Personality Traits. Below is a list of terms that describe personality traits that are commonly found in the population. You can probably think of many others, but stick with these for this exercise. The purpose of this exercise is to compare your own ratings of yourself with the ratings of others. Do others see you in the same way that you see yourself? Follow the directions below to discover the answer to this question.

· Make several copies of the rating sheet below. Ask three people to separately rate you on the list of traits. You should also rate yourself. Select a variety of people to do the rating, such as a family member, friend, co-worker, neighbor, teacher, spouse, etc.

· You and each of your raters should select and check off 20 traits that describe you best. It may be difficult to stick to 20, but force yourself (and your raters) to do so.

· On the summary-rating sheet (located beneath the rating sheet), check off your choices and the choices of each of the raters.

· Finally, evaluate your results. The following questions should help you. This part of the exercise is what you will turn in to me.

1. Overall, does your selection of traits present a favorable, neutral, or unfavorable picture of your personality? Be sure to provide evidence for your answer based on your choice of traits (i.e., provide examples of the traits chosen, provide the percentage of favorable, neutral or unfavorable traits, etc.)

2. Do the traits identified by your raters present a favorable, neutral, or unfavorable picture? Again, be sure to provide evidence for your answer based on your raters’ choice of traits.

3. How different are the traits selected by your raters from yours? In what ways do they differ? If they do not differ, then how are they similar? Provide examples from the various ratings and percentages (i.e., what percentage of traits were the same?).

4. How do you explain the differences or similarities you see in the ratings?

5. Which of your traits appear to be most positive based on all ratings? Why do you consider these traits positive?

6. Which of your traits appear to be most negative based on all ratings? Why do you consider these traits negative?

7. What do you think about this type of evaluation of personality? What are the advantages and disadvantages for using this type of evaluation to determine personality? How could you improve this procedure? In answering these questions be sure to use some of the information you learned about research methods in Lesson 1. PERSONALITY TRAITS: RATING SHEET

Rater’s I.D. ___________________________________ (Rater may wish to be anonymous)

Name of person you will be rating: ___________________________________________

Instructions: Check the twenty (20) traits from this list that best describe the person named above. Your evaluation should be based on behavior that you have observed.This assignment requires you and some friends or acquaintances to assess your personality. To receive full credit for this assignment, you must provide thoughtful answers to the questions at the bottom of the instruction sheet. If you only provide one sentence answers to these questions, points will be deducted from your grade. This assignment is worth 8 points.