Running head: LITERATURE REVIEW

Literature Review: Understanding the human conscious

Janine Perez
Northern Marianas College

English 202, Section 3

Dr. Bunts-Anderson
April 29, 2016

Literature Review

LITERATURE REVIEW

Introspection: Unconscious Behavior and Relationship Personalities

Studying the complexity of the human conscious would take many years to fully
understand, and even then, psychologists have yet to discover the depth of human superiority
compared to other organisms. For instance, what factors influence personality, sociability, and
laws of attraction is still uncertain. By observing an individuals unconscious behavior and
preferences, is it enough to foretell their future behavior to similar situations? With a process
called introspection, the student researcher will, introduce the various perspectives that will help
the reader understand how the human psyche works and whether there is a link between
unconscious behavior and affiliated situational personality traits.
Review: Weitens psychology: themes and variations
According to Wayne Weiten, (2014), in the revised edition of his book, Psychology:
Themes and Variations, personality is the unique set of behavioral traits that are consistent to
each individual (p. 362). Each person has traits similar to others, but overall, each person has
their own perks to distinguish their independence from the ever-growing population of human
race. Although quite informative, Wayne successfully includes various perspectives of
personality to rule out bias and maintain an objective point of view. This section will therefore
review these concepts explained his book.
Different Perspectives of Personality
Psychoanalytic
Weiten introduces the father of the psychoanalytic theory, Sigmund Freud, who gives the
reader a psychodynamic perspective in the structure of personality. He believes that the
conscious is governed by three basic components: the primitive or instinctive component, the

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decision-making, and the morale component that incorporates social standards in any given
situation. This means that, personality is governed by an individuals biological needs and urges
based on the pleasure and survival principle as well as the awareness of what is socially right and
wrong. Freud also argues that by focusing on childhood experiences, unconscious motives,
conflicts, and other methods of coping, a person may better understand personality, motivation
and other psychological disorders.
Weiten also introduces Freuds theory of the three levels of conscious awareness, whereas
the unconscious being below the surface of awareness may also explain why the unconscious
influence behavior because it contains thoughts, memories and other desires that we are not
aware of or easily repressed or forgotten (pp. 364-365).
In contrast to Freuds views, another psychoanalyst, Weiten introduces is, Carl Jung, who
shared the same views in terms of the unconscious playing a big role in personality; however,
Jung did not believe that memories are repressed or forgotten. His new approach believed that
latent memory is stored in the collective unconscious, which is present in the entire human race,
just as the need to survive is biological or innate to any living organism.
Behavioristic
Aside from Freud and Jungs psychodynamic perspective, Weiten then introduces the
behaviorists share of how personality is shaped. Like psychoanalysts, behaviorists study
personality and behavior based on observational behavior alone. B.F. Skinner, for example,
believed that behavior is shaped by an organisms external environment as seen in his operant
chamber box experiment where a lab rat finds its way out of a maze by going through a trial and
error process that molds experience. His theory is quite similar to psychoanalysts Freud, that by

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the pleasure principle, biological needs govern how an organism reacts to its environment.
Weiten further explains that Skinners view of personality is that personality is a collection of
response tendencies that are tied to various stimulus situations (pp. 372-373).
Psychologist Albert Bandura also agrees with the behaviorists perspective, however, he
believed that personality is shaped by learning. Like Skinner, he believed that behavior is
influenced by the external environment and stimuli; however, consciousness is still playing a
vital role in the personality and behavior center. For every favorable outcome in a trial and error
basis, an organism will continue to follow this pattern because they associate rewards with the
desired outcome. (p. 373)
Humanistic
Humanistic perspectives believe that humans are superior than other organisms because
they have the freedom to think, grow, and express themselves which set them off as not only
unique from other organisms, but also to themselves as well. Each individual is similar to some
extent, but how they respond to similar situations vary from person to person. Personality is
shaped by the completion of oneself. This is attained when all needs are met which includes:
survival, security, sense of belonging, achievement, understanding, and the discovery of ones
true self (pp. 376-377).
Biological
Psychologist, Hans Eysenck, provides a biological perspective of personality as well. He
believed that personality is inherited and some behavior traits are genetic. Eysenck believed that
personality is structured by a hierarchy of traits, where other superficial traits are derived
from smaller number of more basic traits which are derived from a handful of fundamental

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higher order traits (p. 379) which means that like Jungs theory, some personality traits are
founded by a collection of other traits. Interestingly, in a twin study, researchers found that twins
who are separated from birth share the same personality to some extent, but not as much as when
they are raised in the same shared familiar environment, which increases the influence of similar
personality (p. 381).
Evolutionary
Evolutionary perspectives believe that some personality traits are determined by
biological basis of needs. In Charles Darwins survival theory, only the fittest will survive, thus,
it is innate for people to judge others according to how they perceive them in their likelihood to
survive in the long run. For instance, confidence and strength may imply a person who is likely
to survive longer as opposed to others. One who shows sympathy to others may be associated to
someone who would not stab an acquaintance in the back in the fight for survival (p. 381).
An evolutionary perspective on how people perceive others is also determined by
attractiveness and likeability (p.400). Sociability also plays a vital role in human adaptation to
others. People are more likely to associate with others with whom they identify with. This is
because; it is innate for organism to unconsciously think of security by distinguishing a friend
from a foe.
According to Fritz Heider, humans tend to attribute their observations to explain why
other individuals behave a certain way. This can range from attaching their own personal
experience as well as other external and internal factors they believe may have cause a certain
behavior or personality trait. However, this is not often the case; in fact, this is called
fundamental attribution error. Fundamental attribution error refers to an observers bias in favor

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of internal attributions in explaining others behaviors, this does not mean than internal behavior
is always wrong or always right, it means that you cannot generalize all actions. Observers may
have the tendency to overestimate the behavior and personal qualities rather than situational
factors; they may be right but not always especially because not everyone reacts the same way as
others (pp. 401-402).
Attraction
In terms of attraction one of the key factors the influence attraction is physical
attractiveness (p. 404). In evolutionary perspectives, physical attractiveness may be associated to
greater survival, given that some cultures believe that physical attractiveness is associated with a
good gene that can be passed to future offsprings. Biological factors such as those who have
bigger breasts and other bodily symmetries may hint reproductive success, thus heightening
attraction amongst the opposite sex.
Similarity
Similarity also plays a vital role in attraction. People tend to associate with those similar
to them be it social class, race, age, religion, intelligence, education, attitude, and views because
people tend to align their attitude with those they associate with. Aside from similarity, there is
another phenomena known as the reciprocity effect, where as a person tend to like a person more
if they share the same mutual affection, or if they are told that they are liked is found to have
similar effects in attraction. This is to say that like yields like and hate yields hate (p. 405).
Cultural Perspectives
Cultural views show a variation on their ideals and perception of attraction and love as
well. For some cultures, attraction is conceived by mutual love, while others believe in a kind of

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love that is learned. This is especially shown in contrast between western cultures and Asian
cultures following fixed marriage. For example, Ana and Richard, both born in California, found
out that their parents arranged a fixed marriage. Although this may be beneficial to both parties
because it results to a marriage between their parents companies, they are not happy to hear the
good news because it seems forced. This is because western cultures believe in a matrimony
with someone that they love. This is not to say that Ana and Richard will not fall in love
eventually, because other cultures accept this tradition willingly. Xue Li and Kim Ah for example
come from a prestigious family in North Korea. Both parties accept a matrimonial bondage not
only because of the benefits upon the merging of their familiar companies, but also because their
parents are more concerned of genes and prestige as well, thus fishing out specific candidates for
their children with the belief that love comes after marriage.
Attitude and Social Judgement
Besides the different perspectives mentioned above, social judgment as well as attitude
may also determine personality and behavioral traits. Attitude is governed by three components:
the Cognitive component or the attitude made up of beliefs of an object of attitude. The Affective
component consist of emotional feelings stimulated by an object of thought, and the Behavioral
component consist of predisposition to act in certain ways towards an attitude of object (p. 409).
Attitudes, according to Wallace Ajzen, are mediocre predictors of peoples behavior.
When he and his colleagues studied attitude and behavior, they found that the average correlation
between attitudes and behaviors was 41 percent which indicated that the correlation was high
enough to conclude that attitudes truly predicts actual behavior; however, that doesnt mean it
will always predict that behavior, only to some extent (Weiten, 2014, p. 409).

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Review: Gazzanigas Cognitive Neuroscience

Gazzaniga provides many illustrations as to how the human mind works, this is especially
evident in his book Cognitive Neuroscience: the biology of the mind, which gives a cognitive
perspective on behavior, personality, social and situational perception. Perception, as Gazzaniga
emphasizes, depends on internal representations, for example, if a person sees a ball or a dish,
this individual will perceive it as something that is circular in shape. Aside from internal
representations, these representations undergo transformations just as learning is shaped. This
means that in order for learning to persist or stick in memory, it must be reproduced or put to
use, for example utilizing sensory or associating the object with an action. Uniquely in learning,
in an experiment made by Posner, physical or visual representations are more likely easier to
categorize compared to phonetic cues. Association and representation vary from different levels,
but overall prove that the human cognition is capable of producing multiple representations.
Likewise, in a study done by Sternberg, parallel linear functions proved that similar mental
actions show increased reaction times because of the familiarity with similar situations or tasks.
This may also explain why people would unconsciously react the same way in situations with
similar concepts because the concept is already premade by previously created concepts (p. 97101). This is especially true with connectionists who create models and rely on concepts that are
inter connected but have the ability to change patterns.
Review: Barghs Our unconscious mind
John Barghs, Our unconscious mind, methodically describes the unconscious, providing
various sections to organize his work as well as providing a response to any critic regarding his
findings. According to Bargh, how we unconsciously view people is a reflective reaction, this
is to say that it is innate for humans to judge others and put labels or stereotypes based on biased

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perceived judgement, just as Weiten explains in the previous section concerning fundamental
attribution error. Bargh also adds that environmental factors such as subliminal messages given
by advertisement and propaganda to influence perception (Boone, 2012). Bargh further adds
humans have an innate need to mimic others as well as follow responses that leads to
unconscious rewards (ex. The hype of smoking weed or eating chocolate) thus acting and
behaving the same way in the same situation. Certain knowledge or priming cues as Bargh
suggests a trigger to certain actions, which makes sense for survival in times of danger. Bargh
ends with a message to the critics to conclude that although past research regarding social
psychology may not be reliable, he adds the notion for consideration that people and the mindset
of everyone changes, therefore, not all previous studies may be false. As the race of humans
evolve, the minds perception and how they behave in other social events changes, therefore
although studies that were once accurate can be replicated, the results may also change or prove
the previous valid research invalid.

Review: Sheas Using Phenomenal Concepts to Explain Away the Intuition of Contingency
Nicholas Sheas, Using phenomenal concepts to explain away the intuition of contingency
thoughtfully inserts insight as to how contingent intuition is controlled based on a phenomena known as
phenomenal concepts. In his work, he provides a well outlined essay to explain the phenomena
followed by evidence to debunk opposing claims regarding intuition of contingency that is said to
cannot be explained away. The highlights of his paper features similar concepts in Gazzanigas work
(see Gazzaniga above) regarding the unconsciouss preinstalled knowledge of concepts and how it
operates in decision making and unconscious behavior. Shea also provides empirical data in his research
as well as citing them properly both in text and in his reference page. Shea makes a striking impression to

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his audience by emphasizing his claim that The intuition runs deeper: that no putative
scientific characterization could do the job (Shea, 544). Which means observation is not
enough to not only claim the reason behind behavior, but also the human psyche is very much superior to
outsmart or truly explain its inner workings because it is ever changing.

Review: Bargh & Morsellas Unconscious Behavioral Guidance Systems

Bargh and Morsellas collaborative work provides more introspective feedback on the
unconscious behavior. With the background previously presented by Barghs research, this
collaborative work provides more insight as to how behavior is controlled by the unconscious.
Bargh and Morsella also includes a figure following the steps of the unconscious guidance
system which is said to be automatic and greatly influences various aspects of behavior. To
conclude the credibility of this source, this source has been updated frequently as new empirical
research is done. This is evidently shown in the Authors note as well as in text citations that
features the researcher, Bargh, has done with respective collaborators in other studies. Below is
Bargh and Morsellas figure as stated above regarding the steps the unconscious guidance
system:

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Review: Wokke, M. E., Gaal, S. V., Scholte, H. S., Ridderinkhof, K. R., & Lamme. The
Flexible Nature of Unconscious Cognition
This study designed by Wokke and respective collaborators in The Flexible Nature of the
Unconscious is to illustrate the flexibility of the human conscious. This is evidently shown in
their research where the unconscious is said to be adaptive in a process of trial and error basis.
Researchers provided a detailed explanation of the experiment that can be used to prove its
possible validity in their research as well as its possibility to be replicated. Below is a snapshot of
the experimental design and behavioral results taken from the study:

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There are many perspectives on how personality, behavior, social attitudes, and
perception are influenced. Psychoanalysts argue that personality and behavior is shaped by
unconscious forces such as hidden and maybe long forgotten memories, desires, and motives,
thus, personality and behavior should be studied by looking into the psychoanalytical perspective
of the conscious. Behaviorists, contend that behavior and personality should be studied not from
the inside but the outside, as such in order to understand personality and perceived behavior,
observations must be made by how an organism behave in an external environment. Humanistic
perspectives point out that humans are superior organisms by possessing the ability of free will
and individualism. Cognitive psychologists assert that aside from the external environment

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shaping personality, learning plays a vital role into shaping behavior and personality. Biological
and evolutionary perspectives strongly agree that genetics and evolution shape personality and
behavior by having the programmed or innate need to survive and adapt.
Behavior and personality, cognitive psychologists insist, is shaped by learning and
perception, each connected by a common representation that is transforming and expanding over
time. It seems that there is enough evidence to conclude that organisms tend to associate similar
situational concepts and react the same way, however this does not mean that they will continue
to react the same way every time. What Wokke and many of the psychologists previously
mentioned clarifies, is the uniqueness of humans. They believe that everyone has a free will and
the ability to make decisions, therefore they can choose to follow what they think is right without
others passing wrongful judgment to explain their behavior because not all observation is as
accurate, only to some extent. Each source provided above brought many enlightening insight
regarding the human psyche, leading her closer to finding a true link between unconscious
behavior and relationship personality by the principle that the unconscious respond in a similar
way through cognitive or phenomenal concepts.
In light of the student researchers study, she designed a survey by which she
administered online. This survey consisted of questions that were similar in concept such as a
persons loyalty to a favorite band or fandom and their belief of their loyalty to loved ones. She
also analyzed the results of her survey to examine Wokke and Barghs theory that because the
human mind is ever changing, previous research may not always be invalid as new research is
proposed. In terms of individuality, as proposed by humanists, she especially payed careful
attention to the unique responses of her examinees personality.

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References
Bargh, J. A. (2014). Our Unconscious Mind. Scientific American, 310(1), 30-37.
Bargh, J. A., & Morsella, E. (2009). Unconscious Behavioral Guidance Systems. Then A Miracle
Occurs, 89-118. doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195377798.003.0006
Boone, L. M. (2012). Subliminal: How Your Unconscious Mind Rules Your Behavior. Library
Journal, 137(9), 91.
Gazzaniga, M. S., Ivry, R. B., & Mangun, G. R. (2002). Cognitive neuroscience: The biology of
the mind. New York: W.W. Norton.
Shea, N. (2014). Philosophical Psychology. Using phenomenal concepts to explain away the
intuition of contingency.Vol. 27, No. 4, 553570,
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09515089.2012.730039
Weiten, W. (2014). Psychology: Themes and Variations, 9th Ed. Belmount, CA: Wadsworth
Cengage Learning
Wokke, M. E., Gaal, S. V., Scholte, H. S., Ridderinkhof, K. R., & Lamme, V. A. (2011). The
Flexible Nature of Unconscious Cognition. PLoS ONE, 6(9).
doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0025729