Ch 13- Personality

Chapter thirteen focused on one’s personality characteristics. The first characteristic was happiness and had to do with whether a person was extroverted or neurotic and how this affected their happiness. When one is high is extraversion they tend to be happier and when a person is higher in neuroticism they tend to have a lower level of happiness. The second characteristic was control. Control focused on how one perceived how much control they had, how they could establish control, and losing control. Perceived control has to do with how much control a person believes they have and desire for control has to do with how motivated a person is to establish control over an event. Arousal is composed of a variety of processes; which are cortical, skeletal muscular system, and autonomic nervous system. Sensation seeking and affect intensity were the two main concepts of arousal. Sensation seekers are always looking for new experiences and are not afraid to take risks. Affect intensity has to do with how strongly one experiences an emotion.
I chose to look into perceived control. Perceived control refers to the beliefs and expectations a person holds that he or she can interact with the environment in ways that produce desired outcomes and prevent undesired outcomes. The higher control a person believes they have the healthier they tend to be. This is because they are not as stressed over situations. It also helps them with their competence of a situation. This leads those with a strong sense of control to believe that outcomes of situations are dependent on their behavior and that they are capable to engage successfully in relevant actions. When a person has a weak sense of control all the opposite things happen for them. They have a difficult time in all situations because they feel as though they do no have control and cannot control the outcome of things.
Another article I looked at discussed how the need to have control over things consumes our lives. A person not only wants to control events that they are part of but they also want to control others. As a person we need to realize that we cannot control the circumstances of the situation but we are capable of overcoming a challenge. Existentialists believe that we need to be able to recognize our ability to choose and be willing to accept responsibility for those choices. Even though we understand we cannot control every little thing the desire to have this control still exists. There is also evidence to suggest that control does not always lead to happiness. Instead the goal is to go with the flow and realize we cannot always have control of events. Many people want to have control simply because they believe it will lead to happiness. It is important to remember that just because you have control does not necessarily mean you are going to be happy. It could cause you more unhappiness trying to maintain control of everything.

Terms:
Happiness
Control
Arousal
Perceived control
http://medicine.jrank.org/pages/381/Control-Perceived.html
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-second-noble-truth/201402/control-is-the-psychological-goal

Chapter 13 talks about personality. The three main principles are happiness, arousal, and control. Within these, there are smaller characteristics than can play into each of these. Some of the characteristics are extraversion, neuroticism, sensation seeking, and affect intensity. These, among the other characteristics, determine why people have different motivation and emotional states even in the same situation. Most everyone can be considered as generally happy although different levels of happiness fall under generally happy. These characteristics can account for where those levels are and how quickly/what is able to make them fall or rise.
I decided that I wanted to look into the biological basis of personality. The brain plays a big role in how we react to certain things that happen to us in our environment. When these things happen, how we react to them can determine different pieces of our personality. There are numerous new ways to find out more information about our brains and how they can affect personality. Electroencephalography (EEG) is used to measure electrical activity on the surface of the brain while we can use tools like fMRI imaging allows for viewing the 3D structure of the brain and subsequent activity. We have also been able to look into how neurotransmitters can affect personality. Through these different tests and technologies, we have been able to find out how important the brain and biology of the brain is in impacting our personality and how we behave in different situations. We have found from these tests that we can tell activation from the different Big 5 personality traits by looking at these scans. For example, when looking at neuroticism we are able to see its presence because it lights up in the right dorsomedial PFC and in portions of the left medial temporal lobe. These different findings from these scans allow us to see how much biology plays a part in our personality and the different physical things that pop up when we are experiencing the different personality characteristics. It was interesting reading through some of the material I found online and getting a better understanding of how each part of your brain can play a part in a different characteristic. Some of our brains work different than others which explains how different characteristics are more prominent in other people's personality than ours or vice versa. If a piece of one part of our brain is more or less active, it can cause that personality trait to be different. I thought this to be very interesting as we all would like to think that we are in charge of our own personality. We like to think that we make our own decisions on how we act and how happy or aroused we are. In reality, however our brain reacts and fires, or what chemicals are produced in regards to what is going on around us is likely to determine how we are going to behave or how our personality is made. I thought this to be very interesting.
Personality
Extroversion
Neuroticism
Happiness
Arousal
Control
Biological Basis
https://psychneuro.wordpress.com/2017/03/04/the-biological-basis-of-personality/
https://courses.lumenlearning.com/wmopen-psychology/chapter/biological-approaches/

Chapter 13 was about why some people are happier and unhappier than others, as well as how arousal and control beliefs play a role in emotion. Knowing one’s own personality, as well as optimal level arousal and control beliefs, is key to experiencing optimal performance and positive emotion in day-to-day life.

First, happiness and unhappiness are not opposite outcomes. They are independent outputs of our personality traits. Happiness is the outcome of high extraversion. High extraversion means a person more sensitive to positive affect and social rewards. Therefore, a person who is extraverted is more willing to engage in approach behavior (Behavioral Activation System). On the other hand, unhappiness is the outcome of high neuroticism. High neuroticism means a person is more sensitive to negative affect, forthcoming punishment, and self-consciousness. Therefore, a person who is neurotic tends to engage more in avoidance behavior (Behavioral Inhibition System). Both extroverts and neurotics appear to be largely inherited and stable even after very good and bad events happen, however, that does not mean people prone to unhappiness can not live a fulfilling life. Cultivating eudaimonic happiness, or one’s authentic self and life, rather than pleasure-seeking or pain-avoidance (hedonistic happiness), improves well-being despite a person’s stable personality traits.

Second, arousal is the wakefulness and alertness of a person, which is associated with cognitive functioning and affectivity. Low arousal means people feel bored and have lower cognitive functions on tasks like anagrams and math problems. High arousal means people feel anxious and also have diminished cognitive functions. Moderate arousal is correlated with optimal functioning and pleasure. (This seems to correlate well with flow theory.) The practical implications of this relate back to personality. The book gave the example of the experiment on caffeine and time pressure. Extraverts did better when aroused and worse when relaxed. Introverts did better when relaxed and worse when aroused. Therefore, not only is personality important to a person’s performance and emotion, but how the environment interacts with one’s personality can change it from working-well to working-poorly.

Third, control beliefs--perceived control and the desire for control---are the beliefs that one’s performance will lead to an outcome and you need a certain amount of control to feel stable. They predict effort and the amount of effort and are associated with performance outcomes and affectivity. Control beliefs proceed and are the building blocks of competence and self-efficacy. They can come from anywhere, such as one’s belief in God or sport’s coach. A person with high perceived control sets difficult goals, persists, self-regulates, monitors strategies and feedback, cultivates hope and optimism, expresses positive emotion, and often performs well. A person with low perceived control sets easy goals, gives or wanders up quickly when things get difficult, becomes pessimistic after a while, expresses negative emotion, and often performs poorly. A high desire of control may make someone more persistent and effortful, but if it is too high, they will often blame others for their failures, attempt too difficult goals, invest too much effort, think that they have control in an uncontrollable domain (illusion of control), and may over assert themselves in conversations (e.g. talk-over people, talk too loudly, and want to “always be right”). Stress reduction techniques do seem to help people with a high need for control in uncontrollable situations.

…

Finding #1

In agreement with my suspicion, flow theory does seem to correlate nicely with arousal theory and can be illustrated in an inverted U curve.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022103114000109

…

“The results indicate that the flow state is a state of moderate mental effort that arises through the increased parasympathetic modulation of sympathetic activity”

Interestingly enough shyness was a interacted with the difficulty of flow tasks. Shy people had a higher HR than non shy people on moderate and difficult tasks.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5495833/

…

Terms:
Happiness
Extraversion
Neuroticism
Arousal
BAS
BIS
Control beliefs
Perceived control
Desire for control

Chapter 13 takes us on a journey through the ins and outs of personality characteristics. More specifically, how these characteristics motivates and effects emotion. It begins by introducing us to the three main motivational principles that underlie personality characteristics (Happiness, Arousal, & Control) and discusses these three principles along with six main personality characteristics that have a more profound effect/definition (Extraversion, Neuroticism, Sensation Seeking, Affect Intensity, Perceived Control, & Desire for Control). The remainder of the chapter is the in-depth discussion of the three main principles along with the six situationally-effective personality characteristics. Happiness is up first, and the chapter introduces the concept of “set points,” where we have a set homeostatic level of happiness/unhappiness that we return to following major life events. These levels are demonstrated through our levels of the personality characteristics of extraversion and neuroticism. Our happiness set point is defined by our level of extraversion, with a high level indicating a higher set point than introversion. Our unhappiness set point is defined by our level of neuroticism, with higher levels indicating a higher set point of unhappiness than those who are emotionally stable. The chapter also mentions the two main types of happiness, hedonic (totality of one’s pleasurable moments; stereotypical “happiness”) and eudaimonic well-being (engaging oneself in meaningful pursuits; self-actualization).

Up next is Arousal, which is the various processes (cortical, behavioral, & autonomic) that govern alertness, wakefulness, and activation. In this section, we are introduced to the Inverted-U Hypothesis (moderate environmental arousal governs best performance and emotionality), sensory deprivation studies (Woodburn Heron and his testing), the ill effects of overarousal, and the criticisms/supports for the Inverted-U. The personality characteristics brought up during Arousal were sensation seeking and affect intensity. Sensation seeking being the characteristic of a person to seek out novel external sources of stimulation and reactivity (sensation-seeking & sensation avoiding). Affect intensity is a person’s capacity to become emotionally aroused (affect-intense & affect-stable). Finally, the chapter concludes on the topic of control, which falls into the two personality characteristics of perceived control and desire for control. The two are very similar, but perceived control is more a characteristic of if you feel in control where desire for control is a characteristic of you will exert control even if you really hold no control at all.

The topic that I really latched on to was neuroticism. Perhaps it’s just because I am a very neurotic person myself, I just felt a personal attachment to the topic. To redefine for clarity, neuroticism is a predisposition of individuals to experience negative affect more and to feel chronically unsatisfied/unhappy due to an overly-sensitive BIS. After researching a bit, I found an excellent little niche to dig into, and that is neuroticism in the world of comedians. Essentially, in the multiple articles I read, it was brought up and discussed that those within the comedic world oftentimes do not lead very happy lives. This is because neuroticism is rampant within those individuals within the employment. These people are more often to be victims of rape (Sarah Silverman), abuse (Chris Rock), mental illness (Robin Williams & depression), and therefore perceive a very negative view of the world. However, today, sarcasm and negativity are all the rage within the comedic sector, and those sad stories can easily be reconfigured into comedic tales with the right inflection and delivery. Comedians are essentially overly-neurotic people who learned to cope with their inner anxieties by publicizing them to the world and rebranding them as jokes. Their suffering was made into a market, and they are reinforced with high paychecks, laughter, and sometimes even movie deals.

The problem with this set up, as with the tragic case of Robin Williams, is that it is not therapeutic. They self-report feelings of elation and happiness when onstage performing, but the underlying personality trait of neuroticism is not cured or changed, just temporarily staved off. Like the chapter says, we each have a set point of happiness and unhappiness. These set points are independent of one another, so a spike in one does not cause a decrease in another. Perhaps the audience and the show were really great, so they receive a boost in happiness. However, nothing has been done to correct the neuroticism causing the increased levels of set unhappiness, so the feeling of unhappiness may be temporarily overwhelmed, but it’s still there when the happiness returns to normal levels. Couple that with a retired comedian no longer doing shows, losing a big portion of what temporarily balanced out the unhappiness (the shows and success), and the neuroticism wins out, as there is not real coping strategy made for handling that. So we wind up with an ironic twist where our unhappiest people are oftentimes the ones making us the happiest.

Terms Used:
Behavioral Activation System – Pg. 61
Behavioral Inhibition System – Pg. 61
Happiness – Pg. 369
Extraversion – Pg. 370
Hedonic Well-Being – Pg. 372
Eudaimonic Well-Being – Pg. 372
Neuroticism – Pg. 372
Arousal – Pg. 374
Inverted-U Hypothesis – Pg. 375
Sensory Deprivation – Pg. 376
Sensation Seeking – Pg. 379
Affect Intensity – Pg. 381
Control – Pg. 383
Perceived Control – Pg. 384
Desire for Control – Pg. 386

Links used:
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/neuroticism
https://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/16/arts/television/female-comedians-are-confidently-breaking-taste-taboos.html
https://nypost.com/2014/02/15/who-tells-the-best-jokes-maladjusted-neurotic-aggressive-jerks/

Jon Lutz - section 01

This week’s chapter was less about personalities and more about how different personalities navigate motivation and attempt wellbeing. Of course the usual suspects made an appearance: extra/introversion, neuroticism, sensation seeking, and desire for control. The text discusses these personality characteristics as they relate to happiness, arousal, and control. The three sections are critical when observing what generates energy to prompt or terminate behavior.
First we look at happiness. Across almost all demographics people report being happy a majority of the time. Yes crisis and fortune send people into valleys and peaks but on the whole there seems to be a consistent average happiness or happiness baseline. Both lottery winners and spinal injury quadriplegics tend to return to baseline after only two months. Once researches actually measure happiness across personalities correlations appear to emerge. In short, extroverts are typically happier than introverts and neurotics. With these findings researchers have suggested a happiness set point and a unhappiness setpoint, as a more effective paradigm then just a happiness baseline. People who are extraverts have a higher happiness setpoints than introverts, meaning they have the physiological tendency to experience higher peaks of happiness. The scale of neuroticism determines a person’s unhappiness setpoint, which allows for more intense levels of unhappiness. This trend also maps onto behavioral activation system (BAS) and the behavioral inhibition system (BIS). High activation of the BAS energizes approach oriented behaviors which lead extroverts to achieve happiness producing goals. High activation of the BIS energizes avoidance oriented behavior leading neurotics avoidance behaviors, which can be problematic in achievement settings.
Arousal is heavily dependent on environment. As humans we not only benefit from stimulus, but it is necessary for proper function. Essentially there is an arousal window in which humans perform the best. Too much arousal and a person becomes stressed and anxious, not enough arousal and a person becomes bored, disinterested, and in extreme instances depressed. Where a person typically finds themselves is correlated with where they fall on the extro/introversion scale. Introverts are chronically over aroused, which motivates them to avoid stimulating environments and prefer isolation. Extroverts are chronically under aroused and motivated to seek stimulating situations. Sensory deprivation experiments have suggested that in the absence of arousal intense negative affect, irritation, and cognitive impairment insue. These findings are even more concerning when one considers solitary confinement in prisons. Used for punishment or the safety of inmates and prison staff, solitary confinement is on the rise in the U.S. and can last for months if not years for some inmates. Not only is this a nightmare scenario for a healthy extrovert, but 35% of people in solitary confinement are victims of mental illness, which is a disproportionate segment of the population (Weir 2012). This is a clear failure to appreciate motivational forces (internalization, efficacy, self concept). Using merely a simple extrinsic punishment only leads to learned helplessness, stunting the rehabilitation process. Sensory deprivation isn’t all bad though. There are now commercially available sensory deprivation tanks (float tanks) which people use for meditative purposes. Not only are they used for relaxation, but some use them for therapeutic reason, even to treat chronic pain (Dowling 2012). Obviously these floats only last a couple hours and are done on a person’s own volition, but I think this still highlights a significant psychological difference across personalities as to the directions people’s motivations take them.
Control is the final concept the chapter uses to view personality. Most importantly a person’s perceived control manifests engagement or disaffection. Engagement is strongly attached to two assertions: the self must be capable of obtaining the desired outcome and their needs to be a somewhat predictable situation. A high perceived control facilitates the seeking of difficult tasks and self monitoring, both of which have been shown to be instrumental to mastery oriented goals. These productive behaviors may lead to a self confirming cycles of engagement. Once a goal is achieved perceived control increases which in turn increases involvement, in turn increases achievement, and on again. Sadly for those who are low in perceived control, there is a similar but opposite cycle for disaffection. Personality has a significant impact on desire for control. Naturally those who are high in desire for control excel in achievement situations, but there are potential pitfalls. Namely illusion of control is an issue that can lead to overly difficult goals and wasted effort towards those obtainable goals.

Dowling, K. (2012, October 12). Time Out: The Rise of Sensory Deprivation Tanks. Retrieved April 3, 2018, from https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/10/time-out-the-rise-of-sensory-deprivation-tanks/263537/
Weir, K. (2012, May). Alone, in ‘the hole’ Psychologists probe the mental health effects of solitary confinement. Retrieved April 03, 2018, from http://www.apa.org/monitor/2012/05/solitary.aspx

wellbeing
un/happiness set points
behavioral activation system
behavioral inhibition system
extra/introvert scale
neuroticism

Chapter 13 of the text discusses the various personality characteristics that effect motivation and the actions that individuals take throughout their lives. The personality characteristics are separated into three main categories which are: happiness, arousal, and control. All three of these categories have an influence on motivation and action.
The first category of happiness describes two distinct forms which are hedonic and eudaimonic. Hedonic happiness is defined as achieving pleasure and avoiding pain. Eudaimonic happiness on the other hand is defined as a self-realization in which an individual engages in meaningful actions and positive environments. This section also described the differences among introverts and extroverts. According to the text, introverts are more susceptible to negative emotions whenever they are confronted with negative situation. It is typically easier for introverts to experience negative emotions and somewhat difficult for them to experience positive emotions at the highest level. Extroverts on the other hand seem to be susceptible to positive emotions rather than negative emotions. It is typically easier for extroverts to see the good in situations while introverts have a more difficult time.
Arousal is another term that is described as having an influence on motivation. Arousal is defined as a situation or event that elicits a strong response. There are two types of arousal which are underarousal and overarousal. Individuals who are underaroused typically find it difficult to focus or perform a task while those who are overaroused may experience stress and anxiety. An example used in the text describes these two types of arousals when performing an athletic event. Individuals who are underaroused will typically find it difficult to concentrate and lack the energy necessary to accomplish the task. The individuals who are overaroused may experience anxiety and stress and may lose focus and concentration. According to the text, the ideal arousal is between both underarousal and overarousal. Alongside the concept of arousal there is sensation seeking and sensation avoidance. Individuals who are typically extroverted may seek out opportunities to enhance their arousal by the means of risks and thrills. An example of this is with skydiving or taking on a new task. Introverted individuals are more prone to avoiding risk because they do not feel comfortable being in an unfamiliar environment.
The final concept described in chapter 13 of the text is control. The different forms of control are perceived control and desire for control. Perceived control is the control that an individual believes they have in certain situations. Individuals with higher perceived control typically believe that they are able to control a situation into having the outcome that they desire. Individuals with lower perceived control however will typically be faced with a situation and automatically believe that no matter how hard they try they will never be able to achieve the outcome that they desire. The desire for control plays an important part within these two individuals. People with higher perceived control will look for any manner in which they are able to control a situation and achieve the outcome that they desire. Although faced with a situation in which control is limited, some individuals may do everything in their power to seize control. However, the individuals who strongly desire control may experience negative emotions such as learned helplessness and depression due to the fact that they no longer have the control that they are used to having.
The once concept that I found interesting from chapter 13 was the concept of arousal. According to sport psychology, arousal level is a crucial factor in athletic performances. According to certain research arousal levels in sports performances affects muscle tension and overall attention. Overarousal levels will cause over tension of the muscles and as a result an athlete will not be able to perform at their optimal level. Underarousal however is also detrimental to performance because athletes will not be able to find the energy and motivation to perform. The inverted U hypothesis is constantly being used in sport psychology because it provides a basis for optimal performance. According to the chart, performance and arousal go hand in hand and certain levels of arousal allow optimal performance. The inverted U chart describes the level in which arousal must be in order to attain optimal performance. Although the typical arousal level is between under and over arousal, the arousal level will typically depend on individual characteristics.

Terms:
-Happiness
-Arousal
-Control
-Introvert
-Extrovert
-Underarousal
-Overarousal
-Motivation
-Inverted U-Hypothesis
-Perceived Control

Links:
https://academy.sportlyzer.com/wiki/arousal-and-performance/
https://academy.sportlyzer.com/wiki/arousal-and-performance/inverted-u-hypothesis/

Chapter 13 is all about personality characteristics. The main categories discussed in this chapter include, individual differences in happiness, arousal, and control. Any situational event offers the potential to affect all three of these. These categories can explain why different people have different motivational and emotional states in the same situations. Happiness is the first category and most people are happy. This chapter explains that people seem to have a happiness “set point”. This regulates their happiness and subjective well-being. People who are happy are generally going to be happy 10 years later at 30, while people who are unhappy art 20 will likely be unhappy when they are 30. Extraversion is the personality characteristic that is associated with being happy, and can be defined within three factors of personality. The first factor is sociability, being the preference for enjoyment of others. Next, is assertiveness and the tendency to have dominance in social situations. The last factor can be known as venturesomeness, which is the tendency to seek out and enjoy exciting and stimulating activities. Extraverts are happier than introverts because they posses a greater inherent capacity to experience positive emotions. I found this super interesting, because I always knew the difference in extraverts and introverts but I did not know that one could actually experience more positive emotions than the other. I was interested in why this is, and this chapter explains that it is because of how each individual is biologically made. Extraverts have a stronger BAS than introverts. The opposite of extraverts can be defined as neuroticism, and this is a personality characteristic associated with someone who is unhappy. It is defined as a predisposition to experience negative affect and to feel chronically dissatisfied and unhappy. The next main category in individual differences is arousal, being a variety of processes that govern alertness, wakefulness, and activation. Insufficient stimulation and under arousal is the sensory deprivation to the consequences of being under aroused. I found the experiment that was done with college students to be very interesting. This experiment asked participants to stay in their bed without audio and visual stimulants and they stayed there for hours. After hours had passed these individuals were not able to do simple math problems, and became more irritable. They found that it was hard to keep individuals in the experiment even with large incentives. I found this interesting because as college students we say we want to relax and do nothing, but if we actually did nothing for periods of time we would not be getting enough stimulation. The other end of this can be excessive stimulation and over arousal, being over stimulating and stressful events that upset our emotional state and impair cognitive activity. I found it interesting that being over stimulated can cause an individual to feel stress and anxiety, and I can see this in my own life when I am taking on to many things at one times. Control is the last individual difference in personality, and can be described as personal control beliefs. Perceived control refers to the beliefs and expectations a person holds that he or she can interact with the environment in ways that produce desired outcomes. Control is often an issue in our daily conversations and interactions with others. I found the part of this chapter talking about the desire for control to be interesting. The desire for control reflects the extent to which individuals are motivated to establish control over the events in their lives. I believe that I am someone who has a high-desire-for-control. Overall I think that a lot of this chapter related to myself, and I found it all very interesting!

TERMS:
happiness
arousal
control
extraversion
introversion
neuroticism
alertness
wakefullness
activation

LINKS:
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/thrive/201205/are-extroverts-happier-introverts
https://mentalhealthdaily.com/2014/03/21/is-social-anxiety-caused-by-overstimulation/

Chapter 13 focused on the differences of happiness, arousal, and control in an individual, and these things can affect the persons’ personality. The book stated that most people are happy; people with low income, those with low formal education, and people from almost every nation are generally happy. People react strongly to life events, whether they are good or bad, but then they generally go back to the state of happiness they were at before the life event took place. There are two emotional set points: positive and negative emotionality. The positive set point comes from individual differences in extraversion while negative emotionality comes from individual differences in neuroticism. Extraverts are different from introverts because they have tendencies to seek out social and exciting situations. Arousal represents a variety of processes that govern our alertness, wakefulness, and activation. There are four principals that connect arousal to motivation. The first is that a persons’ arousal level is mostly due to how stimulating their environment is, and this makes sense. If a person is in a neutral environment they may not be very alert or active. The second is that people engage in behavior that will increase or decrease their current arousal level. The third connection is when people are under aroused, they seek out opportunities to increase their arousal because stimulation is pleasurable and it enhances performance. The final connection of arousal and motivation is that when people are over aroused, they seek out ways to decrease their arousal level because being over stimulated can undermine performance. A moderate level of arousal gives the experience pleasure. Low arousal can produce boredom while high arousal produces stress. Performance is affected at both the low and high ends, and people generally do not want poor performance, so they seek ways to either gain more stimulation or to decrease their current level of stimulation. There are many possible personality characteristics that are under personal control beliefs including locus of control, perceived control and the desire for control. Locus of control can either be internal or external. Internal locus of control is that you have control over your life and the events that happen in it, these individuals usually take responsibility for their failures. External locus of control is that you have no control over your life and the events that happen in it, these individuals usually blame others for their failures. Perceived control concerns differences in peoples’ performance expectancies of processing the needed capacity to produce positive outcomes. The desire for control is also autonomy. People have the desire to make their own decisions, influence others, and enter situations in overly prepared ways.

I chose to focus on the relationship between happiness and personality. The article I found explained that in past studies, the level of happiness was measured by social variables, situational variables, and personality variables. The article explained that a social variable such as extroversion could create a bias that may affect the individual’s confidence and assertiveness that causes them to be extraverted. The study supported the hypothesis that personality structure was the underlying cause of being happy or not.
https://ac-els-cdn-com.proxy.lib.uni.edu/019188699500022X/1-s2.0-019188699500022X-main.pdf?_tid=ccd5528a-7cde-4b88-85bf-161eff660e00&acdnat=1522779566_a803bebf1da994a9ce7021ccfe6820bf

The next topic I chose to focus on was exploring the inverted-U relationship between self-control and happiness. The goal of the study was to find out if too much self-control caused unhappiness. The study found that self-control predicted an individuals’ well being and that there was no downside to having too much self-control.
https://onlinelibrary-wiley-com.proxy.lib.uni.edu/doi/full/10.1111/jopy.12322

Terms: Happiness, extraverts, arousal, performance, control, locus of control, perceived control, desire for control, autonomy

Chapter 13 is about personality characteristics. It talks about the individual differences in happiness, arousal and control. Specifically, they identify characteristics that are related to happiness which is behavioral activating system. Characteristics that relate to unhappiness are behavioral inhibition system and how it makes neurotics more responsive to signals of punishment. There are predispositions for introverts and extroverts that are relayed in chapter 13. Perceived control and the desire for control represent behavior and the outcome for desired and undesirable outcomes.

A topic from this chapter that I found interesting was extroverts and how they relate to happiness. As it turns out, extroverts count on the external environment to give them the energy they need, whereas, introverts regain energy from “alone time.” They rely on high dopamine levels to be able to feel energy when something positive happens. The book talks about how extroverts are happier than introverts, but according to Psychology Today, there is no clear answer. There are tests that state extroverts are higher in happiness, but the tests use examples like making friends and attending social gatherings as being happy. An example of an extrovert would be Barack Obama because he likes to work in a fast pace environment, is into politics (obviously), and finds himself in many social situations. I think I would be an example of an introvert because I like my alone time, being able to be independent, and I prefer less social stimulation.

I also research the desire for control and what that looks like for someone who has difficulty regulating and modulating inner emotions. This happens when there is a conflict and due to emotions, you are not able to separate emotions from the conflict. Some of the common symptoms include always having to be right in an argument, anxieties and insecurities dominate your relationships, or you procrastinate and expect others to pick up your slack. You may fear that if a conflict involved your significant other, they may decide that they do not need you or want you because they can take care of themselves. The book touches on this situation of losing control, but this article gives interesting examples, whereas the book focuses on how to gain back the control. An example that I would use from my life would be if I worked at a place where a couple worked and I noticed that they cannot separate their work from their relationship, it might be evident to them that others do not like the way they act at work around each other. Another co-worker tells them they won’t stand for it anymore. Turns out they use the solution of quitting and keeping their personal emotions involved in the conflict.

Happiness
Behavioral activating system
Unhappiness
Behavioral inhibition system
Introvert/extrovert
Neuroticism
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/thrive/201205/are-extroverts-happier-introverts
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/intimacy-and-desire/201105/people-who-cant-control-themselves-control-the-people-around-them

Chapter 13 is all about personality and how it can play such an important role in motivation and even its relation to our emotions. As discussed in the text, the three main principles of personality are happiness, arousal, and control. People are generally happy regardless of how one’s life seems to be going. Introversion and extraversion can be characteristics reflecting happiness or there lack of. It is believed that introverts are higher in neuroticism, therefore, making the individuals that fall into that category less happy than average. An introvert spends more time alone, has a decreased amount of social interaction, and spends more time reflecting on things. These things may make them sad or anxious from spending so much time overthinking and without taking to others about their thoughts. The individuals that fall into the extravert category are usually less neurotic, more outgoing, and live happier lives. They have increased social interaction and spend less time overthinking about situations or things that make them feel sad or anxious.

Arousal is about a change of action or pace in one’s life that gets them out of the same boring routine. Arousal is a feeling that gets us excited and makes us want to go out and do something different or more fun. This also encourages us to want to perform at our highest abilities, because we are at the peak of arousal, but not overly aroused. As for control, there is two different categories which are perceived and desired control in one’s life. Perceived control is believing that we have control over thoughts, behaviors, environment, etc. If we believe that we have control over something, it increases the likelihood that we will work hard for it. The desire for control is when someone wants control over certain things that take place in one’s life. High desire for control may cause anxiety in individuals, because they want control in things that may not be possible to have control over. It may scare them and cause them to work overly hard for something that is unlikely to occur causing them to feel helpless or like they’ve failed.

The topic in this chapter that I chose to do some more research on is one of the “Big Five” personality traits which is neuroticism. I chose this, because I would consider myself high in neuroticism due to my tendency to overthink usually negatively. I also do not like to be overstimulated by external forces such as large groups of people with loud noises. One of the articles I found discussed how neuroticism delays detection of facial expressions. It says that neuroticism has two factors consisting of general avoidance of people and situations and high sensitivity to environmental aspects. Research shows that those high in neuroticism tend to spend less time looking at facial expressions and are sensitive to negatively expressed negative emotions. These people have also been found to have higher emotional responses to basic social interactions. This article is basically suggesting that the less time a person spends with or around others the more they feel during an interaction, because they are less frequent. Someone low in neuroticism would have many interactions in a day and may find none of them meaningful. Those low in neuroticism would also feel more comfortable around a lot of people with more chaos making it rather easy to keep eye contact through confidence and being care-free. Those high in neuroticism are more prone to anxiety and depression, because they think negatively and constantly worried about their current situation along with future situations that could go wrong.

The other article I found interesting on neuroticism consists of research on how neuroticism has public health significance. The negative effects of high neuroticism consist of depression, anxiety, irritability, anger, worry, hostility, etc. Mental health aspects are at risk due to constantly worry about possible negative things taking place whether it may be realistic or not. Depression can cause an individual to not take care of themselves by not eating correctly, overabundance of sleeping, etc. These individuals are more likely to be under the impression that they are physically ill due to the anxiety and worrying component. Common increased risk of medical problems is cardiovascular disease, irritable bowel syndrome, eczema, asthma, etc. The mental problems can directly cause a lot of the physical problems. If you’re not eating right or exercising due to the depression aspect, it can lead to diabetes or heart problems. It has been found that happier, care free people tend to be in better physical shape and health. They seem to have higher motivation and are better at regulated emotions, especially the negative ones. The spend less time dwelling and overthinking, and more time moving on, and finding happiness in other things.

Terms:
Happiness
Arousal
Neuroticism
Control
Introversion/Extroversion
Behavioral Inhibition System
Behavioral Activation System
Learned Helplessness
Motivation
Personality

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0153400
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2792076/

Chapter 13 discusses personality characteristics and differences. People experience happiness differently. Everyone has a set point for positive and negative emotionality depending on whether they are an introvert or an extravert. Extraverts has a more sensitive behavioral activating system (BAS) than introverts causing them to experience more approach oriented behavior. Introverts have a more active behavioral inhibition system (BIS) which causes them to experience avoidance oriented behavior. People have different levels of arousal. Sensation seeking it the need for new and intense additions to one’s environment. Affect intensity is how strongly a person experiences emotion. Affect-intense individuals show emotional hyperactivity whereas those who experience emotions in a balanced manner experience emotion mildly. Finally, perceived control and desire for control are also personality characteristics. Those who perceive they have control are able to influence their environment to receive desired outcomes. Those who perceive a small amount of control experience negative emotions. Desire for control is the amount people want to control their lives. People who have a high desire for control will persist longer at hopeless tasks and when control is threatened, will experience distress.
I researched perceived control. Perceived control is an indicator of health behaviors. People who believe they have the ability to change their actions are more likely to attempt to lose weight or stop smoking than people who believe they have little control in their lives. Those with high levels of perceived control will also persist longer at an attempt to alter a health behavior as they believe can influence a result even when something such as genetics may be playing a bigger role in their health than their own actions. Those with low perceived control may experience negative affect for feelings of helplessness. This could create feelings of indifference to their situation, even lowering any effort for control they might attempt to exert.
Adolescents who believe they can control their lives experience less psychological stress and obesity. People who have been diagnosed with potentially terminal diseases show increased survival rates if they believe they have control over their disease. Perceived control is shown to peak in midlife such as in the 30s and 40s and decrease as people get older. Perceived control can help protect older people from many health issues that come with aging. Those who perceive control over their life and their environment are not only healthier mentally but physically as well.
Terms: BAS, BIS, introvert, extravert, sensation seeking, affect intensity, perceived control, desire for control

https://cancercontrol.cancer.gov/brp/research/constructs/perceived_control.html

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/media-spotlight/201310/staying-in-control

Chapter 13 was all about personality characteristics such as happiness, arousal, and control and the differences between those characteristics. Happiness seems to have a set point within each person. Whether a terrible life event or an exciting life event occurs, after a while their happiness tends to fall back to where it naturally is. Extroverts tend to be happier than introverts, emotionally. This is partially because they are more sociable, assertive, and venturesome than introverts, and extroverts have a higher capacity to experience positive emotions. Extroverts tend to approach more rewarding situations whereas introverts are less likely. Neuroticism is a characteristic that people are more likely to experience negative affect and also feel dissatisfied and unhappy. Neurotic people are more likely to experience emotions such as anger, fear, and anxiety as well as more pessimistic thoughts because they have an active and sensitive BIS. Extroverts tend to be happier, and neurotics are usually unhappy.

Arousal has to do with alertness, wakefulness, and activation. How stimulating an environment is how we can measure a person’s level of arousal. When we are moderately aroused, not overly or under, our performance is at its best. When under aroused, people can become irritable, senses become deprived, and performance tends to suffer. People tend to keep thoughts of how to stop being under stimulated and aroused. The opposite of under arousal is over arousal and that leads people to become stressed. When we are emotionally disrupted, we experience emotions of anxiety, irritability, and anger. When we are cognitively disrupted, we experience confusion, forgetfulness, and our concentration becomes impaired. Because of this, we also have thoughts on how to stop being over stimulated. Some people tend to seek sensation by taking risks for the mere experience. Those who like to take risks seem to have more levels of dopamine but lower levels of serotonin. Affect intensity has to do with the strength of the emotions that a person feels. Some people feel emotions more intensely and with greater variability than others.

Perceived control and desire for control are two characteristics that best describe personal control beliefs. Perceived control has to do with beliefs and expectations that someone holds about how they can interact and control their environment to get what they want and prevent what they don’t. Perceived control can predict how much effort a person might put in for a certain task. These beliefs influence a person’s emotion, the way they cope, the challenges they seek, and what they engage in. The desire for control is what lengths a person will go to create control over events in their life. People high in this want control over themselves even if they are in situations with little control. These people also have higher persistence and respond well to challenges and seek out more challenging tasks. When someone is high in desire for control but they cannot seem to gain control whatsoever, that person will be more vulnerable to depression and learned helplessness.

I’m interested in the difference of happiness between extroverts and introverts. The first article I found talked about the difference in brains for extroverts and introverts. For extroverts, the back part of the brain is more active and is stimulated by events coming from outside. They also need more dopamine to experience something that is positive. Introverts’ brains are more active in the front part of their brain, and they have lower dopamine, so they don’t need as much stimulation to feel good. This article also talked about why extroverts tend to score higher on happiness scales. This is because most scales measure activities that have to do with socializing and interacting with other people, so of course extroverts are going to score high. Introverts are happier when they are doing more low-key activities, which are not measured on these tests.

The second article I found agreed with the idea that extroverts are happier than introverts. They say this is because of a few factors. Those who are extroverts are more responsive when getting rewarded, which in turn causes happiness. Extroverts also attend more social events, which also causes happiness. The article did state that if an introvert were to attend more social events like parties and such, they would not be happy but the opposite. Another factor is that extroverts are better at controlling their moods than introverts, which allows them to stay happier longer and get out of bad moods easier and faster. Extroverts reflect on their past more positively as well, and introverts tend to look back on their back more negatively.

Terms: happiness, arousal, control, extroversion, introversion, sensation, emotions
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/thrive/201205/are-extroverts-happier-introverts
https://www.learning-mind.com/extroverts-happier-introverts/

Chapter thirteen talks about one of my favorite topics: personality. It explains the differences between three main categories—happiness, arousal, and control—and how individual experiences each main trait differently. When talking about happiness this chapter goes into the OCEAN traits, focusing on extraversion and neuroticism. When talking about extraversion, the book explains that extroverts are more likely to have sociability, greater social dominance, and greater venturesome than introverts, meaning that they are more likely to be happier because they are “more sensitive to social rewards” than introverts (page 371). The chapter moves on to talk about the two types of happiness: hedonic and eudaimonic. Hedonic happiness refers to moments that make a person happy, such as getting a good grade on this assignment or crossing something off your bucket list. Eudaimonic happiness has to do with self-realization and would include things such as realizing you ARE smart enough to get a good grade on this assignment, or you were strong enough to hike the Pacific Crest Trail as Cheryl did in our movie last week. The book also mentions the opposite of extraversion and happiness by bringing up neuroticism. People who are higher in this trait tend to be more vulnerable to negative emotions and are more likely to show avoidance behavior than extraverted people. It moves on to talk about arousal, which involves alertness and activation and relates to how what we’re doing keeps us stimulated. According to figure 13.3 in our textbook, a person has optimal arousal right in the middle of the spectrum. Too little arousal causes social deprivation which doesn’t encourage motivation, and too much arousal causes feelings such as anxiety and fear. Too much arousal can cause things such as a negatively impacted mood, limited cognitive ability, and even exaggerate physiological processes such as sickness. The third topic talked about is control, which involves need for control and perceived control. While perceived control has to do with what people think they need in order to have a positive outcome, the need for control focuses on the level at which people feel they can make their own decisions and be prepared properly. Control focuses on engagement, and the book takes us through the differences between high and low engagement. Engagement is the effort that individuals take to gain control of a situation. A low engagement means that a person may be more passive in letting a particular goal or situation by the wayside, while a high engagement is more aggressive and persistent in reaching control for their desired goals.
The most interesting topic to me in this chapter was the idea that extraverted people can actually be happier as a whole than introverted people. Being an introverted person, I feel happy a majority of the time so I wanted to learn more about this. Looking at the two websites posted below, I was interested to learn that extraverted people may be happier because they tend to paint their memories in a more positive light than introverted people do. This is something I can relate to, because comparing stories between myself and my very extraverted roommate, her stories all seem to end in a positive note, while some of mine may not. While extraverted people thrive on stimulation, people who are more introverted like me get easily overstimulated which in turn makes us less happy than “social butterflies”. These two articles helped a lot in describing why extraversion helps in terms of happiness and arousal!

https://www.livescience.com/13997-extrovert-nostalgia-fuels-happiness.html
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/thrive/201205/are-extroverts-happier-introverts
Extraversion
Neuroticism
Hedonic happiness
Eudaimonic happiness
Arousal
Social deprivation
Control
Perceived control
Desire for control
Engagement (high/low)

Chapter 13 is titled Personality Characteristics and mentions things like Happiness, extraversion, arousal and neuroticism. I like how in the beginning of the book, it states by saying that relatively few people are either sides of the extreme, with most people being somewhere in the middle. A good way to start to chapter off I thought. First it talks about happiness, and the personality characteristic associated with it, which is extraversion. I would say that it has three requirements which are sociability or preference for other people and social situations, secondly is assertiveness or social dominance, and lastly is a tendency towards stimulating situations. It compares them to introverts, who they are more happier than, and in better positive moods because they possess a greater capacity to experience positive emotions. On the opposite side, the personality characteristic associated with unhappiness is neuroticism, which is the predisposition towards negative effects. They tend to feel more dissatisfied and are more unhappy. THey experience more stress and steady moods like anxiety and fear. It talks about BIS and BAS, which I have learned about in my Psych of Personality class with Dr. Choi. BAS is associated with the left prefrontal cortex, and is related to dopamine and impulsivity. BIS is associated with the right prefrontal cortex and is related to serotonin and norepinephrine. It's responsive to cues of punishment, risk and uncertainty. I still have my notes from my personality class so those are directly from my book with their specific responsibilities. Sometimes the brain does not get enough arousal or stimulation. Like just sitting in a bed like in the book, people were unable to think clearly, had blank periods of thought, and dreamed or had visions while awake. Sometimes we get too much stimulation from things like major life events to daily activities. When we are overstimulated we may experience anxiety, irritability and anger which are shown through emotional overstimulation. Cognitive stimulation may also occur as well as physiological, so there are many types that may harmful. Lastly is control, which the book refers to personal control beliefs like locus of control, perceived control and others. Perceived control is a major factor in that it's our beliefs that allow us to hold expectations/beliefs and hold us on how we interact with our environment to produce desired outcomes and prevent undesired ones. Desire for control is how we want to be motivated to establish control over the things in our lives. It relates or predicts things like learned helplessness, depression, achievement and stress.
Something I found interesting were the links between sensation-seeking traits. That they have a low level of monoamine oxidase, and is an enzyme that breaks down neurotransmitters like dopamine and serotonin.
I decided to look at Excessive Stimulation and arousal. Article one talks about everyday things like the fact that noise today is way louder than back then, and never existed. Things like phones, leaf blowers and cars are things that may overstimulate us. Another thing was the amount of time we spend on the internet, like facebook and youtube.
Article two I looked into the effects of too much dopamine. Too little and you feel unmotivated, while too much you may want to go on a rampage. Your more impulsive with high dopamine, your libido will increase and possibly make you prone to addictions.
Terms: BIS, BAS, Control, Arousal.

http://reset.me/story/overstimulation-taming-a-modern-problem-that-leads-to-anxiety
https://bebrainfit.com/too-much-dopamine/

Chapter 13 focuses on individual differences in happiness, arousal, and control. As for happiness, people seem to be resilient. For example, someone can be happy and then be in a terrible car accident, which will make them sad; however, after some time, they will be happy again. Happy people also tend to stay happy thought out their lives and unhappy people tend to stay unhappy through out the course of their lives. Contrary to popular belief, happiness and unhappiness are independent from each other; they are not opposites. Arousal represents a variety of processes that govern alertness, wakefulness, and activation (pg. 374). There are four principles that explain how arousal is related to motivation. Firstly, a person’s arousal is dependent on how stimulating the environment is. Secondly, people engage in particular behaviors to increase or decrease their arousal levels. Thirdly, people are constantly seeking to increase their arousal levels because it is pleasurable. Lastly, if someone becomes over-aroused, they seek out ways to decrease their arousal. Control can be considered a personality characteristic. Two examples of this are perceived control and desire for control. Perceived control concerns differences in people’s preperformance expectancies of possessing the needed capacity to produce positive outcomes (pg. 383). Desire for control is where people want to make their own choices, influence others, be a leader, and be overly prepared for situations. When it comes to losing control, people who have a strong desire for control can feel emotions of distress, anxiety, and/or depression if they feel as if they are not in control of the situation.

The topic from chapter 13 that I have chosen to research in depth is “losing control”. I have chosen this topic because I have a close family member who becomes extremely angry when they do not have full control over a situation. According to Ryan Martin Ph.D., a writer for Psychology Today, most people become angry from a triggering event. After the triggering event occurs, such as being pushed by a stranger in a crowd, the angry person blames the situation for making them mad. However, getting pushed by a stranger in a crowd would not make everyone mad; some people could not care less if they were pushed in a crowd by a stranger. This leaves the question, “why do some people get angrier than others when minor inconveniences occur?”. In this article, it is stated that, for some people, being angry is a part of their personality. According to an article published by GoodTherapy.org, feeling as if you need to be in control all the time can put strains on relationships, careers, and can be exhausting. Many times, these people who seek to control every situation strive to prove they are competent and autonomous. If they have to take direction from someone else, or happen to have zero control over a situation, it leaves it open to others to interpret whether they are capable of making their own decisions or not. If they are in a situation they cannot control, such as their work life, they may take their anger out on their children at home, because their children must respect them and cannot disagree with them.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/all-the-rage/201110/why-we-get-mad
https://www.goodtherapy.org/learn-about-therapy/issues/control-issues

TERMS USED:

Angry
Arousal
Autonomy
Competent
Control
Happiness
Motivation
Perceived Control

Chapter 13 discusses the details of three motivational principles related to personality characteristics: happiness, arousal, and control.
We have two emotional set points that define our level of happiness: positive emotionality and negative emotionality. Happiness comes from differences in extraversion and unhappiness comes from differences in neuroticism. “Extroverts are happier than introverts because they possess a greater inherent capacity to experience positive emotions” (pg. 371). There are two types of happiness: hedonic and eudaimonic. “Hedonic well-being reflects a pleasant life and what most people think of as happiness while eudaimonic involves engaging oneself in meaningful pursuits” (pg. 372). Neurotics suffer emotionally because they experience negative emotions due to disturbed and troubling thoughts. I am an extrovert because I experience more positive emotions than negative.
Arousal is alertness, wakefulness, and activation. There are two personality characteristics related to arousal: sensation seeking and affect intensity. Sensation seeking is “the personality characteristics related to arousal and reactivity” (pg. 379). A high sensation seeker gets bored with routine while a low sensation seeker tolerates routine well. Affect intensity is the strength with which one experiences their emotions. Affect intense people are more psychologically sensitive to changes in arousal than affect stable people. Affect intense people experience emotions strongly while affect stable people experience emotions mildly.
Perceived control and desire for control are two personality characteristics that explain personal control beliefs. Perceived control is “the difference in preperformance expectancies of possessing the needed capacity to produce positive outcomes” (pg. 383). Desire for control is “the extent to which people strive to make their own decisions, influence others, assume leadership roles, and enter situations in overly prepared ways” (pg. 383).
I was interested in learning more about hedonic well-being and eudaimonic well-being.
First, I searched hedonic happiness and found an article on hedonic and eudaimonic happiness on harmonist.us. The author, Shirley S. Wang, says that the “relentless pursuit of happiness may be doing us more harm than good.” Hedonic well-being is short term. Symptoms of depression, paranoia, and psychopathology has increased in recent years due to a cultural focus on materialism and status (hedonic) and a decrease in attention to the community and meaning in life (eudaimonic) in the United States. Participants in these studies who had a greater sense of purpose in life, high in eudaimonic well-being, were less likely to have cardiovascular disease, osteoporosis, Alzheimer’s disease, and even be less likely to die than those with a low purpose in life. Brain imaging studies show that individuals with high eudaimonic well-being use their pre-frontal cortex (used for higher order thinking such as goal setting, language, and memory) more than those with low eudaimonic well-being.
I then searched eudaimonic happiness and found an article from the University of Pennsylvania called Authentic Happiness by Martin E. P. Seligman. There are two paths to happy lives: the Good Life and the Meaningful Life. There is a heritable trait called “positive affectivity” that goes again the hedonic view. Also, Aristotle spoke of eudaimonia as being in a deep absorption and emersion, or flow and it is not a feeling but being one with the activity. Eudaimonia pursuits were significantly correlated with life satisfaction and hedonic was not. Successfully pursuing the Good Life and the Meaningful Life leads to higher life satisfaction.

Terms used:
Personality
Happiness
Extroversion
Hedonic
Eudaimonic
Neuroticism
Arousal
Sensation seeking
Affect intensity
Control
Perceived control
Desire for control

Links:
http://harmonist.us/2011/03/hedonic-and-eudaimonic-happiness/

https://www.authentichappiness.sas.upenn.edu/de/content/pleasure-meaning-eudaimonia-0

Chapter thirteen elaborates on our personality characteristics. Happiness is something that can go either way. We see that individuals who have less money/income say they are happy and same is said with those who have more. For individuals who say they are happy at the age of 25 tend to say they are happy at the age of 35. The chapter showed that someone who had won the lottery a few years back stated the same level of happiness as someone who had been severely injured a few months. Everyone has the chance to experience happiness and unhappiness and it all depends on our own personalities. We see that happiness highlights the emotions of extraversion and unhappiness deals with neuroticism.
Extraversion is basically the preference someone has to involve themselves in joyful situations with other people. This personality characteristic strives on sociability, assertiveness and venturesomeness. With these three facets we see a pattern of joy and happiness. That being said we see how someone who tends to be more extraverted tend to be much happier. A personal example, is the organization called Student Admissions Ambassadors (SAA) that I am currently a member of. This group gives tours of campus and requires a sense of extraversion in order to effectively give a positive image to the future. That being said, when I joined the group and everyone introduced themselves to the new members, I noticed that every single person seemed happy. Everyone had a smile on their face when we met them and I can now see how the extraversion that is needed of this position reflects on their personality. With the opposite personality trait of neuroticism. When someone has a high level of neuroticism we see that they are generally more unhappy and experience much more stress and anxiety. Neurotic individuals suffer emotionally according to the chapter
With arousal, the chapter explains how it is the representation of alertness, wakefulness, and activation. Arousal levels have four principles that emphasize motivation, all of which in a sense tell us that we have to regulate our arousal levels when dealing with motivation. The book provides a Inverted U-Curve that highlights this. It shows how lower levels of arousal represent poor levels of performance and higher levels also show a decrease in performance. This is because you have too high of a level of arousal and you can develop issues. A perfect example of this is when I were to give a tour of campus. If I have a low level of arousal I tend to be kind of bored with the tour and want it to be over and plainly, “not feeling it”. With a moderate level of arousal I am energized, alert and deliver a positive vibe towards the members on the tour (this would be the perfect situation). With a high level of arousal, I would find myself struggling to stay on track with my words. I may stutter or have anxiety and maybe feel way too nervous for the tour. This would then cause stress and tension. Within arousal we all experience the personality characteristic of sensation seeking. What this means is that someone who has a high level would seek out arousal and brain stimulation. They seek out adventure and are quickly bored when a routine is in place. Personally, I feel that I have a high level of sensation seeking. I try to constantly be doing something outside of my class schedule and work schedule that is fun. Here on campus intramural sports gets me excited and also signing up for random tours or panels.
With the concept of control we see both perceived and desire for control Perceived control deals with the expectations we build that can help us achieve a desired outcome in our lives. Someone who has a high level of perceived control will go after challenging tasks and goals and will make a game plan to achieve those goals. This person is someone who is driven. This can be reflected as someone who is a professional athlete. They want to win a championship or even the next game. They have that goal and they will put forth the necessary motivation to either win the game or championship. Lastly, with desire for control, the individual wants to make sure they they are in the drivers seat. We see difficulty with this when individuals join a team, go to the military or even prison.

The first subject from chapter thirteen that I researched was about performance and emotion. The article was titled, The Positive Impact of Physical Fitness on Emotional Fitness. The article focuses on the basic emotions. Half falling on the side of extraversion and the others on neuroticism. This article showed that members who came in to the CrossFit gym that showed emotions of neuroticism within the first couple days, consistently showed more positive and happier moods after two or three weeks of being in the program.
http://library.crossfit.com/premium/pdf/CFJ_Envick_Emotional.pdf?e=1297387670&h=1150b204e399613ad3ed2d9b2b893153

This second article deals with something similar. I searched extraversion and happiness with fitness. The article that I found was called, Personality correlates of physical activity:a review and meta-analysis. This study basically reflected that individuals who were being more physically active at higher intensities would experience more positive attitudes. This would result in higher levels of happiness/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2577457/

Terms:
Extraversion
Happiness
Sociability
Assertivenss
Venturesomeness
Neuroticism
Motivation
Arousal
Stimulation
Sensation seeking
Control
Perceived control
Desire for control

Chapter 13 focuses on personality characteristics and individual differences in happiness, arousal, and control.
Happiness is first discussed, a term that I thought I had clear when I read chapter 10, The Self and Its Stivings, that points out that “happiness is a byproduct of life’s satisfactions, thriumphs, and positive relationships” (Izard, 1991). Now happiness is understood from a more genetic perspective, where people’s positive emotionality can be predicted from personality characteristics like extraversion and neuroticism. These statements do not really fit with the definition that Izard proposed because there are new variables that could affect happiness, like perception. One example of this is that introverts may have the same life’s satisfactions as extroverts, but perceive them differently because of a mild activation in their BAS (Behavioral Activating System) that makes introvert people have a worse sensitivity to positive feelings.
Extraverts are generally happier than introverts because they enjoy more frequent positive moods than do introverts because of a greater sociability, social dominance and venturesomeness. Unhappiness is related with neuroticism, defined as a predisposition to experience negative affect and to feel chronically dissatisfied.
The second term discusses is arousal, that represent processes as alertness, activation, and wakefulness. These processes can be measured by performance and well being, which have a specific relation with arousal levels, following The Inverted-U Curve relationship. Low stimulation produces boredom and restlessness and high stimulation produces tension and stress. The level of arousal that people need is shaped by genetic and the arousal reaction when exposed to external stimulation is called reactivity. The personality characteristic related to arousal and reactivity is called sensation seeking, which drive people to a continual external supply of brain stimulation, in order to avoid getting bored with routine and to promote exciting experiences.
Finally, the characteristic of control is divided in two categories that “capture most of the spirit of control beliefs”: perceived control and desire for control. Perceived control concerns the capacity to initiate and regulate the behavior needed in order to gain or prevent outcomes. Desire for control reflects the extent to which people are motivated to control what happens to them.
I am very interested in some topics related to neuropsychology and abnormal psychology, so I wanted to gain more information in these two areas. I found two different research articles that conducted experiments where BAS and BIS are involved. In the first experiment, the researchers studied how individual differences in BAS were associated with brain activation during appetitive and aversive stimulus processing. The results show a positive correlation with activation of the left lateral prefrontal cortex while viewing erotic pictures, and a negative correlation with the right lateral prefrontal cortex while viewing aversive pictures. These results match with the information learned in chapter 12 about the specific brain areas involving emotions, where the prefrontal cortex is also mentioned.
The results of the second article point out how people with schizophrenia showed higher sensitivity to threat than (healthy) control subjects.

Links used:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2840846/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16643947

Terms used:
Happiness, Control, Arousal, extraversion, neuroticism, positive emotionality, BAS, BIS, moods, sociability, social dominance, venturesomeness, alertness, activation, wakefulness, perceived control, desire for control

Chapter 13 focused mainly on the personality characteristics. It goes into details about a our differences as individuals about happiness, control and arousal. They specifically analyze these components that are related to happiness which is behavioral activating system. Whereas, the characteristics that are related to unhappiness can be described as behavioral inhibition system. These components can make neurotics more sensitive to the indication of punishment. There are dispositions for introverts and extroverts that are mentioned in this chapter 13. Moreover, the chapter talks about the perceived control and the desire control that represent the behavior and the consequences for the desired and undesired outcomes.

One one of the topic in this chapter that I thought was very interesting is the extroverts and how these are not only important but related to our happiness as well. The studies have shown that the extroverts count on the external surroundings to give them the energy that they need. However, the introverts are the opposite that regain their energy from the free and alone time. They rely on high levels of dopamine to be able to feel that energy whenever happy moments take place. Furthermore, the chapter talks about how these extroverts are more happier than the introverts. However, according to Psychology Today website, this still is an issue and there is no clear answer. There are many researches that shows that extroverts are indeed higher in happiness. But, I did not like the fact that these researches and studies used example like going out, socializing and meeting with people is an example of being happy when it’s really not. One of the great example of extroverts would be myself since I like spending time alone and being independent rather than being in the crowd or gatherings.

Furthermore, one of the other topics that I looked into and thought was very interesting was the desire to control. This would be someone who has difficulty managing and controlling their inner emotions and feelings. This mostly happens when someone faces a struggle or rivalry and because of having so many emotions and feelings, that person is unable to disconnect these emotions from the difficult situation. There are many signs that shows these types of behaviors which include the excessive behavior of being right whenever an argument takes place. Not only this, insecurities and anxieties also plays a big role in this behavior and delaying every work until the very last minute and expecting people around you to do the work that you’re supposed to do. I can sometimes relate to this behavior because when there’s a paper due or an assignment, I always think I have so much time to get it done. I’ll just do it “tomorrow”. But we all have heard the phrase that states “due dates are closer than they appear”. Moreover, a person can experience fear because he/she may think that if a conflict involved their compelling others, people around you may decide that there’s not a need for you anymore, or they can get things done by themselves and take of every situations by themselves. The chapter mentions this situation to be as a losing control behavior. An interesting thing that I noticed is that this article gives many different and excellent examples whereas the book talks more about how to win back the control that a person tend to lose. An example of this I can think of is when a person who is having conflict at home tend to talk about it to group of friends at a gathering or in public where this behavior at that time specifically seems a little weird and unusual. Another example I can think of is couples in high school especially. Whenever the bell rings for the next class and you have those 5 minutes to make it there, and a couple decides to “catch up” on everything that happened and they seem to be unable to separate their personal relationship with the school environment and people around them. I guess they express their feelings and emotions to each other in order to get through from this combat.

Terms Used:
External
Internal
Behavioral activating system
Behavioral inhibition system
Happiness
Conflict
Introvert
Extrovert
Combat
LINK 1:
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/thrive/201205/are-extroverts-happier-introverts
LINK 2:
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/intimacy-and-desire/201105/people-who-cant-control-themselves-control-the-people-around-them

Chapter 13 discussed personality traits relating to happiness, arousal, and control. The chapter discusses that people who tend to be more extroverted are more likely to be happy than people who are neurotic. This makes sense as people who tend to identify as neurotic people have a more negative state of mind or outlook on the future—overall having little emotional stability. The second trait discussed in the chapter was arousal. Low levels of arousal can lead to poor performance whereas high levels of arousal can lead to successful performance physically or socially. People who tend to have high levels and a need for arousal are known as people who are sensation seeking. People who are sensation seeking tend to look for new experiences in their lives. The third and final trait discussed in the chapter is control. Control is discussed as the trait that can fall into the category of perceived control or the desire of control. People with a strong perceived control have coping skills to deal with the emotions and obstacles thrown at them. People who have a weak perceived control tend to half-ass obstacles that occur in their life.

The topic I found to be most interesting in this chapter is risk taking, which falls under the trait of arousal. The first article I read, “How To Take Smart Risks” gave information regarding risk taking in the workplace between men and women. The assumption was made that women were less risk takers. However, when surveying 650 women in a managerial position, 80% agreed that they would take the risk about asking for a raise during the same time frame a man would. The women justified their risk-taking business when negotiating for a raise by saying that they simply have to take a risk to get the reward or in this case, income, to get what they want! This article made me smile to see that women are working hard for their positions in the work place and not settling.

The second article I read, “Afraid To Take A Chance?” talks about the justification as to why people don’t take risks and biological aspects of becoming a risk taker. What people seem to fear most when taking risks is not being able to predict an accurate outcome or control the outcome of the situation. People who tend to be less “risk-accepting” tend to be more dissatisfied with their life than those who engage in “risk-accepting” behaviors. It seems that people who do engage in taking more risks are people who tend to have higher self-esteem—which makes me assume these people tend to be more extraverted, and those who do not take risks and are dissatisfied could also fall into a neurotic personality trait category. I enjoyed searching for articles that related to the chapter in order to see the traits come “full circle” in a way and overlap with each other.

Neurotic
Extrovert
Arousal
Sensation Seeking
Perceived Control

https://www.forbes.com/2009/08/18/risk-confidence-success-forbes-woman-power-women-09-decision.html#34b697b1590a

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-couch/201303/afraid-take-chance