Individual Differences

Personality and Abilities

Chapter 3

Learning Objectives
1.
2.
3.
4.

5.

6.

Define personality and describe its role in the study of

organizational behavior.
Identify the big five dimensions of personality and describe
what is meant by positive and negative affectivity.
Describe the Type A and Type B behavior patterns and
describe the nature of Machiavellianism.
Define achievement motivation (or need for achievement)
and describe the difference between learning,
performance, and avoidance goal orientations.
Describe the differences between morning and evening
persons and the relevance of this individual difference to
on-the-job behavior.
Define cognitive intelligence, practical intelligence,
emotional intelligence, and successful intelligence.
Copyright 2003, Prentice Hall

Personality Concepts
Personality:
Personality The unique and relatively
stable patterns of behavior, thoughts, and
emotions shown by individuals.
Interactionist Perspective:
Perspective The view that
behavior is a result of a complex interplay
between personality and situational factors.
Person-Job Fit:
Fit The extent to which
individuals possess the traits and
competencies required to perform specific
jobs.
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The Interactionist
Perspective

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Measuring Personality
Objective Tests:
Tests

Questionnaires and
inventories designed to measure
various aspects of personality.
Reliability:
Reliability The extent to which a
test yields consistent scores on
various occasions.
Validity:
Validity The extent to which a test
actually measures what it claims to
measure.
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The Big Five Dimensions of

Personality
Five

basic dimensions of personality

that are assumed to underlie many
specific traits.
Conscientiousness
Extraversion-Introversion
Agreeableness
Emotional Stability
Openness to Experience
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Conscientiousness
The extent to which
individuals are
hardworking,
organized, dependable,
and persevering (high
conscientiousness)
versus lazy,
disorganized, and
unreliable (low
conscientiousness).
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Extraversion-Introversion
The degree to
which individuals
are gregarious,
assertive, and
sociable
(extraverts) versus
being reserved,
timid, and quiet
(introverts).
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Agreeableness
The extent to which
individuals are
cooperative and
warm (highly
agreeable) versus
cold and
belligerent (highly
disagreeable).
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Emotional Stability
The degree to which
individuals are
insecure, anxious,
depressed, and
emotional
(emotionally
unstable) versus
calm, self-confident,
and secure
(emotionally stable).
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Openness to Experience
The extent to which
individuals are
creative, curious,
and cultured (open
to experience)
versus practical
and with narrow
interests (closed to
experience).
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Affectivity
Positive Affectivity:
Affectivity The tendency to
experience positive moods and
feelings in a wide range of settings
and under many different conditions.
Negative Affectivity:
Affectivity The tendency to
experience negative moods in a wide
range of settings and under many
different conditions.
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Self-Efficacy
Individuals beliefs

concerning their ability

to perform specific tasks successfully.
Judgments of self-efficacy consist of three
components:
Magnitude:
Magnitude The level at which an individual
believes she or he can perform.
Strength:
Strength The persons confidence that she or
he can perform at that level.
Generality:
Generality The extent to which self-efficacy in
one situation or for one task extends to other
situations and other tasks.
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Self-Efficacy
General Self-efficacy:
Self-efficacy Peoples
overall beliefs about their general
capacity to perform tasks
successfully.
Beliefs about self-efficacy develop
through:
Direct Experience:
Experience Feedback from
performing similar tasks in the past.
Vicarious Experience:
Experience Observations of
others performance on these tasks.
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Self-Monitoring
A personality trait involving the extent to which
individuals adapt their behavior to the demands of
specific situations so as to make good
impressions on others.
Consequences of self-monitoring:
Work Performance:
Performance High self-monitors tend to do
better than low self-monitors in jobs requiring
boundary-spanning activities.
Career Success:
Success High self-monitors tend to obtain
more promotions than low self-monitors.
Interpersonal Relationships:
Relationships High self-monitors
tend to form less stable and shallower personal
relationships with others than low self-monitors.

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Self-Monitoring

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Machiavellianism

A personality trait involving willingness to

manipulate others for ones own purposes.
Machiavellian tactics:
Neglecting to share important information (e.g., claiming
to forget to tell you about key meetings and
assignments).
Finding subtle ways of making you look bad to
management (e.g., damning you with faint praise).
Failing to meet obligations (e.g., not holding up their
end on joint projects, thereby causing you to look bad).
Spreading false rumors about you (e.g., making up
things about you that embarrass you in front of others).

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Type A vs. Type B

Type A Behavior Pattern:
Pattern A pattern of
behavior involving high levels of
competitiveness, time urgency, and
irritability.
Type B Behavior Pattern:
Pattern A pattern
of behavior characterized by a
casual, laid-back style; the opposite
of the Type A behavior pattern.
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Type A vs. Type B

Task Performance
Type As tend to excel on tasks involving time
pressure or solitary work.
Type Bs have the advantage when it comes to
tasks involving complex judgments and
accuracy as opposed to speed.

Interpersonal Relations
Type As tend to annoy coworkers, are more
likely to lose their tempers and lash out at
others, are more likely to become involved in
conflict, and are more likely to engage in
aggressive and counterproductive behavior.

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Achievement Motivation
The strength of
an individuals
desire to excel
to succeed at
difficult tasks and
to do them better
than other
persons.
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High Need Achievers

Prefer moderately difficult tasks.
In terms of career success, tend to
be
Promoted more rapidly.
Less inclined to delegate.
More interested in performance
feedback.
More interested in merit-based pay than
seniority-based pay.
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Goal Orientations

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Morning vs. Evening

Persons
Morning Persons

Individuals who feel

most energetic and
alert early in the day.
Evening Persons

Individuals who feel

most energetic and
alert late in the day.
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Abilities
Mental and physical capacities to perform
various tasks.
Cognitive Intelligence:
Intelligence The ability to
understand complex ideas, to adapt
effectively to the environment, to learn from
experience, to engage in various forms of
reasoning, and to overcome obstacles by
careful thought.
Practical Intelligence:
Intelligence Adeptness at solving
the practical problems of everyday life.
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Tacit Knowledge

Knowledge about how to get things done.

Major characteristics:
Tacit knowledge is action oriented;
oriented it involves
knowing how to do something as opposed to
knowing that something is the case.
Tacit knowledge is practically useful;
useful it allows
individuals to achieve goals they personally
value.
Tacit knowledge is acquired without direct help
from others.
others
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Emotional Intelligence
A cluster

of skills relating to the emotional

side of life.
Major components:
The ability to recognize and regulate our own
emotions.
The ability to recognize and influence others
emotions.
Self motivation.
The ability to form effective long-term
relationships with others.
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Successful Intelligence
Intelligence that represents a good balance between
cognitive intelligence (IQ), practical intelligence, and
creative intelligence.

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Physical Abilities

Peoples capacities to engage in the

physical tasks required to perform a job.
Common types:
Strength:
Strength The capacity to exert physical force
against various objects.
Flexibility:
Flexibility The capacity to move ones body in
an agile manner.
Stamina:
Stamina The capacity to endure physical
activity over prolonged periods.
Speed:
Speed The ability to move quickly.
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