Mischel’s Situational

Personality

Bryan Hall
Kristi Simmons
Overview
 Mini-Bio
 Personality
 Aggregation
 Mischel’s Position on Personality
 Personality vs. Situation Debate
Personality
 Traits determine how individuals react in
everyday occurrences
 Personality assumes people are
characterized by distinctive qualities
that are invariant across situations and
time
 Research is counter to this claim
Aggregation
 Acknowledge the importance of
situations
 Aggregate the individual’s behavior over
many different situations to give a “true
score”
Aggregation Example
Walter Mischel Biography
 Born 1930 Vienna, Austria
 Raised in Brooklyn, New York
 Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from Ohio State
in 1956
 Taught at
 University of Colorado 1956-1958
 Harvard University 1958-1962
 Stanford University 1962-1983
 Columbia University 1983-Present
Another Viewpoint
 Mischel argues
 Traits lack internal consistency and cross-
situational generality
 Low agreement in trait structure of individuals
described by raters and other methods
 Low correlations between traits and behaviors
 Behaviors are predicted better by other
methods
Situational Personality
 Mischel proposes a cognitive-affective
system theory of personality
 Situational Personality: Situation
Determines Behavior
If…Then…
 People are characterized by stable
individual differences in their overall
behavior, but also by distinctive and
stable patterns of situation-behavior
relations
 For example, Amy does X when A occurs,
but Y when B occurs
How Behavior Varies Across
Situations
Summer Camp
 Examined children’s interactions over
the summer
 Two main features examined:
 Valence (positive or negative)
 Type of person involved in interaction
(adult counselor or child peer)
Situation-Behavior Profiles for Verbal
Aggression for Two Children at Two
Different Time Samples
Results
 Frequencies of behavior were standardized so that
any remaining variance would be attributable to the
individual’s distinctive personal qualities
 Found meaningful stable situation-behavior profiles
 Indicates there are characteristics intraindividual
patterns in how individuals relate to different
psychological conditions and that these patterns form
a behavioral signature that reflects personality
coherence
Enduring Characteristics
 Encodings or construal (of self, others,
situations, etc.)
 Expectancies and beliefs (about outcomes
and one’s own efficacy)
 Competencies (for the construction and
generation of social behavior)
 Subjective values
 Self-regulatory plans and strategies in the
pursuit of goals
Personality vs. Situation
Debate
 Personality Determines Behavior

OR

 Situation Determines Behavior

Situationist View
 Small Correlation Between Personality
and Behavior (~.30)
 Richard Nisbett (1980): Revised
Personality-behavior Correlation (~.40)
 Still Small
Personality Arguments
 Small Personality-behavior correlations
≠ Situational Variables
 Actual Relationship Between
Personality and Behavior Higher Than .
40
 .40 Correlation Not Small
 Does Not Predict Specific Time in
Specific Situation
Personality Arguments
 Choosing Situations Reflects
Personality
 Personality Traits Useful Psychological
Tools
 Improvements in Personality Research
Personality View
 Emotional Personality Traits Affect Behavior
 Expressions of Behaviors Change
 Example: Display Different Behaviors in
Different Situations
 Personality: Enduring Genotypes Expressed in
Diverse Phenotypes
 Situationist: Behavior Dependent on Situation
Example
 Aggression (Personality Variable),
Social Approval (Personality Variable),
and Home vs Party (Situational
Variable)
 Example
High Aggression Low Aggression
High Social Approval High Social Approval

High Aggression Low Aggression

Low Social Approval Low Social Approval
Alker (1972): Interactionism
 Interactionist Perspective: Traits and
Situations Interact to Influence Behavior
 Behavior = personality x interpretation of
situation
 Individual Differences in Personality-
Situation Relationship
 Kenrid et al. (1990): Trait Appears Only
in Necessary Situation
Alternative View
 Bem (1972): Trait Like vs. Situational
People
Are Traits Consistent Across
Cultures?
 Big 5 Found in Other Cultures
 Culture Specific Traits Exist
 Expression of Traits Influenced By:
 Situation
 Culture

Matthews,
Matthews,G.,
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