Theories of Personality (SEMI-FINALS) Maslow’s hierarchy of needs concept assumes

that lower-level needs must be satisfied or at

Maslow: Holistic Dynamic Theory
least relatively satisfied before higher level
 This theory is also called humanistic needs become motivators. The five needs
theory. This theory assumes that the composing this hierarchy are conative needs,
person is constantly being motivated by meaning that they have a striving or
one need or another and that people motivational character.
have the potential to grow toward
psychological health (self-actualization)
Maslow’s View of Motivation
Maslow’s theory of personality rests on several
basic assumptions regarding motivation.

 First, Maslow (1970) adopted a holistic

approach to motivation: That is, the
whole person, not any single part or
function, is motivated.
 Second, motivation is usually complex,
meaning that a person’s behavior may
spring from several separate motives.
 A third assumption is that people are
continually motivated by one need or
another. When one need is satisfied, it
ordinarily loses its motivational power
and is then replaced by another need. These needs, which Maslow often referred to as
 Another assumption is that all people basic needs, can be arranged on a hierarchy or
everywhere are motivated by the same staircase, with each ascending step representing
basic needs. The manner in which a higher need but one less basic to survival.
people in different cultures obtain food,
build shelters, express friendship, and so Maslow (1970) listed the following needs in
forth may vary widely, but the order of their prepotency: physiological, safety,
fundamental needs for food, safety, and love and belongingness, esteem, and self-
friendship are common to the entire actualization.
species. Physiological Needs - the most basic
 A final assumption concerning needs of any person, including food,
motivation is that needs can be water, oxygen, maintenance of body
arranged on a hierarchy (Maslow, temperature, and so on. Physiological
1943, 1970). Although the most needs are the most prepotent of all.
common visual representation of the
hierarchy is a pyramid, it is worth noting
that Maslow himself never created or
argued for a pyramid (Bridgeman et al.,
2019).

Hierarchy of Needs
 Safety Needs - including physical Unmotivated Behavior
security, stability, dependency,
Maslow believed that even though all behaviors
protection, and freedom from
have a cause, some behaviors are not motivated.
threatening forces such as war,
terrorism, illness, fear, anxiety, danger, Expressive and Coping Behavior
chaos, and natural disasters. The needs
for law, order, and structure are also Maslow distinguished between expressive
safety needs. behavior (which is often unmotivated) and
coping behavior (which is always motivated
Love and Belongingness Needs - the and aimed at satisfying a need).
desire for friendship; the wish for a mate
and children; and the need to belong to a Expressive behavior is often an end in
family, a club, a neighborhood, or a itself and serves no other purpose than
nation. Love and belongingness also to be. It is frequently unconscious and
include some aspects of sex and human usually takes place naturally and with
contact as well as the need to both give little effort.
and receive love.  Expressive behavior includes
Esteem Needs - To the extent that actions such as slouching,
people satisfy their love and looking stupid, being relaxed,
belongingness needs, they are free to showing anger, and expressing
pursue esteem needs, which include self- joy.
respect, confidence, competence, and Coping behavior is ordinarily
the knowledge that others hold them in
conscious, effortful, learned, and
high esteem. determined by the external environment.
Self-Actualization Needs - Self- Coping behavior serves some aim or
actualization needs include self- goal (although not always conscious or
fulfillment, the realization of all one’s known to the person), and it is always
potential, and a desire to become motivated by some deficit need.
creative in the full sense of the word
 It involves the individual’s
OTHER THREE NEEDS: attempts to cope with the
environment; to secure food and
1. Aesthetic Needs - people in every shelter; to make friends; and to
culture seem to be motivated by the receive acceptance,
need for beauty and aesthetically appreciation, and prestige from
pleasing experiences. others.
2. Cognitive Needs - Most people
have a desire to know, to solve Deprivation of Needs
mysteries, to understand, and to be
Lack of satisfaction of any of the basic needs
curious.
leads to some kind of pathology.
3. Neurotic Needs - By definition,
neurotic needs are nonproductive. Instinctoid Nature of Needs
They perpetuate an unhealthy style
of life and have no value in the Maslow hypothesizes that some human needs
striving for self-actualization. are innately determined even though they can be
Neurotic needs lead only to modified by learning
stagnation and pathology Comparison of Higher and Lower Needs
Important similarities and differences exist opposed to deficiency needs, which motivate
between higher level needs (love, esteem, and non-self-actualizers.
self-actualization) and lower level needs
Metamotivation is characterized by expressive
(physiological and safety).
rather than coping behavior and is associated
 higher level needs are later on the with the B-values. It differentiates self-
phylogenetic or evolutionary scale. actualizing people from those who are not.
 higher needs appear later during the
The Jonah Complex
course of individual development,
and lower level needs must be cared Jonah complex - the fear of being one’s best
for in infants and children before
higher level needs become The Jonah complex is characterized by attempts
operative. to run away from one’s destiny just as the
biblical Jonah tried to escape from his fate.
 higher level needs produce more
happiness and more peak The Jonah complex, which is found in nearly
experiences, although satisfaction of everyone, represents a fear of success, a fear of
lower level needs may produce a being one’s best, and a feeling of awesomeness
degree of pleasure in the presence of beauty and perfection.
Self-Actualization Maslow’s own life story demonstrated his Jonah
complex. Despite an IQ of 195, he was only an
Maslow’s ideas on self-actualization began soon
average student, and, as a world-famous
after he received his PhD, when he became
psychologist, he frequently experienced panic
puzzled about why two of his teachers in New
when called on to deliver a talk.
York City—anthropologist Ruth Benedict and
psychologist Max Wertheimer—were so
different from average people. To Maslow, these
two people represented the highest level of Allport: Psychology of the Individual
human development, and he called this level Overview of Allport’s Psychology of the
“self-actualization.” Individual
Criteria for Self-Actualization  Gordon Allport emphasized the
1. they were free from uniqueness of the individual
psychopathology  He called the study of the individual
2. self-actualizing people had morphogenic science and contrasted it
progressed through the hierarchy of with the nomothetic methods used by
needs most other psychologists.
3. embracing of the B-values o Morphogenic methods are
4. fulfilled their needs to grow, to those that gather data on a single
develop, and to increasingly become individual.
what they were capable of becoming o Nomothetic methods gather
data on groups of people.
Values of Self-Actualizers
Personality Theory
Maslow held that self-actualizing people are
motivated by the “eternal verities,” what he What Is Personality?
called B-values. These “Being” values are
the word “personality” probably comes from
indicators of psychological health and are
persona, which refers to the theatrical mask
used in ancient Greek drama by Roman actors Stylistic Dispositions - Allport referred to
during the first and second centuries B.C.E. personal dispositions that are less intensely
experienced as stylistic dispositions, even
In Allport’s later definition, Allport conveyed
though these dispositions possess some
the idea that behavior is expressive as well as
motivational power. Stylistic dispositions guide
adaptive. People not only adjust to their
action, whereas motivational dispositions initiate
environment but also reflect on it and interact
action.
with it in such a way as to cause their
environment to adjust to them. Proprium - Allport used the term proprium to
refer to those behaviors and characteristics that
Conscious Motivation
people regard as warm, central, and important in
Allport emphasized the importance of conscious their lives. The proprium is not the whole
motivation. Healthy adults are generally aware personality, because many characteristics and
of what they are doing and their reasons for behaviors of a person are not warm and central;
doing it rather, they exist on the periphery of personality.

Structure of Personality These nonpropriate behaviors include;

Personal Dispositions – Individual (1) basic drives and needs that are ordinarily
characteristics met and satisfied without much
difficulty;
Common Traits – general characteristics (2) tribal customs such as wearing clothes,
Levels of Personal Dispositions saying “hello” to people, and driving on
the right side of the road; and
1. Cardinal Dispositions -  Some (3) habitual behaviors, such as smoking or
people possess an eminent brushing one’s teeth, that are performed
characteristic or ruling passion so automatically and that are not crucial to
outstanding that it dominates their the person’s sense of self
lives.
2. Central Dispositions - includes the
5–10 most outstanding
characteristics around which a
person’s life focuses.
3. Secondary Dispositions - Everyone
has many secondary dispositions
that are not central to the personality
yet occur with some regularity and
are responsible for much of one’s
specific behaviors.
Motivational and Stylistic Dispositions,
Proprium
Motivational Dispositions - All personal
dispositions are dynamic in the sense that they
have motivational power. Nevertheless, some
are much more strongly felt than others. These
strongly felt dispositions receive their
motivation from basic needs and drives.