TOPIC: THEORIES OF PERSONALITY

The book of Jess Feist and Gregory Feist, “Theories of Personality” defined a scientific theory
as a set of related assumptions that allows scientist to use logical deductive reasoning to
formulate testable hypotheses. A useful theory generates a number of hypotheses that can be
investigated through research. It also organizes research data into meaningful structure and
provides an explanation for the result of scientific research.

1. PSYCHOANALYTIC THEORIES
Psychoanalytic theories focus on the mental and emotional processes that shape the human
personality. Personality is fashioned progressively as an individual passes through various
stages.

A. SIGMUND FREUD was the proponent of psychoanalytic theory. He was born in 1856 in
Freiberg, Moravia which now a part of the Czech Republic. He was the eldest son of Jacob and
Amalie Nathanson Freud. When he was three years old, the family moved to England, the
following year to Vienna, the Austrian capital where Feud spent almost 80 years until 1938 when
the Nazi invasion forced them to emigrate to London where he lived until his death on
September 23,1939.
Sigmund Freud in his Theory of Psychoanalysis identified three level of mental life: the
unconscious, preconscious, and conscious. Early childhood experience that creates high levels
of anxiety is repressed into the unconscious where they may influence behavior, emotions and
attitudes for years. Events that is not associated with anxiety but merely forgotten make up the
contents of the preconscious. Conscious images are those in awareness at any given time.
Freud also recognized three substructures of the mind, ID, EGO, and SUPEREGO.

THE ID
It represents the human beings’ unconscious basic drives that demand immediate gratification.
For example, a person has certain basic needs like food, shelter, safety and security, education,
belongingness and self-realization. To satisfy these needs or drives, the individual needs to relate
with others and approach the world realistically. This done through the EGO.

THE EGO
Ego is the person’s conscious effort to balance innate pleasure-seeking drives with the
demands of society. The Ego develops as individuals become aware of themselves and have
come to realize that they cannot have everything they want. They need others to satisfy their
needs and desires.

THE SUPEREGO
The superego is the person’s conscience, the operation of culture within individuals that
dictates why they cannot have everything they want. There are group norms and standards to
which people must conform their behavior to.
B. ALFRED ADLER
Alfred Adler is known for his work on individual psychology.
People begin life with both innate striving and physical deficiencies which combine to produce
feelings of inferiority. These feelings stimulate style to set a goal of overcoming their inferiority.
People who see themselves as having more than their share of physical deficiencies or who
experience a neglected lifestyle overcompensate for these deficiencies and are likely to have
exaggerated feelings of inferiority, strive for personal gain and set unrealistic high goals. People
with normal feelings of inferiority compensate these feelings by cooperating with others and
developing a high level of social interest. Social interest or a deep concern for the welfare of
other people is the sole criterion by which human actions should be judged.
For Adler, the three major problems of life are neighborly love, work, and sexual love. These
can only be solved through social interest. All behaviors, even those that appear to be
incompatible are consistent with a person’s final goal. Human behavior is shaped neither by past
events nor by objective reality, but rather by people’s subjective perception of situations.
Heredity and environment provide the building materials of personality but people’s creative
power is responsible for their lifestyle. All people, especially neurotics, make use of various
safeguarding tendencies – such as excuses, aggression, and withdrawal – as conscious or
unconscious attempts to protect inflated feelings of superiority against public disgrace. Men
opposing the belief that they are superior to women are fiction for both sexes.
The Adlerian therapy uses birth order, early recollections and dreams to foster courage, self-
esteem and social interest.

C. CARL JUNG
Carl Jung’s work on analytical psychology is an echo of Freud’s own work on psychoanalysis.

According to him, the personal unconscious is formed by the repressed experiences of a

particular individual and is the reservoir of the complexes. Humans inherit a collective
unconscious that help shape many of their attitudes, behaviors and dreams.

Archetypes are contents of the collective unconscious. The eight basic types of archetypes
include persona, shadow, anima, animus, great mother, wise old man, hero, and self.

PERSONA: represents the part of personality that people show to the rest of the world. A
psychologically healthy person recognizes their persona but do not mistake it for the whole
personality.

ANIMA: is the feminine side of the men and is responsible for many of their irrational moods
and feelings.

ANIMUS: is the masculine side of women responsible for irrational thinking and illogical
opinions of women.

GREAT MOTHER: is the archetype of fertility and destruction.

WISE OLD MAN: is the archetype of the intelligent but deceptive voice of accumulated
experience.
HERO: is the unconscious image of a person who conquers an evil foe but who also has a tragic
flaw.
The SELF: is the archetype of completeness, wholeness and perfection.

According to Jung, the two attitudes of introversion and extroversion can combine with any one
or more of the four functions: thinking, feeling, sensation, and intuition to produce the eight
basic types of archetypes.

2. BEHAVIORAL THEORIES
The behavioral theories of personality emphasize the importance of environment or situation
determinants of behavior. Behavior is shaped by environmental conditions through learning. In
turn, a person’s behavior shapes the environment.
Behaviorism was popularized in the period before, during and following World War I by John
R. Watson. Today, behavioral theories are called social learning or social cognitive theories.
The basic tenet of the social learning theory is that people behave in ways that are likely to
produce reinforcement and that individual difference in behavior result primarily from
differences in the kinds of learning experiences a person encounters as he/she grows up.

Classical Conditioning
The study of classical conditioning as a learning process was undertaken by the 20 th century
Russian physiologist IVAN PAVLOV. His research on digestion won him Nobel prize. His
experiment with dog involves measurement of its saliva flow in a tube attached to the dog’s
salivary glands.
The learning process of classical conditioning involves association of a neutral stimulus with
another stimulus through repeated pairings.

OPERANT CONDITIONING
In operant conditioning, certain responses are learned because they operate on, or effect, the
environment.

A. E.L. THORNDIKE
The series of experiments at the turn of the century marked the start of the study on operant
conditioning. He was greatly influenced by Darwin’s theory of evolution. He experimented with
a cat who appeared to engage in a trial-and-error behavior. When a reward immediately follows
one of those behaviors, learning of the action is strengthened. Thorndike referred to this
strengthening as the law of effect. In operant learning, the law of effect only behaviors followed
by positive consequences selects from a set of random responses.

B. BURRHUS FREDERIC SKINNER or B.F. SKINNER

An American psychologist and behaviorist born on March 20, 1904 in Susquehanna, Pe
nnsylvania. Skinner based his work, The Behavior of Organisms (1938), on the principles
of operant (observable) conditioning wherein the organism’s behavioral responses in a situation
are reinforced or discouraged according to a system of rewards and punishments (Collier, 1934).
According to Skinner, operant conditioning can be used to control one’s behavior as well as
others. This is used in weight control clinics, smoking clinics and behavior therapy. In part, he
believed that an undesirable behavior exists because it is reinforced. For example, a child’s
tantrum is reinforced by his/her parents by paying more attention to him/her.
C. JULIAN ROTTER
Julian Rotter proposed the concept of behavior potential into the behaviorist approach.
Behavior potential pertains to the likelihood of occurrences of a specific behavior in a particular
situation being determined by reinforcement value and expectation. The behavior of individual in
a specific situation would depend on the result of what developed the last time he or she was in a
similar situation.
D. ALBERT BANDURA’s social-cognitive theory emphasizes reciprocal determinism in
which external determinants (such as rewards and punishments) and internal determinants (such
as beliefs, thoughts and expectations) are parts of a system of interacting influences that affect
both behavior and other parts of the system. The relationship is based on reciprocity wherein the
environment affects the environment.
When people act, Bandura noted that they use symbols. People consider solutions and outcomes
in their problems. Bandura stressed that through the observation of the behavior of others, which
were rewarded and punished; people learn how to behave when caught in varied situations.
Social learning theories view human personality as highly modifiable.

3. HUMANISTIC THEORIES
Humanistic theories of personality adopt the holistic approach wherein the condition of human
being is viewed in it totality, taking into account their physical, social and psychological
components. The human potentials for self-direction and freedom of choice are maximized.

A. ABRAHAM H. MASLOW
He was born in Brooklyn, New York on April 1, 1908. In his work, Motivation and
Personality, published in 1954, he emphasized human freedom and man’s capacity for self-
actualization.
The hierarchy of needs is one of the key concepts advanced by Maslow. These needs are
unchanging and genetic in origin.
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
The
need
to
fulfill
one's
unique
potenti
al
Esteem need: to achieve, be
competent; gain approval and
recognition

Belongingness and love needs: to

affiliate with others; to be accepted and
belong

Safety needs: to feel secure, safe and out of danger

Physiological needs: to satisfy hunger, thirst and sex drives

 Maslow termed transient memories of self-actualization as peak experiences, which are
characterized by happiness and fulfillment – a temporary, nonstriving, nonself-centered state of
goal attainment. These experiences in occur in various contexts like nature appreciation, intimate
relationship, creative activities, athlethic participation or aesthetic perceptions. Responses may
term as alive, perfect, unique, self-sufficient and so forth.

B. CARL RANSOM ROGERS

He was born in Oak Park, Illinois, January 8,1902, was educated at the University of
Wisconsin (B.A.) and Columbia University (Ph.D).
Rogers referred to the basic force motivating an individual as actualizing tendency - a
tendency toward the fulfillment or the actualization of all the capacities of an individual to move
towards maturity, growth and positive change.

Real Self vs. Ideal Self

The central concept in Roger’s theory of personality is the self or self-concept. Ideas,
perception and values are contained in the real self-characterized by “I” or “me”, including an
awareness of “what I am” and “what I can do”. On the other hand, Rogers also believed that each
person has an ideal self – one’s conception of the kind of person he/she would like to be.

The closer the ideal self is to the real self, the more fulfilled and happy the individual becomes
the opposite also holds that the wider the gap between the real self and the ideal self, the more
unhappy and dissatisfied a person.

4. COGNITIVE THEORIES
The cognitive theory focuses on “information processing” and views each person as an
“information processor” (Vander Zanden,1997). This theory deals with the cognitive structures
and processes that allow a person to mentally represent events that transpire in his/her
environment.

A. JEAN PIAGET (1896-1980)

Swiss psychologist is recognized as a giant of 20th century psychology. He was not interested
in the study of growing children and how they adjust to the world they live in. The key concepts
of his cognitive theory are the scheme, assimilation, accommodation and equilibrium. These
concepts find expression in cognitive development’s four stages: the sensory motor stage, the
preoperational stage, the concrete operational stage and formal operational stage.

1. The Sensory Motor Stage (1-2 years old)

This is the level of human development where individual experiences the world only through his
senses. For example, a two year old knows the world only through his five senses: touch, taste,
smell, sight and hearing.

2. The Preoperational Stage (2-6 years old)

This is the level of human development where the individual first uses language and other
symbols. For example, a child who attaches meaning to individual experiences can identify an
object but cannot explain what kind of object it is. There is lack of understanding of abstract
concepts; the child cannot judge an object’s size, weight or volume.
3. The Concrete Operational Stage (7-11 years old)
This third stage is the level of development where an individual first perceives causal
connections in his/her environment. A child focuses on how and why things happen and attaches
more than one symbol to a particular event or object. For example, a child of five may attach
connections of symbols to a particular date.

4. The Formal Operational Stage (12 years and above)

This last stage in Piaget’s model is the level of development where an individual thinks
abstractly and critically. A youngster begins to reason abstractly rather than thinking only of
concrete situations, can understand events or situations more than their literal meaning and can
understand the contextual or implied associations of situations and events.

According to cognitive learning theorists, our capacity to use symbols allows us a means to
comprehend and deal with our environment. Verbal and imagined symbols represent events to
portray our experiences, communicate with others, to plan, to create, to imagine and to engage in
future actions.

B. LAWRENCE KOHLBERG
He relates moral reasoning to Pieget’s model – how individuals judge situations as right or
wrong. Development is again seen in stages: pre-conventional level and conventional level.

Pre-Conventional Level
In the early stage of pre-conventional level, young children experience the world in terms of
pain and pleasure. Rightness amounts to what feels good to them.

Conventional Level
In the second stage, the conventional level, young people lose some of their selfishness as they
learn to define right and wrong in terms of what pleases their parents and what are consistent
with broader cultural norms. They try to assess intentions or ends in reaching moral judgments
instead of simply observing what others do right. Young people claim that boys have a justice
perspective, relying on formal rules or regulations to define right and wrong while girls have a
care and responsibility perspective, judging a situation with focus towards personal relationships
and loyalties. For example, boys see drug addiction as wrong and immoral because it destroys
life and violates the moral law. Girls are more likely to wonder why some individuals take drugs
and tend to be sympathetic toward those who take prohibited and dangerous drugs, saying they
are only victims, not criminals.

5. EVOLUTIONARY PERSONALITY THEORY

The evolutionary personality theory predicts that men and women look for different features
when selecting a potential mate (Burger,2001). Advocates of this theory think of romantic
relationships in terms of male and female members of a species getting together to eventually
reproduce. Parental investment is the concern when choosing a partner. Because both sexes have
different ideas about parental investment, the theory predicts that they look for various
characteristics in their mates.
This theory proposes intrasexual selection, which is the competition among members of the
same gender for mating access to the best members of the opposite gender. (Burger,2001).
 Researches on this theory show that men are more likely to consider physical attractiveness
when selecting a dating partner or spouse. They also prefer a young partner. On the other hand,
women have preferences for a man who possess resources to raise a family.

6. EVOLUTIONARY ADAPTATION THEORY

The behaviors of individuals are studied in evolutionary adaptation theory from a biological
point of view. The theory relies heavily on Charles Darwin’s evolutionary theory.
Proponents of this theory stressed that evolution applies not only to anatomy and physiology
but also to predispositions for certain types of behavior. Individuals are said to be genetically
prepared for some responses in particular situations.

ASSESSMENT

TASK:
1. Identify and give the focus of personality theories and at the same time their differences or
relatedness from each other.
2. Which among the personality theories presented can you think important to apply in knowing
one personality? Why, give your reason/s.
3. If you make an assessment about your own self, which theory applied to you most? Why you
say so?
4. Identify and give experiences or observation you may have that you see particular theory when
you observed person near you or close to you.
5. Maslow pointed out the different needs the person has to realize with, in his hierarchy of
needs, in your present situation, what level you are in now as you look at yourself. Why you said
so?
6. In the evolutionary personality theory which focused on romantic relationship, but when
selecting a partner men and women have differences in choosing their life partner, do you think
it is valid today, as you observe/s? why?
7. Is it true, that in Conventional level of Lawrence Kohlberg theory, boys have a justice
perspective while girls have a care and responsibility perspective? Why?
8. In looking at yourself now, where at you at present in IDEAL SELF or REAL SELF?
(Roger”s Theory). Why you say so?
9. What differences between men and women can you identify using the theory of Carl Jung.
Give at least three differences and state/write the reasons behind those differences.
10. In the theory of IVAN PAVLOV, Classical conditioning, where does it best to apply, in an
animal or in a human being? Why?