The Psychology Book (103 page)

AFTER

1975
Hans J. Eysenck’s

Looking at

…we also need

Personality Questionnaire

personality traits alone

to consider
external

identifies two biologically

gives us very few cues…

factors
and context.

based, independent

dimensions of personality.

1980
US psychologists Robert

Hogan, Joyce Hogan, and

The dynamic interaction

Rodney Warrenfeltz develop

between a
person
and the
situation

comprehensive personality

he finds himself in is the best

tests based on the “Big Five”

predictor of behavior.

model of personality.

PSYCHOLOGY OF DIFFERENCE 327

See also:
Galen 18–19 ■ Gordon Allport 306–07 ■ Raymond Cattell 314–15 ■

Hans J. Eysenck 316–21

Walter Mischel shocked the world

of personality theory when he

proclaimed in
Personality and

Assessment
that the classic

personality test was almost

worthless. He had reviewed a

number of studies that tried to

predict behavior from personality

test scores, and found them to be

accurate only 9 percent of the time.

Walter Mischel

External factors

Resisting temptation
, rather than

Mischel drew attention to the part

succumbing to short-term gratification,

Walter Mischel was born in

often indicates a capacity for greater

Austria, but emigrated with

played by external factors, such as

achievement in life, as Mischel’s studies

his family to the US in 1938.

context, in determining behavior,

of behavior in young children revealed.

He grew up in Brooklyn, New

believing that it was necessary to

York, receiving his PhD in

look at the dynamic interaction of

clinical psychology from Ohio

people and the situation they find

In his famous marshmallow

State University in 1956.

themselves in. Imagine how absurd

experiments, aimed at testing

He then went on to teach at

it would be if people’s behavior

willpower, four-year-old children

the Universities of Colorado,

appeared to be independent of

were presented with a single

Harvard, and Stanford, moving

external factors. He proposed that

marshmallow and told they could

in 1983 to Columbia University

an analysis of a person’s behavior,

either eat it immediately, or wait 20

in New York City, where he is

in different situations, observed on

minutes and then have two. Some

the Robert Johnston Niven

numerous occasions, would provide

children were able to wait, others

Professor of Humane Letters.

clues to behavior patterns that

were not. Mischel monitored each

Numerous honors have

would reveal a distinctive signature

child’s progress into adolescence,

been heaped on Mischel. These

of personality, as opposed to a list

and reported that those who had

include the Distinguished

Scientific Contribution Award

of traits. Individual interpretation of

resisted temptation were better

as well as the Distinguished

a situation was also considered.

adjusted psychologically and more

Scientist Award of the

Later, Mischel explored habits of

dependable; they did better at school,

American Psychological

thinking, which might endure over

were more socially competent, and

Association, and the

time and across different situations.

had greater self-esteem. Ability to

prestigious Grawemeyer

delay gratification seemed to be a

Award in psychology in

better predictor of future success

2011. Mischel is also a

than any previously measured trait.

prolific and talented artist.

Mischel’s work led to a shift in

the study of personality—from how

Key works

personality predicts behavior to

What is a personality

how behavior reveals personality. It

1968
Personality and

test really telling us

also changed the way personality

Assessment

about a person?

profiling is used in assessing job

1973
Is Information About

Individuals More Important

Walter Mischel

candidates. Tests that were once

Than Information About

considered an accurate basis for

Situations?

staff recruitment are now seen as

2003
Introduction to

a guide, to be interpreted in the

Personality

context of the situations that are

likely to arise in doing a job. ■

328

WE CANNOT DISTINGUISH

THE SANE FROM THE INSANE

IN PSYCHIATRIC HOSPITALS

DAVID ROSENHAN (1932– )

IN CONTEXT

Psychiatrists say that mental disorders
can be

APPROACH

accurately diagnosed through symptoms

Anti-psychiatry

that can be categorized into diseases.

BEFORE

1960
In
The Divided Self:

An Existential Study in Sanity

and Madness
, R.D. Laing

So they should be able to
tell the difference

emphasizes the family as

between the sane and the insane.

a source of mental illness.

1961
Psychologists E. Zigler

and L. Phillips demonstrate

huge overlaps in the symptoms

of different categories of

A second experiment

A first experiment

psychiatric disorder.

showed that people with

showed that sane people

genuine mental health

1961
Hungarian-American

can be judged insane.

disorders can be judged

psychiatrist Thomas Szasz

to be faking them.

publishes the controversial

The Myth of Mental Illness
.

1967
British psychiatrist

David Cooper defines the

We cannot distinguish the sane from

anti-psychiatry movement in

the insane in psychiatric hospitals.

Psychiatry and Anti-Psychiatry
.

AFTER

2008
Thomas Szasz publishes

Psychiatry
:
The Science of Lies
.

Psychiatric diagnoses are not objective
, but

exist only in the minds of the observers.

PSYCHOLOGY OF DIFFERENCE 329

See also:
Emil Kraepelin 31 ■ R.D. Laing 150–51 ■ Leon Festinger 166–67 ■ Solomon Asch 224–27 ■

Erving Goffman 228–29 ■ Elliot Aronson 244–45 ■ Thigpen & Cleckley 330–31

D
uring the 1960s, psychiatry an appointment. Later, at the and powerlessness. Their records faced a vocal challenge to

admissions office, they were to

showed that the average daily time

its fundamental beliefs by

complain of hearing an unfamiliar

they spent with medical staff was

a number of experts known as

voice in their heads, which was

less than seven minutes.
Although

the “anti-psychiatrists.” This

unclear but used words such as

they were undetected by the hospital

informal group of psychiatrists,

“empty” and “thud.” This suggested

staff, other patients challenged their

psychologists, and welfare workers

existential feelings of pointlessness.

sanity, sometimes quite vigorously:

claimed that psychiatry is a medical

They were instructed to give false

“You’re not crazy. You’re a journalist

model of mental health, yet there

names and occupations, but

checking up on the hospital.”

are no physical symptoms, and its

otherwise true personal histories.

treatment regimes largely ignore

As a result, all the pseudo-

Judging the insane sane

the patient’s needs and behaviors.

patients were admitted to hospital

In the second part of Rosenhan’s

In 1973, David Rosenhan carried

with a diagnosis of schizophrenia,

study, he falsely informed the staff

out a field study in the US that

despite showing no symptoms of

at a teaching and research hospital

explored the validity of psychiatric

the disorder. Their hospital stays

(who were aware of the first study)

diagnosis and resulted in the

lasted an average of 19 days, during

that during the next three months,

dramatic conclusion that we

which time they behaved completely

one or more pseudo-patients would

cannot distinguish the sane from

normally. They maintained journals

try to be admitted to the hospital,

the insane in psychiatric hospitals.

of their experiences, surreptitiously

and they were asked to rate each

In the first part of the study,

at first but then openly, as it was

new patient on the likelihood of

Rosenhan assembled a group

never questioned. Demonstrating

them being a pseudo-patient. Of

of eight sane people (including

how even normal behavior might

193 genuine new admissions, 41

himself), made up of women and

be interpreted as evidence of a

were judged suspect by at least

men of different occupations and

psychiatric condition, Rosenhan

one member of staff, and 23 were

ages, and designated them as

found that a common comment in

flagged as possible pseudo-patients

pseudo-patients. They were briefed

their medical notes was “patient

by at least one psychiatrist.

to make an attempt to be admitted

engages in writing behavior.”

Rosenhan’s work generated an

as patients to different mental

The “patients” themselves

explosion of controversy, and led

hospitals in five US states, first by

described their experience in

many institutions to take steps to

telephoning the hospital to ask for

hospital as one of depersonalization

improve their care of patients. ■

David Rosenhan

David Rosenhan was born in

He is a fellow of the American

the US in 1932. After gaining