Hans Eysenck (1916-1997)

Biological Based Traits

 History & Biography
• Born in Germany in 1916, to a theatrical family.
• Ruth Werner his mother a theatrical starlet and father Anton Eysenck was a comedian, actor, a singer.
• He had a dysfunctional and emotionally detached childhood.
• Parents never gave time of attention to him, which he wanted.
• After parents divorce he went to live with his grandmother, who was permissive.
• He had no parental discipline or control over his behavior.
• Often got into fights at school.
• Lost his eyesight due to one fight.
• He had a reckless and wild behavior and once broke his bones by jumping off the roof.
 Significant Events
• He considered himself to be a victim of benign neglect
• His father had promised to teach him bicycle and took him on the top of
the hill. Once their he left him with the bicycle to learn on his own.
• He told his grandmother during his adolescence that he is buying
cigarettes , at which she replied “If you like it, do it by all means”.
• Based on his personal experiences, Eysenck postulated that environmental
experiences like these incidents have little effect on personality
development.
• Genetic factors have a greater affect , rather than childhood experiences.
• He concluded that his permissive upbringing neither hindered nor helped
him in becoming a Psychologist.
 Education
• He left Germany after World War 1, due to unemployment and also
due to Hitler’s condition of joining secret police to study Physics.
• His encounter with fascist right and later with radical left, made
him conclude that trait of tough mindedness (authoritarianism) was
prevalent in both extremes of politics.
• Later he supported this hypothesis in a study that Communist were
radicals and Conservative were fascists. But both scored equally on
tough-minded vs Tender minded. They both were rigid,
authoritarian and intolerant.
• He wanted to study Physics, but took Psychology purely by chance
and did his Ph. D is from University of London.
 Later Years
• He wanted to join Royal Air Force but was not allowed as he was German
“enemy alien”.
• Without any training he got appointed at Mill Hill Emergency Hospital as a
Psychologist.
• He treated patients with anxiety, depression and hysteria but wasn’t satisfied
with the diagnostic system.
• He used factor analysis to conclude that two major factor (i)
neuroticism/emotional stability (ii) extraversion/introversion can account for all
the diagnostic groups.
• After War became the director of psychology department at Maudsely Hospital.
• Eysenck was often involved in controversies. He openly refuted the effectiveness
of psychotherapy.
Contd..
• According to him psychotherapy was just like placebo affects.
• He also came to the support of notion that IQ can not be enhanced
through social programs and wrote a book over it.
• He received threats and the booksellers were forced to stop its
publication.
• He was a prolific writer and wrote 800 journal articles.
Highlights of Eysencks Personality Theory

• Eysenck's theory is based on physiology and genetics.

• Eysenck focused on normal and pathological populations.

• He felt that many traits are biologically based and were shaped
by evolutionary forces (e.g., extraversion, neuroticism).

• He used factor analysis to identify traits.

 Eysenck’s Factor Theory

• According to him psychometric component alone is not enough to measure

structure of personality
• Personality dimensions made through factor analysis are meaningless until
equipped with biological existence.
EYSENCK’S CRITERIA FOR IDENTIFYIG FACTORS
• Psychometric evidence: Factor should be replicable, Eysenck’s, E,N,P factors
were investigated and found by other scientists as well.
• Heritability: must have a biological element attached to it. It shouldn’t include
learned traits.
• Theoretically sound: deductive method used by Eysenck to reach a conclusion.
• Social relevance: factor must have a relationship with social variables.
 HIERARCHY OF BEHAVIOR
ORGANIZATION
Four level hierarchy of behavior organization.
• Lowest level= specific acts/cognitions. (Persons behavior or
thoughts that may or may not be characteristic of person)
• Second level = habitual acts/cognitions. (responses that recur under
similar conditions. They are consistent.
• Third level= Traits (several related habits) important semi-
permanent personality dispositions. (cattell’s traits)
• Fourth level = Types ( super factors) made up of several interrelated
traits.
 Three Dimensions of Personality
• Following are the superfactors identified by Eysenck during the
course of his research which he considered to be the
fundamental dimensions of personality

– E- Extraversion vs. Introversion

– N- Neuroticism vs. Emotional Stability

– P- Psychoticism vs. Impulse Control

 Superfactors
• Introversion versus Extraversion

Degree to which a person is outgoing and participative in

relating to other people

• Emotionality versus Stability (Neuroticism)

Individual’s adjustment to the environment and the stability

of his or her behavior over time

• Psychoticism

Characterized by the loss or distortion of reality and inability

to distinguish between reality and fantasy
Table 1: Sample Questionnaire Items for Personality Research
• Neuroticism and psychoticism are not limited to
pathological individuals, although disturbed people tend
to score higher than normal people on scales measuring
these two factors.
• Eysenck regarded all three factors as part of normal
personality structure. All three are bipolar, with
extraversion being at one end of Factor E and introversion
occupying the opposite pole.
• Similarly, Factor N includes neuroticism at one pole and
stability at the other,
• and Factor P has psychoticism at one pole and the
superego function at the other.
 EXTRAVERSION
• Oriented toward the outside world, prefer the company of other
people.
• Tend to be sociable, impulsive, adventurous, assertive, and
dominant.
• People who score high in extraversion on the Eysenck Personality
Inventory have been found to experience more pleasant emotions
and to be happier.
• Extraverts have a lower base level of cortical arousal than introverts.
• They need, and actively seek, excitement and stimulation to arouse
themselves.
• Introverts shy away from excitement and stimulation because their
cortical arousal levels are already high.
• Introverts react more strongly than extraverts to sensory
stimulation.
 Neuroticism
• Neurotics are characterized as anxious, depressed, tense, irrational,
and moody.
• Neuroticism is largely inherited, a product of genetics rather than
learning or experience.
• People high in neuroticism seem to have greater activity in the brain
areas that control the sympathetic branch of the autonomic nervous
system.
• Body’s alarm system, which responds to stressful or dangerous
events by increasing breathing rate, heart rate, blood flow to the
muscles, and release of adrenaline.
• Neurotics, the sympathetic nervous system overreacts even to mild stressors,
resulting in chronic hypersensitivity.
• People are genetically predisposed either toward neuroticism or toward emotional
stability.
• Eysenck accepted the diathesis-stress model of psychiatric illness, which suggests
that some people are vulnerable to illness because they have either a genetic or an
acquired weakness that predisposes them to an illness.
• This predisposition (diathesis) may interact with stress to produce a neurotic
disorder. Eysenck assumed that people at the healthy end of the N scale have the
capacity to resist a neurotic disorder even in periods of extreme stress.
• High N scorers may suffer a neurotic reaction as a result of only a minimal level of
stress. In other words, the higher the neuroticism score, the lower the level of
stress necessary to precipitate a neurotic disorder.
 PSYCHOTICISM
• People low on psychoticism (in the direction of superego function) tend to be
altruistic, highly socialized, empathic, caring, cooperative, conforming, and
conventional.
• People who score high in psychoticism are aggressive, antisocial, tough-minded,
cold and egocentric.
• Paradoxically, people who score high in psychoticism can also be highly creative,
thus, creativity is linked to abnormality. Throughout history geniuses tend to
show episodes of various forms of psychopathological behavior.
• Examples of the insensitivity, cruelty, and heartlessness of highly creative
individuals : mathematician Gauss was working on a particularly difficult
problem when a servant came into his room to inform him that his sick wife was
about to breathe her last. Gauss could only mutter, “Tell her to wait a moment till
I’m through.”
• Diathesis Model suggests that people who score high on psychoticism and who
are also experiencing levels of stress have an increased chance of developing a
psychotic disorder.
• People high on psychoticism have a high “predisposition to succumb to stress and
develop a psychotic illness”. High P scorers are genetically more vulnerable to
stress than are low P scorers.
• During periods of little stress, high P scorers may function normally, but when
high psychoticism interacts with high levels of stress, people become vulnerable
to psychotic disorders. By contrast, people with low P scores are not necessarily
vulnerable to stress-related psychoses and will resist a psychotic break even in
periods of extreme stress.
• The higher the psychoticism score, the lower the level of stress necessary to
precipitate a psychotic reaction.
Contd.
• Eysenck noted that the hallmark of the creative genius is his or her
ability to think in unusual, almost bizarre ways “Divergent
Thinking”
• Originality of both geniuses and psychotics is based on a cognitive
style that is over inclusive.
• This over inclusiveness may be due to a failure of cognitive
inhibition caused by an excess of dopamine and a lack of serotonin
in the brain.
• Normal people process incoming information by narrowing it
down—by deciding which information is relevant to the solution
• Also Eysenck found that people who have more male hormone
Androgen tend to be more leaning towards Psychoticism
 AROUSAL THEORY
• Arousal theory helps identify the physiological systems underlying the
extraversion/introversion and neuroticism/stability paradigm.
• Difference in behavior of Introverts/extroverts is due to ARAS (ascending reticular
activating system)
• Stimulation of the ARAS results in increases in alertness and arousal of the cortex.
• ARAS is a network of fibers traveling upward from the lower brain stem to the
thalamus and cortex.
• Other fibers descend from the lower brain stem, and thereby influence bodily
musculature and the autonomic nervous system
• In Eysenck’s theory, introverts are assumed to have innately higher levels of arousal
than do extraverts
• Thus, any given level of incoming stimulation is amplified by the high cortical
arousability of introverts
Assessment of personality
Developed 4 personality inventories to measure superfactor.
• Maudsley Personality Inventory (MPI) = Assessed E and N

• Eysenck Personality Inventory (EPI) = Measures E and N with a L scale

• Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ) = Assesses E, P and N

• Eysenck Personality Questionnaire-Revised.

Eysenck relied on variety of physiological measures to assess arousal such as heart

rate, electroencephalogram (EEG), electrodermal response, and pupillary response.
It has been shown quite consistently that introverts manifest greater physiological
responsiveness to stimulation than extraverts; the most consistent results are
obtained on electrodermal measures