned by him on that test and then we can compute I.Q. by using the formula IQ=mental age / chronological Age x 100. This ratio a measure of defining relative brightness or intellectual possibilities of an individual remains practically constant throughout one’s life or at least throughout the age limits covered by an intelligence test. This property of I.Q. is referred to as Constancy of I.Q.
The I.Q. Scores of individuals may be employed in classifying them as above average, average and below average. The individuals haviog I.Q. range upto 90 i.e. having below average intellectual abilities are termed as mentally retarded while those having I.Q. 140 or above are termed genius or gifted.
References and Suggested Readings
Binet, A and Simon, T, The Development of Intelligence in Children, Baltimore: Williams & Wilkins, 1916.
Brody, E.B. and Brody, N., Intelligence: Nature, Determinants and Consequence, New York: Academic Press, 1976.
Bureher H.3., Human IntelligenceNature and Assessment, London: Methuen,
Cc ronbach tye Essentials of Psychology Testing (31rd ed.) New York: Harper & ow, .
Drever, Jand Collins, M., The Performance Tests of Intelligence Edinburgh: Oliver & Boyd, 1948. 4 f gene
Griffith, J.H_ , The Psychology of Human Behavior, London, George Allen, 1933. Guilford, J.P., The Nature of Intelligence, New York: Mc Graw-Hill, 1967.
Pillai, N.P.. Pillai. K.S. and Nair, K.S., Psychological Foundations of Education, Trivandrum: Kalaniketon, 1972.
Shankar, Udai, Exceptional Children, (2nd ed.), Delhi: Sterling 1984.
Spearman, C.E., The Nature of Intelligence and Principles of Cognition, London: armillan 19792.
Spearman, C.E., The Abilities of Man, New York: Macmillan, 1927,
Stern, W., Psychological Methods of Testing Intelligence,. Baltimore : Warwick and York. Inc. 1914.
Stoddard, G:D., The Meaning of Intelligence, New York: Macmillan, 1943.
Terman, L.M. and Macmill, M.A., Measuring Intelligence, Boston: Houghtoa Mifflin, 1937.
Thomson, G.H., The Factorial Analysis of Human Ability, London: London University Press, 1939.
Thorndike, E.L., Fducartional Psychology (Briefer Course) New York: Columbia University, 1914.
Thurston, L.L., Primary Mental Abilities, Chicago: University of Chicago Press,, 1938.
Vernon, P.E., The Structure of Human Abilities, Lendon: Methuer, 1950.
Wagnon, M.J. (Ed.): Readings in Educational Psychology, New York: Houghtog Mifflin, 1937.
Wechsler, D., Wechsler Scale of Intelligence (WAIS, WISE). New York: Psychologica) Corporation, 1939.
Wechsler, D.. The Measurement of Adult Intelligence (rd ed.) New Yorks Williams and Wilkins, 1944.
Wolfie. D (Ed), The Discovery of Talent, Cambridge, Masa> Harvard University Press, 1969.
Woodworth, R.S., Psychology~A Study of Life, New York: Century, 1932.
Woodworth. R.S. and Marquis, 'D.G.; Psycholegy (Sth ed.), New York: Henrys Holt & Ca. 1948,
Chapter 15
APTITUDES
Meaning and nature of aptitudes
It isan observable fact that people differ from one another and within themselves in their performance in one or the other fields of human activity such as leadership, music, art, mechanical work, teaching etc. Ramesh goes to a commercial institute in order to learn typing and shorthand. He progresses rapidly with his typing and shorthand and gets the diploma in due course. Later on, when he is Offered a stenographer-cum-typist job he carries it out satisfactorily. Suresh although not in any way inferior to the former in general intelligence, who also gets admission to this institute, progresses very slowly and even after getting the diploma proves himself an inefficient typist as well as stenographer. Similarly Radha profits from musical training while Sunita having almost the same intelligence as Radha under similar circumstances, makes little or no progress.
In this way in many spheres of every day life we usually come across individuals who under similar circumstances surpass other persons in acquiring certain knowledge or skills and prove themselves more suitable and efficient in certain specific jobs. Such persons are said to possess certain specific abilities or aptitudes, besides general intellectual abilities or intelligence, which help them in achieving success in some specific occupations or activities.
Therefore in a simple way aptitude may be considered a special ability or specific capacity besides the general intellectualability which helps an individual to acquire a required degree of proficiency or achievement in a specific field. However, for having a clear underStanding of the term aptitude let us try to consider the following definitions given by different scholars:
Bingham: “Aptitude refers to those qualities characterizing a person’s way of behaviour which serve to indicate how well he can learn to meet and solve certain specified kinds of problems” (1937, p. 21).
Traxler: ‘‘Aptitude is a condition, a quality or a set of qualities in an individual which is indicative of the probable extent to which he will be able to acquire under suitable training, some knowledge, skill or composite of knowledge, understanding and skill, such as ability to contribute to art or music, mechanical ability; mathematical ability or ability to read and speak a foreign language. (1957, p. 49).
Freeman. ‘‘An aptitude is a combination of characteristics indicative of an individual's capacity to acquire (with training) some specific knowledge, skill. or set of organized responses, such as the ability to speak a language, to become a musician, to do mechanical work.”’ (1971, p431).
All these definitions reveal the predictive nature of aptitudes, When we say that Ram or Radha has an aptitude for teaching we
mean that he or she has the capacity or ability to acquire proficiency in teaching under anoropriate conditions.
Similarly when we say Mohan has an aptitude for music we mean that his present condition or ability reveals that if he were to learn music he would succeed in this line. In this way the knowledge of aptitude helps us in predicting the future success of an individual. Under suitable training or experiences, in a particular area of activity.
Something more about the nature of aptitudes
Are Aptitudes inherited or acquired? Like so many other personality traits or characteristics, it is difficult to say for one or the other aptitude that itis an absolute product of heredity or environment. Certain aspects of many aptitudes may be inborn. For example a person showine musical aptitude may have a musical throat and a person showing aptutude for typing work or watch repairing may have long and dexterous hands. But this is one side of the picture. It is also equally possible that the person’s aptitude for music may be the result of his living in the company of good musicians of his aptitude for typing work may be the creation of his father or mother who happens to be a typist.
Therefore, it is safer to conclude that the aptitude of an individual at a particular moment is, in all probability, dependent upon both, heredity and environment.
How aptitude differs from ability and achievement .
Aptitude and present ability do not mean the same thing. You may have no present ability to drive a car but you may have a high aptitude for driving—which means that your chances of being a successful driver are good provided you receive the proper training. In this way while aptitude has future reference and tries to predict the degree of attainment or success of an individual in an area or activity after adequate training—the ability concerns itself onlv with the present condition—the potentiality or capability possessed at the present moment irrespective of its past and does not try to make any estimate of one’s future success or failure,
Contrary to the forward-looking nature of aptitude and presentoriented characteristic of ability, achievement is past-oriented. It looks to the past and indicates what an individual has learned or acquired in a particular field.
But by this differentiation it should not be concluded that we can measure an individual’s future accomplishment in any area of activity with the help of aptitude measurement. Aptitude tests, in all their forms, measure only the present ability or capacity of an individual which can be exploited for making predictions about future attainments.
Difference between intelligence and aptitudes
Intelligence tests as they exist usually test the general mental ability of an individual; but aptitudes as we have discussed, are concerned with specific abilities. Therefore, where with the knowledge of intelligence of an individual we can predict his success in a number of situations involving mental function or activity, the knowledge of aptitudes, on the other hand, acquaints us with those specific abilities and capacities of an individual which give an indication of his ability or capacity to succeed in a special field or activity. Therefore, in predicting achievement in some particular job, training, courses or specialized instruction we need to know more about one’s aptitudes (specific abilities) rather than his intelligence or general ability.
Difference between aptitude and interest
To get desirable success in a given activity, a person must have both an aptitude for activity and an interest in it. Therefore, usually, interest and aptitude go hand in hand. But by this co-ordination, we should never infer that interests and aptitudes are one and the same thing. A person may be interested ina particular activity, job or training but may or may not have the aptitude for that. In such cases, the interest shown in a particular occupation or course of study is often the result of some other temptation or persuasion like ambitions of the parents, probably of getting an appointment or job provision of stipend or financial help, the prestige associated with the work—rather than the personal aptitude. Similarly a person may have long and dexterous fingers and can show a good performance on a mechanical aptitude test yet he may show little or no interest in becoming a watch maker. Therefore a guidance or section programme must give due weightage to the measure of aptitude as well as of interest. Both are essential for the prediction of the success of an individual in a given activity, job or course of instruction.
Measurement of aptitudes
Like intelligence tests various aptitude tests have been devised to measure aptitudes of the individuals in various specific fields or activities. Generally these tests can be classified into the following types according to the specific nature of the aptitude tested by them:
1. Mechanical Aptitude tests.
2. Musical Aptitude tests.
3. Art judgement tests.
4. Professional Aptitudes tests i.e., Tests to measure the aptitudes for professions like teaching. clerical, medical, legal, engineering, salesmanship, research work etc.
5. Scholastic aptitude tests i.e., tests to measure the aptitude for different courses of instruction.
In the following pages we will throw light on some of these above mentioned aptitude tests.
Mechanical aptitude tests
Like intelligence, mechanical aptitude is also made up of many components. While explaining its meaning Freeman writes:
‘‘The capacity designed by the term ‘mechanical aptitude’ is not a single, unitary function. It is a combination of sensory and motor capacities plus perception of spatial relations, the capacity to acquire information about mechanical matters and the capacity to comprehend mechanical relationships. (1977, p. 444).
Therefore mechanical aptitude tests try to test the above mentioned abilities and capacitics of an individual in order to know his mechanical aptitude. Some of the well known mechanical aptitude tests are:
1. Minnesota Mechanical Assembiy Test.
2. Minnesota Spatial Relations Test,
3. The Revised Minnesota Power Form Board (1948).
4. Stenquist Mechanical Aptitude Tests (Part I and III).
5.. L.J. O’Rourke’s Mechanical Aptitude Tests (Part I and II)
6. Bennet Tests of Mechanical comprehension.
7. S.R.A. Mechanical aptitude test.
8. A Battery of Mechanical Aptitude Tests (Hindi) prepared by Mano-Vigyanshala, Allahabad. Usually these tests contain the items of the following nature:
A. Asking the subject to put together the parts of mechanical devices.
B. Asking to replace cut-outs of various shapes in their correct holes in the board.
(c) Requiring the ability to solve problems in geometric terms.
(d) Asking questions concerning the basic information about tools and their uses.
(e) Questions relating to the comprehension of physical and mechanical principles.
As an illustration Bennet Mechanical comprehension test Form AA has 60 items in pictorial form. They present mechanical problems arranged in a difficult order and involve comprehension of mechanical principles found in ordinary situations. Two items of this test are presented below for illustration.
Clerical aptitude tests
Like mechanical, clerical aptitude is also a composite function. According to Bingham, it involves several specific abilities like:
(a) Perceptual ability: Ability to perceive werds end numbers with speed and accuracy.
(b) Intellectual ability: Ability to grasp the meaning of words and symbols.
(c) Motor ability: Ability to use various types of machines and tools like typewriter, duplicator, cyclostyle machine; punching machine etc.
Some of the popular clerical. aptitude tests are:
(i) Detroit Clerical Aptitude Examination.
(ii) Minnesota vocational test for clerical workers.
(iii) The Clerical Ability Test prepared by the dept. of psychology b University of Mysore, Mysore.
(iv) Clerical Aptitude Test Battery (English and Hindi), Bureau of Edu. and Voc. Guidance, Patna (Bihar).
(v) Test of Clerical Aptitude prepared by “the Parsee Panchayat ’ Guidance Bureau 209, Hornby Road, Bombay—1.
Specimen item from a Clerical aptitude test. Samples done correctly of pairs of numbers. 79542 79524
5194367 5794367
Samples done correctly of pairs of names.
John C Linder
John C. Lender
Investors Syndicate
Investors Syndicate
Now try the samples below,
66273894 — 66273284
527384578 —527384578
New York World—New York World Cargil Grain Co—Cargil Grain Co.
This is a Test for speed and accuracy. Work as far as you can without making mistakes.
Do not turn the page until you are told to begin. (Reproduced from General Psychology by H.E, Garrett, 1968, p. 477).
Musical aptitude tests
These tests have been devised for discovering musical talent. One of these important musical aptitude tests is described below:
Seashore Measure of Musical Talent:
It gives consideration to the following musical components:
(a) discrimination of pitch.
(b) discriminaticn of intensity of loudness.
(c) determination of time interval.
(d) Discrimination of timbre.
(e) Judgement of rhythm.
(f) Tonal memory.
Test items in this battery are presented on phonograph records. The subject sits, listens and attempts to discriminate. He is required to mark his responses on an answer form supplied to him by the examiner. The instructions in these tests are of the following nature:
“You will hear two tones which differ in pitch. You are to judge whether the second is higher or lower than the first. If the second is higher, record H: if lower, record L.”
Aptitude for grahpic art
These tests are devised to discover the talent for graphic art. The two important tests of this nature are:
1. The Meier Art Judgement Test.
2. Horne Art Aptitude Inventory.
In Meier Art Judgement Test there are 100 pairs of representational pictures in black and white. The one such pair is given below for illustration.
One member of each pair is an acknowledged art masterpiece while the other is a slight distortion of the masterpiece. It is usually altered from the original so as to violate some important principle of art. Testees are informed regarding which aspect has been altered and are asked to choose from each pair the one that is better more pleasing, more artistic, more satisfying. For example in the above given illustration, the examinees are required to select the original and aesthetically superior work on the basis of the shapes of the bowls. The number of correct responses is taken as a measure or aptitude for graphic art.
Another important test of measuring aptitude for graphic art is the Horn Art Aptitude Inventory. It requires the subject to produce sketches from given patterns of lines and figures. The created sketches of the subject are then evaluated according to the standard given by the author of this test.
Tests of scholastic and professional aptitudes
For helping in the proper selection of students for the studies of specific courses of professions like Engineering, Medicine, Law, Business Management, Teaching etc., the various specific aptitude tests have been designed. Some of these aptitude tests are:
(i) Stanford Scientific Aptitude Test by D.L. Zyve.
(ii) Science Aptitude Test (after Higher Sec. Stage): N.L.E. Delhi.
(iii) Moss Scholastic Aptitude Test for Medical Students.
(iv) Ferguson and Stoddard’s Law Aptitude Examination.
(v) Tale Legal Aptitude Test.
(vi) Pre-Engineering Ability Test.
(Education Testing Service, U.S.A.).
(vii) Minnesota Engineering Analogical Test. (viii) Coxe-Orleans Prognosis Test of Teaching Ability.
(ix) Teaching Aptitude Test by Jat Parkash and R.P. Shrivastav, University of Saugar (M.P.)
(x) Shah’s Teaching Aptitude test.
(xi) Teaching Aptitude Test by Moss, F.A. & others, George Washington University Press.
Contemporary trend in aptitude testing
Instead of utilising specific aptitude tests for measuring specific aptitude in very specific field or area, the trend at present, has now been changed towards multiple aptitude test battery to find the suitability of people for different professions requiring different abilities on the basis of scores in the relevant aptitude tests im the battery. The examples of such tests are General Aptitude Test Battery (GATB) and the Differential Aptitude Test (DAT),
GATB, developed by the Employment Service Bureau of USA, bas 12 tests. Eight of which aro paper-pencil tests as for name comparison, computation, yocabulary, arithmetic, reasoning, form matching, test matching, three dimensional space etc. The other four require the use of simple equipments in the shape of moving pegs on boards, assembling and dissembling rivets and washers. trom the scores obtained bythe subject, the experimenter is able to draw inferences about the nine aptitude factors: intelligence, verbal aptitude, numerical aptitude, spatial aptitude, form perception, Clerical perception, motor coordination, finger dexterity and manual dexterity. The GATB has proven to be one of the most successful multiple aptitude batteries particularly for the purposes of job Classification. ’
The DAT, developed by U.S. Psychological Corporation is available in two forms. It includes tests for verbal reasoning, numerical ability, abstract reasoning, spatial relations, mechanical reasoning, clerical speed and accuracy and two tests for language usages (for spelling and grammar,) DAT has proved more successful in predicting academic success and found specially useful for providing educational and vocational guidance to secondary school children.
Utility of aptitude tests
Aptitude tests have a wide area of application. Firstly, they are the backbone of the guidance services. The results of these tests enable us to locate, with a reasonable degree of certainty, the fields of activity in which an individual is most likely or least likely to be successful. Therefore these tests are found to be very useful in helping the youngsters as well as youth in the selection of special courses of instruction, fields of activities and vocations.
Secondly, they can be safely used for the purpose of educational and vocational selection. They help usin making scientific selection of the candidates for various educational and professional courses as well as for specialized jobs as Munn puts it. ‘‘The chief value of aptr tude testing is, in fact, that it enables us to pick out from those who do not yet have the ability to perform certain skills, those who, with 3 reasonable amount of training, will be most likely to acquire the skills in question and acquire them to a desirable level of proficiency.” (1967, p. 117).
Therefore aptitude tests properly anticipate the future potentialities or capacities of an individual (irrespective of the fact whether he possesses those future capacities before the training or not) and there’ by beip us in making selection of those individuals who are best fitted for a particular profession and course of instruction or those wbo are likely to be more benefited by the preprofessional training of experiences.
In this way any reasonable guidance and counselling programm? or the entrance examination to the specialized, academic and professional courses or the selection procedure for specialized jobs is required to give proper weightage to Aptitude testing. Aptitude testing when combined with the other information received through Interest Inventory, Personality tests, Intelligence tests and cumulative record etc., can help, to a greater extent, in avoiding the huge wastage of human as well as material resources by placing the individuals in their proper places and lines of work.
SUMMARY
Aptitude may be considered as a specific capacity or special ability, besides the general intellectual ability of an individual, indicative of his probable success in a relevant field after getting proper opportunity for learning or training. Like so many other personality traits, aptitudes have been adjudged as a joint product of both heredity and environment.
Aptitude differs from ability and achievement in terms of its forward looking nature i.e., predicting the future success of an individual where the ability limits itself in disclosing the present position of an individual] with regard to the possession of the particular ability or capacity, the achievement with its past oriented nature merely indicates what an individual has learned or acquired.
Aptitude should not be confused with interest. One may have interest in a particular act or job but may or may not have an aptitude for that. The converse is also true. However for obtaining the desired success In a given task, one must have both interest as well as aptitude.
Measurement of aptitudes is carried out through some relevant, specific aptitude tests. For example, Mechanical aptitude tests measure one’s aptitude for mechanical work; Clerical aptitude tests are employed for measuring aptitude for clerical work; Musical aptitude tests like Seashore measure of musical talent attempts to discover musical talent. Aptitude for graphic art is tested through the tests like Meier Art Judgement test. Similarly, we have various standardized aptitude tests forthe measurement of scholastic and professional aptitudes of individuals for relevant specific courses or professions like engineering, medicine law, business management, teaching, etc.
Aptitude tests have a wide range of application. They prove to be the backbone of all types of guidance services and selection programmes. Through their adequate prediction values, they exhibit their worth in placing the persons in their proper places and lines of work.
References and Suggested Readings
Anastasi, A., Psychological Testing. London: Macmillan, 1968.
Bennett, G.K., et al; Differential Aptitude Tests, New York: Psychological Corporation, 1947.
Bingham. W.V., Aptitudes and Aptitude Testing, New York: (Harper & Brothers 493i,
Freeman, F.S., Theory and Practice of Psychological Testing (3rd Indian reprint), Bombay: Oxford & IBH, 1971.
Hull, C.L., Apritedes Testing, New York: Yonkers, World Book Co, 1928,
Long, L and Mehta, P.H., The First Mental Measurement Hand Book of India, New Delhi: NCERT, 1966.
Meier, C.N.. Meier Art Tests Il Aesthetic Perception, JOWA, University of lowa, 1963.
Munn, N.L., Introduction to Psychology (indian Ed.) Delhi: Oxford & IBH, 1967.
Seashore, C.E., Seashore Measures of Musical Talents, New York: Psychological Corporation, 1960.
Traxler, A.E., Techniques of Guidance (Rev. ed.) New York: Harper & Brothers,
Chapter 16
PERSONALITY
Meaning and nature
The term “‘personality”’ stems from the Latin word persona, which was the name given to the masks actors wore and the characters they portrayed. The meaning of the word personality in practice has changed little since classical time for it is still quite common to hear the comments such as “I do not know what he sees in her, she has a very poor personality’, or “‘look at that young man, what a fine personality he has”. Remarks like this make us believe that personality is a thing or quality that is possessed by all of us and we can paste such labels as fine, good or poor on it on the basis of the physical makeup, manner of their’ walking, talking. dressing and a host of other similar characteristics possessed by individuals. However what is believed in this way is quite wrong as the psychological concept of personality goes far beyond and deeper than mere appearance or outward behaviour. How should it be given a proper meaning or definition has remained a serious problem from time immemorial before the psychologists.
Watson (1930) the father of behaviourism, taking clues from his behavioural studies, tried to conclude that ‘‘personality is the sum of activities that can be discovered by actual observations over a long enough period of time to give reliable information’’. In this way he tried to make the word personality synonymous to the consistent behaviour patterns of an individual. Indeed it reflected a very narrow meaning of the term personality.
In the subsequent years, Morton Prince tried to give personality a broad base by accepting the role of both environmental and hereditary factors in constituting what’ is named as personality. He remarked: “‘personality is the sum total of all the biological innate dispositions, impulses, tendencies. appetites and instincts of the individual and the dispositions and tendencies acquired by experience.”” (1929, p.532).
This defintion of Morton Prince was criticised on the grounds that it does not present any integrated and organisational view of personality. Personality cannot be described through merely summing up the various elements involved in one’s personality. If we do so it is not more than counting of bricks in describing a house.
The inability of various existing definitions to define personality In some proper way made Allport to engage in discovering some useful definition. After evaluating 49 such definitions, he arrived at the conclusion that “‘personality is a dynamic organisation within the individual of those psycho-physical systems that determine his unique adjustment to his environment” (1948, p. 48).
Although Allport tried to give a comprehensive definition of the term personality by recognizing the dynamic nature and organisational aspect of one’s personality and emphasizing the role it can play for making one adjusted to his environment, yet his definition suffered from some serious defects. In emphasizing the “dynamic organisation within the individual” he tried to view personality as something different from the individual as something residing inside the individual and not the integrated whole of mindbody relationship. Moreover by emphasizing merely on the theoretical aspect and describing it in terms of behaviouralior dynamic concept, the true nature of personality cannot be understood. The contemporary psychologists like R.B. Cattell and Eysenck are of such opinion. They feel very strongly that if personality cannot be demonstrated, measured and quantified it should be called philosophy or art and not personality theory in psychology. Below we reproduce their ideas in connection with the meaning of the term personality.
‘Personality is that which permits a prediction of what a person will do in a given situation.’ (Cattell, 1970, p. 386)
“‘Personality is the more or less stable and enduring organisation of a person’s character temperament, intellect and physique Which oh) his unique adjustment to the environment” (Eysenck, 1971, p. 2
By character Eysenck meant conative behaviour or will; physique meant bodily configuration and neuro-endocrine endowments, temperament stood for affective behaviour based on emotions and intellect implied the cognitive behaviour or intelligence.
The definition given by Eysenck has very strong points in its favour. First, it tries to provide personality a physiological base and gives a balanced consideration to the role of heredity and environment in building one’s personality. Second, it gives a complete picture of the human behaviour by involving all of its aspects—conative, cognitive and affective. Third, it stresses the need for integrating and organisation of the behavioural characteristics and last it aims at making personality somewhat measurable and assessable and thus gives it a scientific base. However, on the other hand, it does have some weak points in the sense that human personality need not be necessarily supposed to possess a physiological base and moreover we cannot think personality is so static and fixed as advocated by this definition. It is true that personality should be evaluated on the basis of generality of the behaviour but on the other hand, changes cannot be denied. The person who is an extrovert may turn into an introvert depending upon so many intervening factors.
In this way, evolution of an ideal definition capable of explaining the measuring of the term personality in all its aspects still needs some extensive research. In fact the concepts like personality are difficult to be explained as they have the identity like sound, electricity etc., the impact of which can be felt but the real nature of them is always a matter of secrecy. Something about them can be known by their utility or describing some of their characteristics and distinguished features. Let us seek the meaning of the term personality also con similar lines,
Distinguished features and characteristics of personality
The results of various experimental studies and observations have led to the identification of the following characteristics of personality.
1. The personality is something unique and specific. Every one of us is an unique pattern in ourselves. No two individuals not even identical twins, behave in precisely the same way over any period of time. Every one of us has specific characteristics for making adjustments.
2. Personality exhibits self-consciousness as one of its main characteristics. Man is described as a person or to have a personality when the idea of self enters into ‘his consciousness. In this connection H.R. Bhatia writes, ‘‘We do not attribute personality to a dog and even a child cannot be described as a personality because it has only a vague sense of personal identity.”’ (1968, p. 371).
3. Personality includes everything about a person. It is all that a person has about him. It includes all the behaviour patterns i.e., conative, cognitive and affective and covers not only the conscious activities but goes deeper to semi-conscious and unconscious also.
4. It is not just a collection of so many traits or characteristics which is known as personality. By counting the bricks only how can we describe the wall of a house? It needs something more and actually personality is more than this. It is organisation of some psychophysical systems or some behaviour characteristics and functions as a unified whole. Just as to describe an elephant, we cannot say that it is like a pillar only by examining its legs. In the same way by looking through one’s physique or sociability we cannot pass judgee ment over one’s personality. It is only when we go carefully into all the aspects—biological as well as social that we can form an idea about his presonality.
5. Personality is not static, it is dynamic and ever in process of change and modification. As we have said earlier that personality is all that a person has about him. It gives him all that is needed for his unique adjustment in his environment. The process of making adjustment to environment is continuous. One has to struggle against the environmental as well as the inner forces throughout the span of his life. As a result one has to bring modification and change in One’s personality patterns and it makes the nature of personality dynamic instead of a static one.
6. Every personality is the product of heredity and environment. Both contribute significantly towards the development of the child’s personality.
7. Learning and acquisition of experiences contribute towards the growth and development of personality. Every personality is the end product of this process of learning and acquisition.
8. Personality should not be equated with one’s. character. Character is an ethical concept. It represents a moral estimate of the individual. While personality, as a psychological concept, is a more comprehensive term which encircles in its sphere the character as one of the constituents of one’s personality.
9. Personality may further be differentiated from temperament which can be called a system of emotional disposition. This system of emotional disposition represents only the effective side of one’s personality and so personality must be taken as much beyond that of one’s temperament.
10. Personality should be viewed as different from the ego or the individual self. The word ‘‘ego”’ is generally used for that unified part of one’s personality which in ordinary language we call ‘‘I’’. However, as the psychoanalytic view of personality advocated by Freud explains, itis only asmall aspect of one’s total personality. Personality, therefore, stands for more than what the ego carries.
11. Every person’s personality has one more distinguishing feature that is aiming to an end—towards some specific goals. Adler asserts this view frankly in his book “‘Individual psychology”. He is of the opinion that a man’s personality can be judged through a study and interpretation of the goals he -has set for himself to achieve and the approaches he makes to the problems of his life.
While going through all that has been said in terms of the definitions and characteristics of personality, we may accept a workable definition of the term personality as under:
PERSONALITY IS A COMPLEX BLEND OF A CONSTANTLY EVOLVING AND CHANGING PATTERN OF ONE’S UNIQUE BEHAVIOUR, EMERGED AS A RESULT OF ONE’S INTERACTION WITH HIS ENVIRONMENT, DIRECTED TOWARDS SOME SPECIFIC ENDS IN VIEW.
Theories of personality
The search for understanding the meaning and nature of personality will be rather incomplete if we do not mention some important theories of personality. These theories in one way or the other, try to describe the basic structure and underlying entities or constructs involved in personality along with the processes by which these entities interact. The theories of personality in general can be classified into four broad categories as given ahead:
A. Theories adopting type approach
The viewpoint of Hippocrates, Kretschmer, Sheldon and Jung belong to this category.
B. Theories adopting trait approach
Theories like Aliport’s theory and Cattell’s theory of personality are based on trait approach.
C, Theories adopting type cum trait approach
Theories like Eysenck’s theory of personality can be put under this category.
D, Theories adopting developmental approach
Theories like psycho-analytic theory of Freud, theory of indivis dual psychology by Adler, Carl Roger’s Self theory, and learning theories of personality can be included in this category.
Let us summarize the viewpoints of the above mentioned theories:
Type approach: Theories adopting type approach, advocate that human personalities can be classified into a few clearly defined types and each person can be put in one or the other type depending upon his behavioural characteristics, somatic structure, blood types, fluids in the body, or personality traits. Based on such approach, the physicians of ancient India broadly categorized all human beings into three types. This classification was based on the three basic elements of the body i.e., pitt (bile), bute (wind), and kuf (mucus). Almost the same approach was followed by the Greek physicians like Hippocrates, one of the disciples of the great philosopher Aristotle. In the Subsequent years many more scholars and psychologists tried to divide persons into certain types depending upon their own specific criterion. Let us describe a few of such approaches.
Hippocrates’ classification: According to Hippocrates the human body consists of four types of humours of fluids--Blood. yellow bile, phlegm (mucus) and black bile. The predominance of one of these four types of fluids in one’s body gives him unique temperamental characteristics leading to a particular type of personality summarized as below:
Dominance of Floyd type in the body
Personality type
Temperamental characteristic
Blood
Sanguine
Light-hearted, optimistic, happy, hopeful and accommodating
Yellow bile
Choleric
Irritable angry but passionate and strong with active imagination
Phlegm (mucus)
Phlegmatic
Cold calm, slow, sluggish, indifferent
Black bile
Melancholic
Bad tempered, detected, sad, depressed, pessimistic, deplorable, and self involved.
Kretschmer’s classification: Kretschmer classified all human beings into certain biological types according to their physical structure and has allotted definite personality characteristics associated with each physical make-up as follows:
Personality types
Personality characteristics
I. Pyknic (having fat bodies)
Sociable, jolly, easy going and good natured.
II. Athletic (balanced body)
Energetic, optimistic and adjustable.
III. Leptosomatic (lean and thin).
Unsociable, reserved, shy, sensitive and pessimistic.
Sheldon’s classification: He, too like Kretschmer, classified human beings into certain types according to their physical structures and attached certain temperamental characteristics to them as under:
Personality type
Name
(According to somatic or body structure)
Description
Personality characteristics
Characteristics
Endomorphic
Person having developed viscera but weak somatic structure (like Kretschmer's Pyknic type)
Easy going, sociable and affectionate
Mesomorphic
Balance development of viscera and somatic structure ( like Kretschmer's athletic type)
Craving for muscular activity, self assertive, love risk and adventure
Ectomorphic
Week somatic structure as well as undeveloped viscera ( like Kretschmer's Leptosomatic)
Pessimistic, unsocial, and reserved
The approach adopted by the above psychologists to have classification on the basis of seeking correlation between structure of the body and personality characteristics, is lopsided. It is somewhat misleading. There does not exist such perfect body-mind or bodyheart correlation as the propagators of these approaches have assumed.
Jung’s classification: He divided all human beings basically into two distinct types—Introvert and Extrovert according to their social participation and the interest which they take in social activities. Later on he further sharpened his two-fold division by giving subtypes. In this process he took into consideration the four psychological functions—thinking, feeling, sensation and intuition, in relation to his previous extrovert and introvert types. Diagrammatically, we can represent this division, along with the main characteristics of each sub-type as below:
Thinking
Introvert thinking type
(i) more theoretical
(ii) afraid of external realities
(iii) absorbing in his own intellectual pursuits.
Extrovert sensational type
(i) good taste and enjoyment seeker.
(ii) demand constant emotional sensation.
(iii) fluent in speech.
(iv) interested in athletics
Ill Sensation (Empiricism)
Introvert Sensational type
(i) cool and alloof
(ii) better in writing than speaking.
( iii) interested in books, magazines etc.
Introvert Feeling type / Feeling
(i) day dreamer
(ii) strong feelings, likes, dislikes.
(iii) go on suffering but do not express ( their feelings to others,
Thinking
Extrovert thinking type
(i) realistic and practical
(ii) support theory with facts.
Extrovert Intuition type
(i) optimistic
(i) Risk taker and change seeker.
IV Intuition/ Introvert Intuition type
(i) concerned with probabilities then actual (Prophet type).
(ii) not interested in external facts.
(iii) moody and temperamental.
Extrovert Feeling type
(i) helpful nature.
(ii) feel for others and admire others.
(iii) more social.
The classification has been criticised on the grounds that in general, such different types or classes as suggested by Jung do not exist. Most of us, on the basis of typical characteristics prescribed for extrovert and introvert. may belong to both of the categories, as may be called ambivert. This brings complication and, hence this type of approach does not give a clear picture of the Classification or description of personality.
Trait approach
In trait approach the personality is viewed in terms of traits. In our day-to-day conversation we label our friends and near ones with traits such as being honest, shy, aggressive, lazy, dull, dependent, etc. In the real sense, traits are defined as relatively permanent and relatively consistent general behaviour patterns that an individual exhibits in many situations. These patterns are said to be the basic units of one’s personality that can be discovered through observing one’s behaviour in a variety of situations. A person if he behaves honestly in several situations, after having generalization may be labeled as honest and honesty or laziness becomes a behavioural trait of his personality.
G.B. Allport (1897-1967) was the first personality theorist who adopted trait approach in providing a theory of personality. According to him, an individual develops an unique set of organized tendencies Or traits, generally, these traits are organised around a few cardinal (primary) traits. Allport’s theory of personality thus rejected the notion of a relatively limited number of personality types in favour of descriptions of highly individual personalities made up of a large number of traits.
Cattell’s theory
The most recent advanced theory of personality based on trait approach has been developed by Raymond B. Cattell, a British born American researcher. He has defined trait as a structure of the personality inferred from behaviour in different situations and describes four types of traits:
(i) Common traits: the traits found widely distributed in general population like honesty, aggression and cooperation.
(ii) Unique traits: unique to a person as temperamental traits, emotional reactions.
(iii) Surface traits: able to be recognized by our manifestation of behaviour like curiosity, dependability, tactfulness.
(iv) Source traits: Underlying structures or sources that determine one’s behaviour such as dominance, submission, emotionality etc.
The theory propagated by Cattell intends to give certain specific dimensions to personality so that the human behaviour, related to a particular situation, can be predicted. Cattell has adopted factor analysis as a technique for this work. We shall try to understand how he has done it in a non-technical way.
(1) Cattell began by attempting to obtain a complete list of all possible human behaviours. tn 1946 he formed a list of over 17000 traits and by eliminating similarities and synonyms reduced them to a list of 171 words (dictionary words) related with personality and called these trait-elements.
(2) The next step was to find out how they are related. He found that each trait element correlated high with some and low with others. In this way he managed to form some specific groups and called them Surface Traits. These surface traits identified were 35 in number.
(3) Again he went on examining these surface traits in terms of their intercorrejations. There was overlapping. The removal of such overlapping gave him the desired basic dimeasions which he called Source Traits i.e., the real structural influence underlying personality.
(4) After obtaining source traits (which are 15 in number) he tried to use them to predict behaviour employing what is known as specification equation.
Response = s1T1+s2T2+s3T3 ———Sn Tn
In this way the response or behaviour of an individual is predicted from the degree to which he exhibits each source trait (T) moditied by the importance of the trait for that response(s).
Let us clear it by an example.
Suppose that academic performance (AP) is predictable from two source traits called Intelligence (I) and Reading habits (R), then AP = s1I+s2R
Now also suppose that Intelligence is more important for this behaviour than Reading habits (in the ratio of 5: 3); then we might have an expression such as AP =5i+3R.
Thus in order to predict Academic performance (A.P.) tor an individual we need to know his intelligence and scores on reading habits.
In addition to this in 1950, Cattell, devised the Sixteen Personality factor questionnaire in the form of an inventory, these factors, which he claimed, may work as a “building blocks’’ of personality.
These sixteen factors (twelve independent and four partially independent), involved in the personality structure, are produced low:
A Reserved
B Less intelligent
C Affected by feelings
E Submissive
F Serious
G Expedient
H Timid
I Tough-minded
L Trusting
M Practical
N Forthright
O Self-assured
Q2 Conservative
Q3 Group-dependent
Q4 Uncontrolled Relaxed
V/S
↓
V/S
Outgoing,
More intelligent
Emoticnally Stable.
Dominant
Happy-go-Lucky. Conscientious
Venturesome
Sensitive.
Suspicious.
Imaginative
Shrewd
Apprehensive
Experimenting
Self-sufficient
Controlled
Tense
Type-cum-trait approach
This approach tries to synthesize the type and trait approaches. Starting from the trait approach it yields definite personality types. The Eyesenck theory of personality reflects such an approach.
Eysenck’s theory of personality
While Cattell has tried to give dimensions to personality by giving traits, Eysenck gave it more specification by grouping traits into definite types.
We have four levels of behaviour organisation.
(i) At the lowest level we have specific responses.
They grow out of particular responses to any single act. For example ‘blushing’ is a specific response.
(ii) At the second level we have habitual responses. If the individual reacts in a similar fashion when the same situation reoccurs we get habitual responses. For example the responses like:
(a) Not easily picking up friendship.
(b) Hesitant to talk to strangers etc., are habitual responses.
(iii) At the third level we have organisation of habitual acts into traits. The behaviour acts which have similarities are said to belong to one group called trait. In the above example the habitual responses no. (a) and (b) etc., give birth to a group or trait called ‘Shyness’.
(iv) At the fourth level we have organisation of these traits into a general type. A type is defined as a group of correlated traits. The traits which are similnr in nature give birth to a definite type just as in the given earlier, the traits like persistence, rigidity, shyness etc., have been grouped into a type which is ‘Introversion’.
Now at this final stage, ultimately, we obtain a definite type. A person, now can be classified as an Introvert if he has traits as described at III level, habits and habit systems as described at level II and responds specifically as described at level.
Eysenck has given the following distinct types:
(1) Introversion
(3) Neuroticism
(2) Extraversion.
(4) Psychoticism.
He has also tried to link different traits and characteristics with each of these types.
Developmental approach
The theories adopting developmental approach take into consideration, the. developmental patterns or characteristics of one’s personality.. How does the human personality develop gradually from various stages of growth and development? What directs or energises the forces of development of the personality? What type of personality characteristics are acquired as a result of development etc.? Let us iry to discuss some of the views mentioned involving this developmental approach.
Freud’s psychoanalytic theory of personality
Freud’s theory of personality is built on the premise that the mind ts topographical and dynamic: there are provinces or divisions which are always moving and interrelated. The human mind has three main divisions in the form of conscious, semiconscious and unconscious.
These three levels of the human mind continuously clash and compromise to give birth to one or other types of behavioural characteristics leading to a particular type of personality. Besides believes the anatomy of our personality is built around this as Freud and interrelating systems: Id, ego and super ego the three unified.
The Id is the raw, savage and immoral basic stuff of a Man’s personality that is hidden in the deep layers of one’s unconscious mind. It consists of such ambitions, desires, tendencics and appetites of an individual as guided by pleasure seeking principle. It has no values, knows no laws, follows no rules, does not consider right from wrong and considers only the satisfaction of its needs and appetites.
Obviously. the Id cannot be allowed to discharge its energy wildly and irresponsibly and thereby a second system: the ego, functions as a police man to check the unlawful activities of the Id. It is the executive with Veto powers. It follows the principle of reality and acts with intelligence in controlling, selecting and deciding what appetites have to be satisfied and in which way they are to be satisfied.
The third system of personality is super ego. It is the ethical moral arm of the personality. It is idealistic and does not care for realities. Perfection is its goal rather than pleasure. It is a decisionmaking body which decides what is bad or good, virtue or vice according to the standard of society, which it accepts.
The above mentioned constituents of personality play a significant role in deciding the personality of an individual. Let us see how.
1. The individuals who have a strong or powerful ego are said to have a strong or balanced personality because in their cases ego is capable of maintaining proper balance between super ego and Id.
2. In case an individual possesses a weak ego, he is bound to have a maladjusted personality. Here two situations may arise. In one situation the super ego may be more powerful than ego, it does not provide a desirable outlet for the repressed wishes and impulses. Consequently it may lead towards the formation of a neurotic personality. In another situation Id may prove more powerful than ego. The person, thus may engage himself in unlawful or immoral activities leading towards the formation of a delinquent personality. In addition to the above structure of the personality built around the concepts of Id. Ego and Super ego, Freud tried to provide an explanation of the development of human personality through his ideas about Sex. He emphasized that Sex is a life energy. The sexual needs of an individual are the basic needs which have to be satisfied for a balanced growth of the personality. If we want to know about the personality of un individual. a knowledge of his sex needs and their status of satisfaction is sufficient to tell us all about a person. He will have an adjusted or maladjusted personality depending on the extent to which his sex needs have been satisfied or not.
So much was his emphasis on sex, that he linked the whole development of the personality with the sex. behaviour by putting his theory of psycho-sexual development. In this theory, he outlined the five different psycho-sexual stages for the development of personality namely, oral, anal, phallic, latency and genital. Here we would not provide the description or explanation about these stages as it has already been presented earlier in chapter two of this text.
Adler's individual approach to personality
Adicr opposed the Freudian’s structure of personality. He said that sex is not the life energy or the centre of human activities. Actually, power motive is the centre urge. Human beings are motivated by the urge to be important or powerful. All of us strive towards superiority but each strives in a different way. He named it as ‘style of life’. Therefore. what kind of personality one possesses, can be understood by studying his style of life 1.e., the goals of life he has set for himself and the way of striving for achieving these goals.
In this way he gave birth to the individual approach in the study of a personality pattern and maintained that there are no definite personality types or classes. Each individual is an unique pattern in himself because everybody has delinite goals and his own life style.
Carl Roger's self theory
Carl Ransom Rogers, an American psychologist, in 1947 brought out a new theory of personality named Self-theory quite distinct from the earlier theories of personality. He stressed the importance of an individual’s self for determining the process of his growth and development, and unique adjustment to his environmeat. Thero are two basic systems underlying his personality theory—the organism and the self. Rogers considers them as systems operating in one’s phenomenological field (a world of subjective experience, the personal and separate reality of each individual). The “‘organism” is an individual's entire frame of reference. It represents the totality of experience—both conscious and unconscious available with him. The second system the “Self” is the accepted, awareness part of experience. The self as a system of one’s phenomenal field can perhaps best be understood in terms of our concept of ‘‘I’’, ‘‘me” or “‘mysel ”.
What we think as a personality of an individual is the product of the interaction between the above mentioned systems of one’s phenomenological field. What we think of ourself or the acquisition of the concept of self is a long and continuous process. Human beings have inherited a tendency to develop their “self” in the process of inter-personal and social experiences which they have in the environment. In other words, our inner world —our natural impulses—interacts with our total range of experience to form the concept of our “Self”’. For example, if you say that you are a handsome person, you tend to include in the concept of your ‘‘self’’, the idea that you are handsome. in a similar way, we are ina continuous process of building the concept of our “‘self’. The so developed concepts of self may differ from person to person as they are purely based on one’s own personal experiences. Sometimes concepts of self are based more on personal needs than on reality, at other times as Rogers believes, we develop an ideal self i.e., a perception of what we would like to be.
Rogers does not propose a set of specific stages in the development of personality as proposed by Freud in his theory, rather he advocates continuity of growth in terms of the continuous evolution of the concept of ‘“‘self’. Once a concept of self is formed, the individual strives to maintain it. In order to do this, he regulates his behaviour. What is consistent with the concept of his self is immediately accepted and maintained at the conscious level while what threatens the image of self may be totally ignored or buried deep in bis unconscious.
The most unfortunate results in the development of one’s personality lie in the cases where an individual develops some false self-images. This false image is often so strong that obvious reality can be stoutly denied. Inconsistency between one’s actual image and false image, then may lead to abnormality in one's behaviour. Similarly, the development of an ideal self too inconsistent, unreasonable and unattainable to harmonise with one’s real self may result in maladjustment and serious personality disorders.
Contrary to this, an individual’s adjustment, nappiness, growth and development all depend upon the union and harmony between
the image of his self and the organism (i.e. the experience or situations he meets in his life). Stressing the theme of psychological personality theory, Rogers emphasizes that a person normally possesses a great capacity for growth and realization of his individual potential and thus tries to advance continuously towards the development of his self (i.e. self-actualization) jor creating harmony between the concept of his self and his real life ‘experiences resulting in feelings of self integrity, self fulfilment and satisfying psychological growth. However the development runs into trouble when the self fails for some reason to incorporate and learn to live with its own new thoughts, feelings or behaviours. The goal of a therapist. as Rogers advocates in his therapy, in such cases lies m bringing the individual from what he or she is not, in a more unified fashion, to what he or she really is.
Learning theories of personality
Learning theories of personality depicts anew developmental approach quite different from psychoanalytic and phenomenological theories of personality in the sense that they stress the importance of learning and objectivity to understand personality. The notable psychologists who are known to develop personality theories are Paviov, Watson, Guthrie, Thorndike, Skinner, Dollard and Miller, Bandura and Walters, etc. Here we would like to make special mention of the theories developed by Dollard and Miller and Bandura and Walters.
Dollard & Miller’s learning theory of personality
By combining the psychology of learning with aspects of psychoanalytic theory, John Dollard and Neal Miller (1950) in the Institute of Human Relations at Yale University provided their own theory of personality. In this theory they tried to substitute Freud's concept of a pleasure principle with the principle of reinforcement, concept of ego with the concept of learned drive and learned skills, concept of conflict with competing reinforcers, etc.
The theory of Dollard and Miller tries to describe the development of personality from simple’drives to complex function from a learning theory angle. It emphasizes that what we consider as a personality is learned. The child at birth is equipped with two types of basic factors: reflexes and innate hierarchies of responses and a set of primary drives, which are internal stimuli of great strength and are linked with known psysiological processes which impel him to action. Thus impelled by drives (both conditioned and unconditioned) he acquires responses to the extent that they reduce drives. Drive reduction yields in reinforcements (provides rewards) which in turn may give birth to many other drives or motives and set the individual to learn new responses and new behaviour patterns. Since our social environment is a major source of reinforcement, it plays a key role in creating new drives and motives, learning new responses and consequently developing our personality. In this way, Dollard and Miller's theory of personality stressed the acquisition of personality in the same way, as learning of most of the responses and behaviour through the process of motivation and reward. Dollard and Millec’s theory of personality in actual sense, did not prescribe any static structure in personality. Instead, it emphasized haba formation through learning as a key factor in the development of personality. Habits are formed by S.R. Connections through learning. As one gruws in learning on the basis of experiences and interaction with one’s environment, the habits are reorganised, new habitsare learned and consequently one gets changed and developed in terms of learning new behaviour and picking up new threads of styles of one’s lite.
Bandura and Walter's social learning theory
Albert Bandura and Richard Walters in 1963 gave altogether a new approach to personality in the shape of a social learning theory. This theory emphasizes that what one represents through his personality is very much acquired through a process of continuous structuring and restructuring of his experiences through social learning. Such type of social learning tukes place in the shape of observational learning when one gets opportunity to observe the behaviour of others considered as models. These behaviours are initiated, learned and produced by the individual at some later stage.
Such observational learning from social situations may involved both real and symbolic models. Children, for example, may learn social etiquette by watching their parents and elders as well as by direct instructions. What is perceived through mass media on T.V. or film screen in the form of the roles of one’s favourite hero or models is at once picked up by the viewers. The imitation of the model’s behaviour by the viewer is further reinforced by observing the reinforcement or reward that the model receives in response to his behaviour. The degree to which (i) the behaviour of the model, he observes, is reinforced and also (ii) his own learned behaviour, (through imitation) at a later stage, is reinforced, he is said to be benefited through such social or observational learning. Consequently, he picks up so many traits and modes of his behaviour from so many modelling sources that are responsible for the formation and development of his unique personality.
ASSESSMENT OF PERSONALITY
Why we have named the topic as assessment of personality and not simply as measurement of personality is a question which needs to be answered. The answer to this question lies itself in a questionis the measurement of personality possible? If not, what are the difficulties which have to be faced while trying to measure it? Let us think over it.
Difficulties in the measurement of personality
There are three basic elements involved in any process of measurement upon which the success or failure of this process depends. They are:
(i) The nature of the thing we want to measure,
(ii) Nature of the instruments with the help of which we have to measure it.
(iii) Nature of the person who is going to measure. Let us evaluate the personality measure on the above criteria.
(i) The nature of the thing: Personality is so complex that it is hardly possible to make it an object of measurement. First, because personality is not the thing, itis an idea. It is an abstraction, and in attempting to measure it we go wrong in trying to give it a concrete shape. Second, we are not clear about what exactly we want to measure in personality. Psychologists have reached no agreement about the dimensions or elements in personality. Third, personality is a dynamic phenomenon. It is not static. How can one measure a thing which is ever in a process of change and modification. Its measurement will certainly differ from time to time and hence it is not proper to call it measurement.
(ii) The nature of the instruments. The process of measurement, in addition to the object of measurement requires the tools and the satisfactory units of measurement. In personality measurement, we also encounter difficulties such as:
(a) There is no zero (starting point) for reference in case of personality. No child is born with zero personality.
(6) In measuring a rod we can measure it in terms of the unit of length like centimeters, inches etc. In measuring temperature we have units in terms of degrees but in psychological measurement we do not have any such equivalent or regular unit of measurement.
(c) For measurement we require such scales or measuring instruments as are exact, reliable and valid in terms of their results. In the field of personality measurement we do not find such satisfactory instruments.
(iii) The nature of the person. To a great extent, the objectivity, reliability and validity in any process of measurement depends upon the competency and impartiality or objectivity on the part of the person who performs the task of measurement. But after all he isa human being, having his own beliefs, likes and dishkes, tastes and temperaments and hence we cannot check the ‘influence of his subjectivity on any work of personality measurement.
In this way the actual measurement (which defines itself in terms of objectivity, reliability and validity) of personality is not possible. Also it is very difficult to go in search of all the constituents or elements Of personality, most of which are unknown. Moreover prediction of the future status is the most essential aim of measurement. In case of a dynamic phenomenon like personality such prediction is not possible and hence it is not justified to use the term measurement. We can only have an estimate of assessment personality.
Techniques and methods used for the appraisal of assess. ment of personality
The methods used for the assessment of personality are often classified as:
(i) Subjective methods
(ii) Objective methods
(iii) Projective methods.
But this classification suffers from so many drawbacks. It is difficult to draw a straight line between subjectivity and objectivity, even projective techniques cannot be saved from the subjectivity and self-projection of the examiner. Actually speaking, there is nothing like absolute objectivity in these methods. Objectivity (if at all we can have it) is nothing but subjectivity pooled together. Therefore it is proper to seek other ways of classifying the methods Of personality assessment.
We can classify these techniques in the following five categories.
First, there are techniques, where we can see how an individual behaves in actual life situations. The main techniques in this category are:
(a) Observation technique,
(b) Situation tests.
Second, there are techniques by which we can find what an individual says about himself. The main techniques in this category are:
(a) Autobiography
(b) Questionnaire and Personality Inventory
(c) Interview.
Third, there are techniques by which we can find what others say about the individual whose personality is under assessment. The main techniques in this class are:
(a) Biographies
(b) Case-history method.
(c) Rating Scales
(d) Sociometric techniques.
Fourth, there are techniques by which we can find how an individual reacts to an imaginative situation involving fantasy. All kinds of projective techniques are included in this class,
Fifth, there are techniques by which we can indirectly determine some personality variables in terms of physiological responses by machines and technical instruments.
SOME IMPORTANT TECHNIQUES
1. Observation
Observation is a popular method to study the behaviour pattern of an individual in actual life situation. What personality traits or characteristics the observer needs to know, are first decided by him and then he observes relevant activities of the subject in real life situations. The observation can be done in two ways. In one the observer does not hide his presence. He rather, becomes more or less a part of the group under observation. While in the other, he takes a position ata place where his presence is least disturbing to the gtoup but from where he can observe in detail the behavieur of an individual under observation. For having a clear idea the observer can make use of tape-recorder, photographic cameras, telescope otc. To ascertain whether the observer can rely on the observed results he can repeat observations in the same situation a number of times, or the subject may be observed by a number of observers and the results may be pooled together.
2. Situational tests
Here the situation is artificially created in which an individual is expected to perform acts related to the personality traits under testing. For example to test the honesty of an individual, some situations can be created and his reaction can be evaluated in terms of honesty or dishonesty. Does he feel temptation of copying? Does he try to pick up the one rupee note in a given situation?, all such instances can lead towards the assessment of the trait of honesty in the individual. “
3. Questionnaire
What is a questionnaire can be understood by the following description given by Goode and Hatt:
“‘In general the word questionnaire refers to a device for securing answers to questions by using a form which the respondent fills in himself.” (1952, p. 33).
This definition makes it clear that in collecting information from the subject himself about his personality characteristics, a form consisting of a series of printed or written questions, is used. The subject responds to these questions in the space provided in the form under the columns yes, no or cannot say (?) etc. These answers are then evaluated and used for personality assessment. Items, like the following, are included in the questionnaires:
Do you enjoy being alone? Yes, no, ? (not definite)
Do you enjoy seeing others successful? Yes, no, ? (not definite
Do you laugh at a joke on you? Yes, no, ? (not definite
Do you get along well with your relatives? Yes, no, ? (not definite
It is the most popular method and is quite useful in collecting quantitative as well as qualitative information. .
4. Personality inventory
It resembles Questionnaires in so many aspects like administration, scoring, interpretation etc. The difference can be seen in two ways.
First, the questionnaire is the general device and can be used fof collecting all kinds of information (not only connected with personality traits or behaviour of an individual). Personality Inventor, is specially designed to seek answers about the person and his personality.
Second, the questions, set in the Questionnaire, are generally addressable to the second person. They are such as:
Do you often feel lonely? Yes, no, ? while in the Personality Inventory, they are usually addressed to the first person such as: I often feel lonely. Yes, no, ?
The best known Personality Inventory is the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI). The questions, included in this inventory are such that their answers are known to indicate certain specific personality traits. It consists of 550 items. Some of these items are presented below for illustration:
I sweat very easily even on cool days.
There is something wrong with my sex organs. I have never been in love with any one. I like to talk about sex.
Each item is printed on a separate card. The subject reads the questions and then, according to the category of his response—yes, no or doubtful—puts them at three places. With the help of these responses, evaluation in terms of the important personality traits can be obtained.
The Questionnaire and Personality Inventory suffer from the following drawbacks:
(i) It is difficult to get the response to all Questions.
(ii) The subject may give selected responses rather than the genuine ones (hide his weaknesses etc.).
(iii) He may be ignorant of certain traits or qualities which he may possess.
5, Rating scale
Rating scale is used to know from cthers where an individual stands in terms of some personality traits. Usually with the help of this technique, we try to have some specific idea about some of the personality traits of an individual (whom we do not know well), from the person, who knows him very well. It reflects the impression the subject has made upon the person who rates him. The three basic things involved in this technique are:
(i) The specific trait or traits to be rated.
(ii) The scale by which degree of possession or absence of the trait has to be shown.
(iii) The appropriate persons or judges for rating.
First of all, the traits or characteristics, which have to be evaluated by tho judges are to be stated and defined clearly. Then a scale for rating work is to be constructed. How it is done can be under stood through the following example.
‘Suppose we wish ta have rating on the ‘Quality of Leadership’ of the students of a class. We can have divisions of this quality into degrees such as very good, good, average, poor, very poor, etc. Now the arrangement of these divisions along a line, at equal intervals, from high to low or otherwise will be named as Rating Scale for assessing the quality of leadership. Usually the degrees are indicated by numbers, 1 to 3,1 to or 1 to 7, comprising three points, five point or seven points scale. The seven point scale is of tho following type:
7 Excellent 6 Very good 5 Good 4 Average 3 Below average 2 Poor 1 Very poor
Now the raters, who are in a position to rate the individuals properly, can be asked to rate them and give them scores, ranging from 1 to 7, according to the degree of leadership they possess.
Rating techniques suffer from some drawbacks like subjective bias and halo effect etc. In the former, the rater may have bis own likes and dislikes and this may go to colour his estimates about the individuals under rating, where under tho halo effect, he may rate an individual (on the basis of general impression) to be more honest or likeable than his actual potentialities.
To bring some reliability it has been suggested that instead of having rating by only one judge. we can assign the rating work to a number of judges—for example to different teachers, classmates, Parents etc.—who can pool in their judgements or ratings.
6. Interview
Interview is a technique of getting information, directly from the subject about his personality in face to face contacts. It gives an opportunity for mutual exchange of ideas and information between the subject and the Psychologists. For this purpose, the Psychologist tries to fix a face to face appointment with the person or persons under assessment. He makes sure of the personality traits or behaviour he has to assess and then he plans, accordingly. Usually, a list of questions, to be put, is prepared for this purpose and after taking the subject into confidence, the psychologist tries to seek answers to his pre-planned questions. He does not only care for the content of the responses but the tone, behaviour and other similar factors, are also kept in mind for the proper evaluation of the desued personality pattern of the individuals.
The limitation of this technique Is that it needs a well trained competent interviewer. It is costly in terms of labour, time and money.
It also suffers from the subjective bias of the interviewor, Here also like Questionnaire and Personality Inventory, we cannot have any safeguard to stop the subject to hide his feelings or to respond in terms cf selective answers. On the credit side, 100 percent to answer the questions put to the subject, are obtained through interview. There is very little danger of not getting answers to the questions and moreover we can get most confidential information from the subject which otherwise, he hesitates to reveal through writing. In fact, interview is relatively, a more flexible tool. It permits explanation, adjustment and variations according to the situation and thus proves one of the essential ard important tools for the personality assessment.
7. Projective techniques
So far we have discussed only those techniques which usually evaluate the overt or conscious behaviour of an individual. The covert or unconscious behaviour, by all means, is not so insignificant; rather it is more significant than the former, as Freud believes that our conscious behaviour is only one-tenth of the total behaviour. Therefore, there should be some other techniques which not only emphasize on the observable part of the human personality but can reveal his inner or private world and go deeper in the unconscious behaviour of an individual to dig out the repressed feelings, wishes, desires, fears, hopes and ambitions, etc.
Projective techniques are devised to accept the challenge. They try to assess the total personality of an individual and not in fragments. Let us see what these techniques are.
What are the projective techniques
These techniques are based on the phenomenon of projection. In these techniques relatively indefinite and unstructured stimuli (like vague pictures, ink-blots, incomplete sentences, etc.) are provided to the subject and he is asked to structure them in any way he likes. In doing so he unconsciously projects his own desires, hopes, fears, repressed wishes etc, and thus not only reveals his inner or private world but gives a proper clue to estimate his total personality. The common Projective Techniques are:
The Rorschach ink-blot test
This technique has been developed by the Swiss psychologist, son of an art teacher Mr. Harmans Rorschach. Material of the test consists of 10 cards on which we have ink-blots. Five of them are in black and white and five are multi-coloured. These ink-blots are completely unstructured—the shapes of the blots do not have any specific meaning.
Administration of the test
(i) The cards are presented one at a time in a specified order. When the subject takes his seat, the examiner gives him the first card with necessary instructions. He is asked to say what he sees in it, what does it look like, etc,
(ii) The subject is allowed as much time as he wants for a given card and is permitted to give as many responses to it as he wishes. He is also allowed to turn the card around and look at it from any angle to find things in it,
(iii) Besides keeping a record of the responses of the subject concerning these ink-blots on different pieces of paper, the examiner notes the time taken for each response, position in which cards are being held, emotional expression and other incidental behaviour of the subject during the test period etc.
(iv) After all the cards have been presented, the second phase of inquiry follows. It is mtended to seek clarification or addition to original responses.
Scoring, analysis and interpretation of the test: For the purpose of scoring, the responses are given specific symbols which are entered in 4 columns.
These scoring categories are named as:
(i) Location, (ii) Contents, (iii) Originality and (iv) Determinants.
Location (The first column). Location refers to the part of the blot with which the subject associates each response. The symbol W,D,d and 8 are used for scoring the location responses. The symbols stand for the things given ahead:
(W) for that response which shows that the subject is seeing the card as a whole.
(D) indicates large details.
(d) indicates small details.
(s) indicates the subject’s response to the white spaces within the main outlines.
Contents (2nd column). This column concerns itself with the contents of the responses. It simply takes note of what is seen by the subject and not the manner of its perception. Below we write some of the symbols used for scoring the content of the responses:
Scoring symbol Content of the response
H Subject sees human forms.
A Subject sees animal forms.
Ad or Hd Subject sees animal detail or human detail.
N Subject sees natural objects like rivers, mountains, green fields etc.
O Subject sees inanimate objects like lamp shade, pot, etc.
In this way for details of the contents the symbols are used and entered into the 2nd column.
Originality (3rd column). For each of 10 cards, certain responses are scored as popular, by symbol P, because of their common occurrence with some others in which something new is given, and thus they indicate some type of originality in them, are scoredjas original and depicted by the symbol O.
Determinants (4th column). This column takes note of the manner of perception i.e., the particular characteristics which have helped the subject in determining the blot of deciding his manner of perception. The main determinants are: (i) the form (F) of the blot, (ii) its colour (C), (iii) movement (M) and (iv) shading (K).
For example, if the subject responds to a blot as butterfly. then. we can say that it is the ‘‘form”’ which led to this way of seeing it and then we score the response as F. On the other hand, if the subject sees something like fire, blood etc., then the determinant is certainly the ‘“‘colour’’ and we enter C in the fourth column.
Subject’s responses on account of “‘shading” e.g., perception of rough or smooth surfaces, smoke, cloud etc., are scored as K, whereas if the subject responds in terms of ‘movements’ —movement of human beings (like boy running, dancing etc.), animal being (like dog barking) or inanimate objects (water owing, cloth moving etc.) the symbols, M Fmor m are entered in the 4th column of dcterminants. We can have cases where we note thom by mixed symbols as (CF), (FK), etc.
Interpretation: Now, in all the four columns the different symbols are counted. It gives an idea of the relative frequencies of different kinds of responses. The entry of scores (in symbols) in different columns can be roughly made in the following way:
I Column location Il Column content lIl Column Originality lV Determinant Frequency
The relative frequencies of the different symbols within the scoring categories and among the several categories help the interpreter to decide the personality characteristics of the subject. For example if:
(i) the number of W’s are greater than d or D; then the person is said to be mature, intelligent and is expected to possess the ability to synthesize.
(ii) More frequency on the side of the colour at the expense of human movement indicates an extrovert nature while domination of M over colour, an introvert.
(iii) Dominance of shading responses expresses anxiety, depressed attitudes and feeling of inferiority and
(iv) Relatively more emphasis on movement indicates richness of one’s imaginative life.
It is not only the relative importance or occurrence of certain kinds of responses which help in interpretation, the various other factors like time factor, the behaviour of the subject at the time of reactions etc., also have their meanings.
Therefore, it is only through various kinds of relationships, observations, records and integration of results from various parts that a final global picture about a subject’s personality can be drawn. The test demands a lot of training and skill in scoring and interpretation on the part of the examiner and therefore, the work should be considered as a serious one and should only be done by an experienced and trained psychologist.
TAT or Thematic Apperception Test
The test consisting of perception of a certain picture in a Thematic manner (revealing imaginative themes) is called TAT or The matic Apperception Test. This test was developed by Murray and Morgan.
Test material and administration: It consists of 30 pictures which portray human beings ina variety of actual life situations. Ten of these cards are meant for males, 10 for females and 10 for both. In this way the maximum number of pictures used with any subiect is 20. The test is usually administered in two sessions, using 10 pictures in cach session.
The pictures are presented one at a time. They are vague and indefinite. The subject is told clearly that this is a test of creative Imagination and that there is no right and wrong response. He has to make up a story for each of the pictures presented to him, within a fixed time period. He has to take care of the following aspects while knitting the story:
(i) What is going on in the picture? (ii) What has led to this scene? (iii) What would happen in such a situation?
In making up the stories the subject unconsciously projects so many characteristics of his personality. There is no time to think. Therefore, the stories express his own life—natural desires, likes and dislikes, ambitions, emotions, sentiments etc. Its special value resides in its power of exploring the underlying hidden drives, complexes and conflicts of the personality. An expert examiner can know much about the personality of his subject by carefully interpreting the given responses.
Scoring and interpretation. Originally Murray analyzed the contents of the stories according to need and presses (the need of the hero and the environmental forces to which he is exposed). Today this way of interpretation is not generally followed. Nowadays, the system of scoring and interpretation takes account of the following:
(i) Hero of the Story—What type of personality he has?
(ii) Theme of the Story—What is the nature of the theme or plot used in making the story?
(iii) The style of the story—Length of the story, language used, direct or indirect expression, forced or poor expression, organisation of the contents, originality and creativity, etc.
(iv) The content of the story—What interests, sentiments, attitudes they depict. In which manner (reality or fantasy) the behaviour has been expressed. What inner-state of the mind, the story reveals.
(v) Test situation as a whole—The subject’s reaction to be listed as a whole.
(vi) Particular emphasis or omissions—The omission, addition, distortion and attention to particular details.
(vii) Subject’s attitude towards authority and sex.
(viii) Outcome. Conclusion of the story—happy, unhappy, Comedy, etc.
As a whole, the recurring themes and features contribute more than a single response towards interpretation. Moreover, the global view of one’s personality should be based on the responses of all the 20 pictures shown to the subject. There are so many chances of misinterpreting the stories’ contents by an immature examiner. Therefore, the future of TAT hangs on the possibility of perfecting the interpreter more than in perfecting the material. He should be given full opportunity for acquiring essential knowledge and training for this purpose.
CAT (Children Apperception Test)
TAT test works well with adults and adolescents but for children it is not suitable. For children between 3 to 10 years, the CAT was developed by D. Leopold Bellak.
Description of the test: It consists of 10 cards. The cards have pictures of animals instead of human characters since it Was thought that children could identify themselves with animal figures more readily than with persons. These animals are shown in various life situations. For both sexes, all the 10 cards are needed. The pictures are designed to evoke fantasies relating to a child’s own experience, reactions and feeling. Whatever story the child makes, he projects himself. It isa colour free test but it demands some alterations rocording to the child’s local conditions.
Administering the test: All the 10 cards are presented one by one and the subject is asked to mike up stories on them. The child should have confidence and he should take story making a pleasant game to play with.
Interpretation. Interpretation of the stories is centred round the following eleven variables:
(i) Hero. The personality traits of the hero as revealed by the story.
(ii) Theme of the story. What particular theme has he selected for the story building?
(iii) The end of the story: Happy ending or unhappy, wishful, realistic or unrealistic.
(iv) Attitude towards parental figures. Hatred, respectful, devoted, grateful, dependent, aggressive and fearful, etc.
(v) Family role. With whom in the family the child identifies himself.
(Vi ) Other outside figures introduced. Objects or external elements introduced in the story but not shown in the pictures.
(vii) Omitted or ignored figures. Which figures are omitted or ignored should be noted as they may depict the wish of the subject that the figures were not there.
(viii) Nature of the anxietics. Harassment, loss of love, afraid of being left alone etc., should also be noted.
(ix) Punishment for crime. The relationship between a crime committed in the story and severity of punishment given for it.
(x) Defence and confidence. The type of defences, flight, ageression, passivity, regression etc., the child takes, nature of compliance or dependence, involvement in pleasure and achievement, sex desire, etc.
(xi) Other supplementary knowledge. The language, the overall structure of the stories, time taken for completing them and the reactions of the subject at the time of making the story etc.
With all this knowledge an expert interpreter can pronounce judgement on the various aspects of the child's personality.
Word association test
In this technique there are a number of selected words. The subject is told that:
(i) the examiner will utter a series of words, one at a time,
(ii) after each word the subject is to reply as quickly as possib!e With the first word that comes to his mind, and
(iii) there is no right or wrong response.
The examiner then records the reply to each word spoken by him; the reaction time and any unusual speech or behaviour manifestations accompanying a given response. The contents of the responses along with the other recorded things give clues for evaluating the human Personality and thus help a psychologist in his work.
Sentence completion tests
These tests include a list of incomplete sentences, generally ‘open at the end, which require completion by the subject in one or more words. The subject is asked to go through the list and answer as quickly as possible (without giving a second thought to his answers). For example, we can have the following sentences:
I feel proud when........
My hero is.........
I feel proud when ....
The Sentence completion tests are regarded as superior to Word Association because the subject may respond with more than one word. Also there it is possible to have a greater flexibility and variety of responses and more area of personality and experiences may be tapped.
In addition to the projective techniques mentioned above there are some others which may prove useful in many situations. They are play technique, drawing and painting tests etc. Both of these techniques are very useful in the case of small children. In the former, the examiner observes the spontaneous behaviour of the children while playing or constructing something with the help of given material and in the latter, the natural free hand drawing and paintings of the children are the matter of the study. Both of these techniques provide a good opportunity for the careful analysis of a child’s personality.
SUMMARY
A good personality is often taken as synonymous to one’s charming appearance, healthy build-up, pleasing behaviour patterns, good character, fine temperament, etc. The personality, although it includes all these aspects of one’s self, yet is far beyond each or the sum total of these attributes. It may be defined as a complex blend of a constantly evolving and changing pattern of one’s unique behaviour, emerged as a result of one’s interaction with his environment, directed towards some specific ends in view.
Personality theories try to throw light on the structure of personality by adopiing various approaches like type, trait, trait-cum type and developmental approach.
Theories adopting type approach try to classify people into categories or type according to certain characteristics. Hippocrate classified people according tothe type of humour or fluid found in one’s body. Kretschmer emphasized specific biological types based on body structures. Sheldon also identified three distinct types based on the relationship between a person’s physique and behaviour. Hung too adopted the type approach in classifying people in terms of introversion and extroversion.
Theories adopting trait approach try to describe people in terms of an unique pattern of traits. They dofine traits as relatively permanent and relatively consistent general behaviour patterns that an individual exhibits in many situations. Notable among these theories are the personality theories of Allport and Cattell. Cuttell used factor analysis to identify surface traits and source traits and provided sixteen factors as the building blocks of personality.
Eysenck's theory of personality presents trait cum type approach towards personality. Starting from the traits it yielded definite personality types.
Theories adopting developmental approach try to describe personality from a development angle. Freud used this approach in providing psychoanalytic theory of personality. He proposed that there are three mind levels—the conscious, the sub-conscious and the unconscious that operate to shape personality. Besides this be believed that the anatomy of our personality is build-around three unified and interrelated systems: Id, ego and super ego. He also held that sexuality is at the core of human behaviour. For the development of the personality, the child has to pass through five psychosexual stages, namely, oral, anal, phallic, latent and genital.
Adler, while disagreeing with Freud emphasized power motive as a life energy in place of sex. He gave birth to individual approach in the study of personality.
Carl Rogers’ self theory holds personality asa function of the interaction between the two systems (The organism and the self) of one’s world of subjective experience. He likened personality with the development and maintenance of the self-concept and the attempt to achieve the ideal self.
Dollard and Miller in his learning theory of personality attempted to combine learning theory with psychoanalytic theory and viewed personality asa function of drive reduction. Bandura and Walters in his theory of social learning emphasized that people acquire personality characteristics by observing and imitating real life and symbolic models
We can only have the éstimate or assessment of personality as the true measurement of one’s personality is not possible. This assessment can be made through a variety of techniques like observation, situation, tests, questionnaire, personality inventory, rating scale, interview, and projective techniques.
Projective techniques make use of ambiguous or unstructured stimuli in order to permit people to impose their own perception of stimuli. The various techniques involved in such category may be named as Rorschach Ink-blot Test, Thematic Apperception Test (TAT), Children Apperception Test (CAT), Word Association Test, sentence completion test, play technique, drawing and painting test, etc.
References and Suggested Readings
Abramson, Paul R., Personality, New York: Holt, 1980.
Adler. A., Practice and Theory of Individual Psychology, New York: Harcourt Brace & World, 1927
Anastasi, A., Psychological testing (2nd ed.) New York: Macmillan, 1961,
Allport, G.W., Personality—-A Psychological Interpretation, New York: Holt, 1948.
Allport, G.W., Pattern and Growth in Personality, New York: Hott, 1961;
Bandura, A & Walters, R.H., Social Learning and Personality Development, New York; Holt, 1963.
Bhatia, H.R., Elements of Educational Psychology (3rd ed. reprint), Calcutta, Orient Longman, 196s..
Butcher, James, N., Objective Personality Assessment, New York: Academic Press, 1972.
Cattell, R.B. quoted by Hall, C.S. and [Lindzey, G -» (2nd ed.) Theories of Personality, John Wiley, 1970,
Cohen, R and Dirk, L Schaeffer, Patterns of Personality Judgment, New York: Academic Press, 1973.
Cronbach, L.J., Essentials of Psychological Testing (3rd ed.) New York: Harper & Row, 1970.
Dollard, J and Miller, N.E., Personality and Psychotherapy, New York: McGraw-Hill, 1950.
Eysenck, H J., Dimensions of Personality, London: Kegan Paul, 1947.
Esenck, H.J., The Structure of Human Personality (3rd ed.) New York: Methuen, 1971.
Fordham, F., An Introduction to Jung’s Psychology, London: Penguin Books, 1953.
Freud, S., An outline of Psychoanalysis, New York: Norton, 1939. Freud, S., An outline of Psychoanalysis, London: Hogart, 1953. Good and Hatt, Methods of Social Research, New York: McGraw Hill, 1952.
Hall. C.S. and Nordby, V.J., A Primer of Jungian Psychology, New York: New American Library, 1973.
Hall, C.S. and Lindzey, G., Theories of Personality (3rd ed.) New York: John Wiley, 1978.
Hogan R., Personality Theory—Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 197
Janis, I.L-, Mahl. G.F., Kagan, J & Holt R.R., Personality Dynamics, Development and Assessment, New York: Harcourt Brace, 1969.
Jones, E., The Life and Work of Sigmund Freud (Lionell Trilling and Steven Marcus, eds.) Garden City, New York: Anchor, 1963.
Klopter. |B and Kelley, D., The Rorschach Technique, Yonkers: World Book Co. 1946.'
Kretschmer, E , Physique and Character, New York: Harcourt Brace, 1925.
Maddi,S.R., Personalities Theories: A Comparative Assessment, Homewood Illinois: Dorsey, 1672.
Mischel, Walter, Personalisies and Assessment, New York: John Wiley, 1976.
GLOSSARY
Absolute threshold: The minimum amount of physical stimulus that is needed to produce a sensation 50 per cent of the time.
Accommodation, visual: The change in shape of the lens to focus an image on the retina.
Achievement motive: An urge to succeed, to perform well or better than others.
Achievement test: Test designed to measure what an individual has already learned.
Achromatism: Complete colour blindness caused by the absence of cones in the retina of the eye.
Activation theory of emotion: Theory stating the emotion is a state of general excitation.
Adaptation level: Standard level of stimulation to which an individual has become accustomed and which he then uses in Judging other stimuli.
Adrenalin (epinephrine): Hormones produced by the adrenal glands to assist the body in reacting to stress.
Adrenocorticothropic hormone (ACTH): Pituitary hormones associated with stress.
A ffiliation motive: An urge to be with others.
After images, Visual: An image that persists after the termination of stimulus.
All-or-none law: Principle that nerve fibres respond completely or not at all..
Ambivalence: In psychoanalytic theory, the simultaneous and often unconscious holding of opposite emotions, such as love and hate toward one person.
Ambivert: Alternating introvert and extrovert. Amplitude: Half the distance between the trough and the height of the crest of a wave.
Anal stage: Second stage of psycho sexual development in Freudian psychology.
Androgens: Male sex hormones, also secreted in small amount in females.
Aperceptive mass: The totality of a person's associations to a stimulus or an event.
Apparent motion: Motion perceived because the observer sees an object in successive different positions rather than because the object is actually moving.
Aptitude: Specific ability indicative of one’s potentiality to get desired future success. Auditory area: Area of the cortex stimulated by the auditory
sensory neurons located along the upper portion of the temporal fobe.
Autokinetic motion: The apparent movement of a stationary object such as a point of light m a dark room.
Autosome: 22 pairs of chromosomes that determine the development of our body structures and characteristics.
Axon: Extended nerve fibre that carries impulses from one cell body to other nerve celis or to a muscle or glands.
Basilar Membrane: The membrane within the cochlea of the inner ear on which the organ of Corti is located.
Basket nerve findings: Nerve ending wrapped around the base of a hair, receptor for the pressure sense.
Behaviour modification. Change in behaviour brought about by Operant conditioning techniques.
Binaural cues: Cues for the distance and location of sounds requiring two ears.
Binocular cues: Cues for depth perception requiring two eyes. Binocular disparity: The difference between the retinal images of the two eyes that arises because each eye sees an object from a slightly different location.
Blaky Test: A projective test using a series of cartoons of dogs who engage in behaviour that the subject describes in a story.
Blind Spot: Small spot in the retina with no light sensitive cells.
Brain Stem: Lower part of the brain, an enlargement of the spinal cord.
Brightness constancy: Perception of objects as maintaining the same brightness even though the amount of light reaching the retina changes.
Castration complex: A concept in Freudian theory attributed to children involving fear of losing the penis for males and anxiety at having ‘‘lost” the penis for females.
Catharsis: A process involving the release of emotional tension through expression of the emotion.
Cerebellum: The part of the brain close to the brainstem responsible for body balance and coordination of body movements.
Cerebral Cortex: Thick folded layer of tightly packed nerves covering the cerebrum also called the new brain.
Cerebrum: Largest part of the braim composed of the two cerebral hemispheres, left brain and the right brain.
Chromosomes: Threadlike body in the cell nucleus that contains genes.
Chronological ages Age in years or calendar age.
Chunking: Grouping associated bits of material into one unit for processing by memory.
Classical conditioning: A kind of learning in which a conditioned stimulus comes to elicit a response after having been paired with an unconditioned stimulus that innately elicits the response.
Closure: Gestaltist’s term for a person’s perceptual tendency to “close up” figures.
Cochlea: Part of the ear containing fluid that vibrates, which ijn turn causes the basilar membrane to vibrate.
Cognitive dissonance: Perceived in consistency between, two different beliefs, ideas or attitudes,
Cognitive map: Concept developed by Tolman, involving a spatial representation or formation of mental hypothesis to reach a goal.
Collective unconscious: A term used by Jung for the part of the
unconscious that is inherited and common to all members of a ‘species.
Colour anomalies: Defects of colour vision in which the colours of some wave lengths are abnormally perceived.
Colour blindness: Partial or total inability to perceive colours.
Colour mixing: The mixing together of pigments or lights or different colours to form new colours.
Concept: Generalized idea involving perception of a particular shared property in a given group of stimuli.
Concordance: A simple measure of the resemblance between pairs of individuals or objects.
Cones. Receptor cells in the retina responsible for colour vision.
Connected discourse: Written or spoken grammatical utterances; normal language.
Control group: Group exposed to all experimental conditions
except the independent variable in order to compare with the experimental group.
Cornea: Transparent outer coating in front of the iris of the eye.
Cultural fair test: Intelligence test designed to eliminate cultural bias.
Dark adaptation: A kind of visual adaptation involving increasing ability to see after being in the dark for a time.
Death instinct: A Freudian concept representing an urge leading to destruction and death.
Decay theory of forgetting: Theory of forgetting which holds that memorizedmaterial gradually fades from memory over time.
Decibel: Unit of measurement for the loudness of sounds.
Delusion: A fixed but erroneous belief strongly held even though it does not correspond to physical or social realities.
. Dependent variable: The variable that undergoes change, in an experiment with the changes introduced in the independent variable.
Deprivation: Condition under which needs are unfulfilled.
Dendrite: Fibre extending from the neuron which receives information from sense organs or the axon of an adjacent neuron and passes it to the cell body.
Difference threshold: Smallest difference between a pair of stimuli that can be perceived, also called just noticeable difference.
Dominant gene: A gene with the capacity to express itself wholly, to the exclusion of the other member of the pair of genes.
Drive reduction: Diminution of the state of tension of an organism by the achievement of a reinforcing goal.
Eardrum: A thin stretchable membrane in the middle ear that vibrates when sound waves exert pressure against it.
EEG (Electroencephologram): A record of the electrical activity of the brain.
Ecolocation: The location of objects by the use of sound cues reflected from the objects that are approached.
Efferent neuron: A neuron that carries the impulse from the brain or spinal cord to the muscles (also called motor neuron).
Egg: A female reproductive cell produced in the ovary.
Ego: A concept in psychoanalytical approaches related with the part of personality that mediates between the id and super ego to deal with reality.
Embryo: An organism in the early stage of its development, in humans from the second to the eighth week after conception.
Encapsulated end organs: Pressure-sensitive receptors found near the surface of the skin.
Endocrine glands: Ductless glands that secrete hormones directly snto the bloodstream.
Engram. A hypothetical physical trace by which a memory is stored in the brain.
Erogenous Zones: The areas of the body that provide pleasure when stimulated.
Estrogens: Sex hormones present in both sexes but found in higher concentrations in the females.
Estrous cycle: Hormone cycle related to femate fertility cycle.
Experimental Group: The group subjected to a change in an independent variable for carrying out experimental studies.
Extinction: Cessation of a behaviour in classical and operant conditioning.
Extrovert: Jung's term to describe a personality that focuses on social life and the external world instead of its internal experience.
Factor analysis: A statistical technique to determine overlapping Characteristics (in terms of factors) of certain measures.
Fantasy: Reaction to frustration by withdrawing and seeking pleasure in the world of one's make-believe.
Feed back: Knowledge of the results of an action. Fetus: Prenatal organism in final 30 week period before birth.
Figure-ground relationship: Perception typified by one feature Standing out against a larger background.
Fixation: A concept in Freudian theory indicating an object or way of behaviour to which libido is attached at an early stage.
Fore-hrain : Top portion of brain consisting of thalamus, hypothalamus and cerebrum and controlling all “higher level’’ behaviour.
Fovea: Area ofthe retina containing the cones of bright light and colour vision.
Free-association: A psycho-analysis technique in which the patient expresses whatever comes into his mind for revealing his unconscious.
Free nerve endings: Structures below the surface of the skin responsible for detection of pain, warmth, cold, etc.
Frontal lobes: Large section of the cerebrum, containing motor Projection areas and centres for speech, problem solving and reasoning.
Functionalism: School of psychology that studies the purpose underlying behaviours.
Functional fixedness: A kind of mental rigidity, not perceiving beyond a familiar use of a familiar object.
Gate Control theory: Theory of pain holding that the paid signaling system contains a gate like mechanism that may be opened fully, partly or not at all for regulating the level of pain felt by organism.
Galvanic skin response: A change in electrical resistance of the skin that may occur during many emotions.
Genes: The basic carriers of heredity located in chromosomes.
Genital stage: The stage of normal adult sexual behaviour in Freud’s theory of psycho-sexual development.
Gestalt: A perceptual whole. Gonads: Male (testes) and female (ovaries) sex glands. Habituation: State of being accustomed to a particular situation.
Hair cells: A part of the organ of corti that participates in transduction of mechanical energy (set up by sound waves) into electrical discharges of the auditory nerve.
Hertz. Unit of measurement for the frequency of light or sound waves.
Hierarchi of needs: Maslow’s description of human needs begin
ning with physiological needs to the higher order needs having selfactualization on the top.
Hind brain: Portion of the brain containing the medulla, pons and cerebellum.
Homeostasis: A state of physiological equilibrium that is maintained by innate and automatic regulatory mechanisms. Hormones. Chemicals secreted by the endocrine glands.
Hypothalamus: Area of the fore-brain that plays a critical role in motivation and emotional responses. ,
Hypothesis: Idea that is tested experimentally.
Id: A concept in Freudian psychology that relates with unconscious amoral and irresponsible personality. It functions on the pleasure principle and is the reservoir of instincts.
Ideal Self: The goals and aims of the individual set in Roger’s theory of “‘Self’’.
Identification : Unconsciously taking on characteristics of another person.
Illusion: Perception that does not correspond with actual stimuli.
Image: The representation of an object focused on the retina; recollection or reconstruction of a sense experience.
Immediate memory: The process by which we can recall something for a half second after having perceived it.
Imprinting: The tendency of an organism during a critical period of its early development to follow a moving object and to form a lasting attachment to that object.
Incentive: A kind of reward that reinforces the behaviour in its own right.
Independent variable: Variable that is manipulated in an experiment while all others are held constant.
Inferiority complex: Deeply rooted feelings of inadequacy.
Inhibition. A concept in learning theory of conditioning that relates to a process that counters the conditioned response and results in extinction.
Insight: The sudden occurrence of the solution to a problem or of a novel idea.
Insulin: Hormones secreted by the pancreas that regulates bloodsugar levels.
Intelligence Quotient (I.Q.): A measure of intelligence. It is equal toa person's mental age divided by chronological age and multiplied by 100.
Interference theory of forgetting: The theory of forgetting holding that we forget things because other knowledge gets in the way..
Inter-position: A cue to depth; if one object appears to be interposed between the viewer and another object, the inter-posed object Is judged to be closer to the viewer.
Introspection: The observing and reporting of one’s own covert behaviour.
Intervening variable: A state or mechanism that comes between a cause and its effects.
Introvert. Jung's term to describe a personality that focuses on its own thoughts and feelings instead of the outside world.
Iris: Coloured part of the eye.
Kinesthesis: Sense of position and movement in space guided by internal bodily stimulation from the muscles and joints.
Latency period: A stage of psycho-sexual development, in Freudian psychology, from age of 6 to puberty in which sexual drives are dormant.
Lateral fissure: Deep groove on the lateral surface of the cerebral cortex, sefarating the temporal lobe from the frontal and parietal lobes.
Lateral hypothalamus: A region of the hypothalamus that largely controls the motivated behaviour resulting from the biological drives of hunger and thirst serving as a centre for these drives.
Law of Pragnanz: A Gestalt law of perceptual organization emphasizing the wholeness and meaningfulness of perceived objects.
Learning: Relatively permanent changes in the behaviour of the learner brought about by experience or training.
Libido: A concept in Freud's psychology denoting the basic sexual drive or instinct responsible for every aspect of a person’s behaviour.
Lie detector (Polygraph): Aninstrument to record autonomic nervous system changes brought on by emotion provoking stimuli.
Life Instinct: A concept in Freudian psychology related with an inner urge that leads towards construction and integration and away from death.
Life style. A concept in Adler’s psychology depicting the typical attitudes and behaviour constituting the essential ways a person lives.
Limbic system: A group of closely inter-connected structures at the core of the brain that works with the hypothalamus to control the emotions and motivational processes.
Linear perspective: A cue to depth and distance based on the fact that parallel lines seem to come closer together as they become more distant.
Localization of functions: The doctrine that particular psychological functions are located in particular parts of the brain.
Long term memory (LTM): The memory for items retained indefinitely; has almost limitless storage capacity; codes information according to meaning, pattern and other characteristics.
Massed practice. The continuous study of material to be memorized without rest periods.
Maturation: The changes in behaviour of an organism resulting from physiological growth, the blueprints of which are provided by heredity.
Medulla: The part of the bind brain that regulates breathing, heart rate and blood pressure.
Memory drum: A device used in memory experiments for repetitively presenting verbal material to be memorized to a subject one item at a time.
Memory span: The amount of material that can be retained in immediate memory, usually seven items plus or minus two.
Memory Trace: Believed to be a fragile highly perishable neural response produced by sensory experience likely to bring retention if sepeated often enough.
Menopause: A stage of cessation of ovarian functioning in females.
Mental age: Mental development expressed in years or months as determined by an intelligence test.
Method of constant Stimuli: A psychophysical method for determining thresholds of sensation in which several stimuli. from above and below the threshold, are presented, and the subject indicates which he can perceive.
Method of forced choice: A psychophysical method for determining the thresholds of sensation in which the observer is forced to choose one alternative on each trial.
Method of limits: A psychophysical method for determining thresholds of sensation in which the stimulus intensity is raised of lowered until the subject can just detect it or just not detect it.
Mid brain: Area of the brain that controls auditory and visual responses.
Mnemonics: Techniques to make material easier to remember.
Modeling: A type of imitation in which one individual does what He sees his model (whether person) doing.
Monaural Cues : Cues for the distance of the sound using only one ear.
Monocular Cues: Cues for the distance of visual objects using, only one eye.
Motivated forgetting: Loss of memory for material because of conscious or unconscious wish or reason not to remember.
Motion parallex: The apparent motion of objects.as an observer’s head turns from side to side.
Motor area: Primary area of the cortex responsible for motor functions.
Motor Skill: Skill involving coordination of the skeletal muscle system.
Miiller-Lyer illusion: An illusion of length in which two lines of equal Length appear unequal on account of out interpretation of angles at the ends of the lines as perspective cues.
Myelin Sheath: Fatty covering found on some axons.
Naturalistic Observation: A psychological method of studying behaviour by observing the subjects in their natural settings.
Need: Deprivation caused by a lack of something necessary to survival or well being.
Need reduction: The satisfaction of one’s biological or sociopsychological needs.
Negative reinforcer: Reinforcement of a response by the postponement, withdrawal or termination of an aversive or unpleasant stimulus.
Negative transfer: A type of transfer of training or learning in which learning of one task interferes or disrupts the learning of other tasks.
Nerve fibre. An axon or dendrite of a neuron, many of which together form a nerve, transmitting nerve impulses to and from the central nervous system.
Nervous system: Central control system of the body which organizes and coordinates the functions of the organism.
Nerve tract: Bundles of axons in the brain and spinal cord that travel together.
Neuron: Nerve cell that is the basic unit of the nervous system.
Non-sense syllable: A syllable, usually of three letters. (Consonantvowel-consonant), Which has no meaning, used as a material in memory experiments.
Occipital lobes: Areas of cerebral cortex responsible for vision.
Oedipus Complex: A concept in Freudian psychclogy indicating tendency of a child to show feelings of love and desire for oppositesex parent and of jealousy and hostility toward same-sex parent.
Olfactory sense organ: Organ that is responsible for the sense of smell, situated high upon the walls of each side of the nasal cavity.
Operant Conditioning: Type of conditioning referred to a kind of learning process whereby a response is made more probable or more frequent by reinforcement (consequences of its occurrence).
Opponént process theory: Theory of colour vision that holds that three sets of cones respond in an either/or fashion to each of three primary colour pairs.
Oral Stage: First stage in Freud’s psychoanalytic theory of personality during first 18 months of life in which intense pleasures are derived from activities that involve the mouth.
Organ of Corti: Spiral structure in the cochlea that contains the receptor cells for hearing.
Oval window: The membrane separating the middle and inner ear, that conducts vibrations to the cochlea.
Ovaries: Female sex glands that produce egg cells and sex hormones.
Ovum: Female sex cell.
Oxytocin: Hormone secreted by the posterior pituitary that signals the uterus to start contractions during child-birth and the mammary glands to produce milk.
Paired associate list: A list of paired items used as material in memory experiment. The subject is asked to learn to respond with the second of the pair when presented with the first of the pair.
Pancreas: Endocrine gland that secretes two hormones —insulin and glucagen, which control the blood sugar level.
Para sympathetic division: Division of the nervous system that leads to relaxation of internal organs and muscles after stress.
Parietal lobes: Areas of cerebral cortex concerned with body sense such as temperature, pain, and the feel of.
Part method: A technique of memorizing in which the lengthy material is broken into parts, for memorizing them separately and then in their order.
Peer group: One's associates, by whom one is treated as an equal.
Penis envy. A concept in Freudian psychology depicting the female’s unconscious desire to have a penis.
Perception. A procese of organising environmental stimuli into some meaningful patterns or wholes.
Perceptual constancy : A tendency to perceive the stimuli in the environment as unchanging, though in reality there may be changes in shape, size or other characteristics.
Peripheral nervous system: Part of nervous system outside the brain and the spinal cord.
Phallic stage: Third stage in the Freud's theory of psycho-sexual development when the child is strongly interested in the genitals.
Phi-phenomenon: The perceptual illusion of movement caused by flashing a series of stationary lights one after another in succession.
Phobia: Intense and irrational fear of some specific object or situation.
Pitch: The sensed quality of sound resulting from the frequency of the sound waves stimulating the ear.
Pleasure principle: A principle in Freudian theory emphasizing the immediate gratification regardless of the consequences, a function of the id.
Polurization: The condition of a neuron before it fires, when the Positive ions are on the outside and negative ions are on the inside of the cell membrane.
Pones: Wind brain nerve centre that helps with breathing and coordination of activities of both sides of the brain.
Positive reinforcer: A concept in operant conditioning indicating a stimulus whose presentation strengthens the responses leading to its presentation.
Positive transfer: A type of transfer in which one learning helps facilitate the other learning.
Proactive inhibition: The tendency of earlier learning to disrupt the recall of later learning.
Projection: Defence mechanism characterized by attributing one’s own desires and feelings to others.
Proximity: A principle of perceptual organization stating that
nearness or closeness of objects leads the perceiver to perceive them in patterns.
Psychosexual stages: The five stages of psychological development as put by Freud in his personality theory.
Purkinje effect: The shift in relative visibility from long to shorter wave lengths of light under conditions of reduced illumination.
Rationalization. The process of justification of behaviour that is otherwise unjustified by providing rational reasons.
Recall: The process of remembering without the aid of extra cues.
Recessive gene: Gene whose heredity potential is not expressed when it is paired with a dominant gene.
Recognition. The ability to look at several things and select one that has been seen or learned befoue.
Reflex: Involuntary, unlcarned, immediate response to a stimulus.
Reinforcement: The process of strengthening a response with the help of an appropriate stimulus making it more likely to recur.
Retention: Storage of learned material in memory.
Reticular activating system (RAS): Nervous system structure running through the hind brain and mid brain to the hypothalamus responsible for general arousal of the organism.
Ribonucleic acid (RNA); Chemical that translates genetic instructions from DNA into specific cellular processes, such as the synthesis of needed proteins.
Rods: The receptor cells in the retina of the eye responsible for night vision but which do not produce the perception of colour.
Rorschach test: A projective technique consisting of the ten ambiguous symmetrical ink-blots that subjects are asked to interpret.
Saving method: A measure of retention arrived at by determining the difference between the number of trials originally needed to learn the material and the number of trials needed for relearning.
Schedule of Reinforcement: A pattern of taking decision in the way a given response is to be reinforced.
Secondary Sex Characteristics: Bodily changes that occur during puberty specific to the sexes but not necessary for reproduction, for example, facial hair in men, development of breasts in women.
Selective Breeding: The process of mating species for a specific trait for the purpose of studying the inheritability.
Self-actualization: The highest need in the hierarchical structure of needs proposed by Maslow, that drives an individual to discover one’s self and fulfil one’s potential.
Self Concept: The general ideas and feelings that one acquires about himself as unique individual of special significance.
Self-esteem: A positive attitude toward oneself, varying in degree of favour or approval.
Sensory Projection area: Cerebral cortex area where messages from the sense organs register.
Sensory storage: The brief perceptual memory process of storage of sensory input for less than a second.
Serial lists: Any lists that are to be memorized in order.
Set: .A predisposition to respond in a certain way when presented with certain stimuli.
Shaping: A technique in operant conditioning in which reinforcement is used to mould desired behaviour by reinforcing successively close approximations to it.
Short term memory (STM): The type of memory helpful in retaining several items of information for about twenty seconds or so even if one gets no chance to rehearse or repeat them.
Somatotyping: Sheldon’s system of classifying persons into certain body types according to the degree to which their somatic structure {body build) reflects certain physical characteristics.
Source traits: A concept in Cattell’s theory of personality meaning the basic traits serving as the essential structures of the personality.
Species specific behaviour: Behaviour that is characterized of all normal members of a given species.
Sperm: A male reproductive cell produced in the testes.
Spontaneous recovery : The recovery of part of the strength of a conditioned response some time after it has been extinguished.
Stero-types: Beliefs presumed to apply to all members of a given group. .
Stimulus: An occurrence or event that produces some effect on some organism.
Stimulus discrimination: A concept in the theory of conditioning emphasizing that an organism learns to react to differences in stimuli and to distinguish between them.
Stimulus generalization: A concept in the theory of conditioning emphasizing that Once an organism gets conditioned to respond to a specific stimulus, other, similar stimuli bring the same response.
Stimulus variability: Innate performance for change in environmental stimull.
Stroboscopic motion: Apparent motion caused by the successive presentation of separate visual stimuli.
Super ego: A concept in Freud’s psychoanalytic theory related with tnat part of personality which imposes on the individual the restraint and moral precepts of the society.
Surface traits: One of the types of traits defined by Cattell that are close to the surface of the personality; they are more easily changed than source traits e.g. aggressiveness.
Sympathetic division: Division of the autonomic nervous system.
Synapse: Fluid filled space between the axon of one neuron and the receiving dendrite of the next that helps the flow of information through the nervous system.
Taste buds: Organs that receive the chemical stimuli for taste sensation.
Textural Density gradient: A cue to visual depth.
Testosterone : A male hormone responsible for sex-role behaviours.
Thalamus: Egg shaped structures in the fore-brain that function as the relay centre of the brain.
Thyroid gland: Endocrine gland located below the larynx that secretes thyroxin, which controls metabolism.
Timbre: The sensory quality of the sound that characterizes a given source.
Trait: Particular feature of an individual’s personality that seems to stand out and endure over a vide variety of situations.
Transduction: Process by which receptor cells transform physical energy into an impulse that the nervous system can carry
Transference: A concept in psychoanalysis related with the patients’ unconscious transferring of feelings from earlier interpersonal relationships to the analyst.
Variable: Event or condition affecting a particular situation.
Verbal behaviour. The use of spoken or written language in communicating with others.
Vestibular sense. Sense of body balance, position and movement.
Visible spectrum: That part of the light wave spectrum visible to the human eye; the colours we see.
Visual acuity: Ability to distinguish fine details in the field of vision.
Volley theory of pitch perception: Theory that receptors in the ear
respond in volley, with one group responding, then a second, then a third, and so on.
Weber’s Law: The amount of increment in physical stimulus needed to produce a “‘just noticeable difference’’ is proportional to the magnitude of the initial stimulus.
Whole method: The method of memorizing material as a whole without breaking it into parts to be memorized separately.
X-chromosome:. X-shaped sex chromosomes to be found as one in males and two in females.
Y-chromosome: Y-shaped sex chromosomes, found only in males. Zygote: A fertilized egg or ovum.
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