Personality and its development

Personality and its development(1)

All of us use the term ((Personality)) in our daily conversation, but it’s difficult to provide an accurate meaning of this term.
It was ones said ""if all members of any social group acted alike ,feel alike and thought alike ,personality would not be exist .this statement underlines one of the most important fact about people ,namely that; each of us even if we have an identical twins, is psychologically different in one way or another from our fellow men .

The term Personality is derived from the ancient Greece word (Persona) which means the mask worm by the early actor to signify his role in the drama.
Indeed every one of us practice many roles throughout his life, these roles will reflect his own personality to the society.

As a whole, Personality can be defined as the distinctive and characteristic patterns of thought, emotion, and behavior that define an individual's personal style of interacting with the physical and social environment.

Elements of personality:

1. Present since teenage years.
2. Consistent over time.
3. Recognized by friends& other people in the society
4. Stable in different situation.

Appraisal of personality characteristics

There are many ways of characterizing an individual personality. At least seven classes of units can be used in personality appraisal:


1:-Physique and temperament: A person's physical endowments of body size, strength, appearance, and temperament (mood), all can affect on the Personality.
2: Intellectual and other Abilities: It’s important to bear in mind that intellectual abilities are a part of personality. Other abilities, such as skills involved in musical performance are also relevant to personality.
3: Interests and values: Personality in part reflected in the kinds of things one likes to do, enjoys, appreciates.
4: Social attitudes: A person necessarily, adopts attitudes toward features of his contemporary culture; these attitudes reveal aspect of his individual personality.
5: Motivational dispositions: Motivational dispositions served in the description of individual personality .Some of motives may be unconscious.
6: Expressive and Stylistic traits: Very often when we characterize a person, we tell some things about his style: politeness, talk activeness, consistency, hesitancy, sociability, criticalness.
7: Pathological tends: Sometimes it is easier to characterized illness than health.

What are the conditions causes break down of Personality:

1: Life stress & conflict
2: Repeated noxious stimuli
3: Uncertainty and doubt about things.
4: Lack of need satisfaction

General factors influencing Personality

Development: Two General factors are seen to influence Personality
A person's experiences within the environment and that person's hereditary background.
1-Environmental experiences: A person's experiences within the surrounding environment may have major effects upon the development of personality characteristics. These include:
A: Family environment in childhood, adolescence &early adulthood
B: Social &Economic environment (social customs,& traditions ,culture…and economic status.
.these experiences may be unique to one person only or common to many people


2: Hereditary effects: The particular genetic pattern established at the moment of conception influences the personality characteristics which a person will develop.
It is clearly that, inherited brain damage or birth defects have pronounced influence upon the person's behavior,. in addition, somatic (bodily) factors such as height, weight, skin coloration may affect personality development.

Interaction of heredity and environment:

Personality results from the combined effects and complex interaction of hereditary and environmental factors. In most cases, it's difficult or impossible to assign percentage of importance of hereditary and environmental influences.

Personality theories:

1. Psychoanalytic theory: this theory, put emphasis on the concept of mental illness and the use of psychotherapy to try to help people with problems.
According to Freud ,there are two basic drives motive all thought ,emotions ,and behavior ,these two drives are simply: ,sex and aggression .
To understand personality it is important to expose what is in the unconscious, but because they are painful or unwanted they tend to appear in some forms, as slips of the speech ,dreams and fantasies .Interpreting of such forms exposes unconscious and explained the personality .

Personality stricture

Freud believed that personality has three basic components: the( Id) ,( ego) and ( superego),and the personality motivated throughout life by the fundamental drive called(Libido)which provided psychic-energy that devoted to the achievement of goals.

Id: According to Freud we born with our id. The id is an important part of our personality. Because it is as a newborns, it allows us to get our need met. It is the most primitive or innate part of personality. The Id operates according to the( pleasure principle) , that is seeking pleasure and avoiding pain regardless of social beliefs. In other words, the id wants whatever feels good at the time, without consideration for the reality of situation. When the child is hungry, the id wants food .and therefore the child cries. It still speaks up until his or her needs are met with no care to reality

Ego: Within the next three years as the child interacts more and more with the world ,the second part of the personality begins to develop .The ego understands that other people have needs and desires and that when being impulsive or selfish can hurt us in the long run .It's the ego's job to meet the needs of the id ,while taking into consideration the reality of situation .
In other words, ego is the problem –solving of personality ,which operates according to the( reality principle) .it seeks pleasure and avoids pain in rational ways that society approves
.
Superego: by the age of five ,the superego develops. It's the moral part of us and develops due to the moral and ethical roles pleased on us by our caregivers. It reminds the person of what would be ideal behaviors and what behaviors are totally unacceptable .

In a healthy person ,the ego is the strongest so that it can satisfy the needs of the id ,not upset the superego ,and still take into consideration the reality of every situation .This is not easy if the id gets too strong ,impulses and self gratification take over the person's life .If the superego becomes too strong ,the person would be obsessed by rigid morals ,would be inflexible in this or her interaction with the world .

Ego defense mechanisms:

Freud proposed that actions or events that hurt somebody's superego and do damage to one's self –image result an anxiety in the ego .To keep this damage and anxiety to a minimum ,a person develops and uses ego defense mechanisms as a way of protecting the self.
anxiety

Intrapsychic conflict between(id,,ego.superego)

Reliance on defense mechanism

Some examples of defense mechanisms

1-Repression: The first step of all defense mechanisms (and thus the most prevalent of all )is repression ,when the individual "forgets" anxiety –producing memories or keeps unacceptable desires from surfacing in the unconscious. Sustained repression requires psychic energy ,so if the material repressed is especially anxiety-producing ,the individual may devote a great deal of energy to it. This may result in an abnormal personality pattern.

2-Rationalization supplying a logical or rational reason as opposed to the real reason e.g: stating that he was not succeed because he didn't like the boss, when the real reason was his poor performance–. Rationalization, the most commonly defense mechanism after repression.

3-Projection: People who attribute their own unacceptable feeling to others are demonstrating -Projection .Projection may allow the person to express sentiments or beliefs that would produce anxiety if they were accepted as his or her own.


4- Displacement: Displacement occurs when aggressive reaction are directed toward some " not guilty " stimulus rather than the one actually producing anger. This is done because direct attack upon the hostility- producing stimulus is viewed as too stressful, .e.g destroyed a door instead of hitting the person who created the mistake

5- Regression: A person who adopts an attitude that is appropriate to a younger age level may be showing Regression .Adopting a more childlike attitude may allow the person to avoid responsibilities and yet not "lose face".

6-Compensation: Someone who feels deficient in some way may defend himself or herself by emphasizing some behavior that "covers up" the deficiency. This is called compensation, and it may take two forms .
Direct compensation ,the person will emphasize behaviors that are specifically meant to be reactions to the felt deficiencies Indirect compensation, the person will stress behaviors that are not associated with the felt deficiency, but are rather substitutes.

Stages of personality development

Freud proposed that the development of personality advanced through several( psychosexual stages) .however, disturbances in the form or frustration during any stage could lead to fixation at that stage.

1:The oral stage(birth-first year) :the first psychosexual stag is called the oral stage .libidinal energy centers around oral activities ,particularly feeding and weaning. Fixation at this stage means that a high level of oral activity may be shown by the adult.

2:The anal stage(age2-3) : the anal stage is the second psychosexual stage where the focus of libidinal energy centers around the external conflicts created for a child who is being toilet trained . The way that parents conduct toilet training will affect adult personality characteristics .Fixation at this stage may result in adult difficulties with the giving of love or approval.

3:The phallic stage(age4-5) :In the phallic stage, the source of libidinal pleasure is in the genitalia .Characteristic behaviors at this time include exploration of the genitals , and interest in the anatomical differences between the sexes .Inability to achieve adult sexuality, incomplete gender identify ,difficulties in authority situation or homosexuality may result from fixation at this stage .

4:The period of latency(age6-12): Freud believed at the end of the phallic stage , the child entered a latency stage ,when preoccupation with sexual concerns no longer existed . During this period ,libidinal energies reduced dramatically .

5:Adolescence and Adulthood(puberty onward) :With the onset of puberty ,a person goes in to the final stage of development . At this point, the libidinal energies are increase, and the individual attempts to achieve adult sexuality.

if there have been difficulties at earlier stages, the giving and receiving of adult (mature )love may be difficult or impossible to achieve, then Fixation will occur


2 .Humanistic theories of personality:
These theories put emphasis on studying the whole human being and helping humans to achieve their fullest potential.

The theory of hierarchy of needs (by Abraham Maslow)is often used to summarize the system of humanistic psychology

1-The first level consists of our physiological needs, or our basic needs for survival .Without food, water, sleep, and oxygen, nothing else in life matters.

2-Once these needs are met, we can move to the next level, which consists of our need for safety and security .At this level we look seek out safety through other people and attempt to find a world that will protect us and keep us free from harm.

3-The third level is the need for belonging and love focuses our desire to be accepted, to fit in, and to feel like we have a place in the world .Getting these needs takes us closer to the top of this pyramid and into the fourth level.

4-Called esteem needs :At this level we focus our energy on self –respect ,respect from others ,and feeling that we have made activities on our life .We struggle to move upward in careers, to gain knowledge about the world.

5-The final level in the hierarchy is called the need for self -actualization .Self actualization refers to a complete understanding of the self .To be self –actualized means to truly know who you are ,where you belong in the greater society ,and to feel like you have accomplished all that you have set out to accomplish.

3. Learning theories of personality:

Many psychologists attribute the acquisition of personality characteristics to learning e.g. Classical &Instrumental Conditioning ,and Modeling(Social Behavior theory)
The basic belief of such theories are that normal and abnormal behavior are learned according to the environmental circumstances that are presented by the principles of (Excitation) and(Inhibition).
According to Albert Bandure(leader of Social Behavior theory)personality can be acquired by conditioning as well as by observing others and modeling our behavior after them.

Types of Modeling:

1:LiveModeling-observation :is the most common of learning behavior by Modeling which involves the direct observation of life model .
2:Symbolic learning –verbal modeling: learning a behavior without actually observing. Here; verbal description are used to establish the modeled response.
3:Pure Imitation: modeling involves exact imitation of another's response. In some cases ,this may mean there has been imitation without understanding.


4. Traits theory: This theory states that personality consists of broad disposition called traits that tend to lead responses. So that we can describe people in terms of their basic behavior like outgoing ,friendly ,dominant ,or assertive and so on.
According to this theory we have three types of traits:

1-Cardinal traits: the most powerful traits. when they are present they dominate on the individual personality .However few people have such traits (famous people).
2-Central traits: are limited numbers of traits that are usually adequate to describe most people's personality(usually 6-12traits).Such as being friendly , calm, kind.
3-Secandary traits :limited in frequency and least in importance they include particular preferences such as the type of food and music.

Eysenck believed that three main dimensions are needed to explain personality :

1-Introversion –extroversion.
2-Stable- unstable(neuroticism)
3-Psychoticism
Various combinations of these dimensions results in certain personality traits .For example a person who is extraverted and unstable is likely to be impulsive.
The psychoticism dimension reflects to how much the person is in contact with reality ,controls his impulses, and is crude or caring to others.

Personality Testes : there are several different ways to evaluation personality, including :

a. Paper and pencil tests(direct):usually used for personality evaluation consist of a questionnaire containing statements to which the individual can respond with answer such as "yes, may be ,No" or" true, false, can't say " .e.g.
1.Eysenck's personality inventory (EPI)(include extroversion, introversion,vs neuroticism
2.Minnesota Multiphase personality inventory (MMPI)
3.Cattell's personality factor's questionnaire(Chattel's 16PF)
4.Edward's personal performance schedule(PPS).


B. Projective tests: here the subject is usually presented with a series of ambiguous stimuli and asked for a description of a story about each . the theory of these tests is that the person will reveal some personality characteristics by introducing them into (or projecting them into) the stimulus provided. E.g.
1.Thematic apperception test (TAT)
2.Thematic apperception test for children (CAT)
3.Rorschach test (Inkblot test).
4.Sentences completion test.
5.Rosenzweig p-f study (for Adult of children )

Other Personality Evaluations:

Two other personality evaluation deserve mention ,these are interviews and situational tests.
*Interviews are face –to-face encounters between people.
*Situational tests : A person is placed in a previously planned situation and is expected to react ,the responses made by the person are evaluated .

Types Of Personality :

1.Obsessive –compulsive personality characterized by :
Inflexible- careful - stable mood – persistent.

2.Histrionic personality characterized by:

Lively-_sociable-_emotionally responsive.

3. Cyclothymiac personality characterized by: changing from high sprit, self confidence and high energy to lack energy ,low sprit and loss of self confidence along days or weeks .


4.Dependant personality :people with such personality are complaint ,falling in wishes of other people , don't help themselves and most of time , they are out of work.

5.Schizoid personality : self-sufficient ,emotionally cold ,fantasy ,difficult to get know well.

The characteristic of personalities types if exceed the normal level ,will lead to personality disorders.