PERSONALITY 2011

AMITY
LAW PERSONALITY
SCHOOL

Animesh Kumar | B.A. LL.B (H) – IV Sem

 PERSONALITY 2011

INDEX

Introduction……………………………………………………………………………………..3

Personality Theories

 Trait Theory………………………………………………………………….4
 Type Theory………………………………………………………………….6
 Psychoanalytical Theory………………………………………………..8

Bibliography……………………………………………………………………………………..11

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INTRODUCTION

"Personality" can be defined as a dynamic and organized set of characteristics possessed by a

person that uniquely influences his or her cognitions, motivations, and behaviors in various
situations. The word "personality" originates from the Latin persona, which means mask.
Significantly, in the theatre of the ancient Latin-speaking world, the mask was not used as a plot
device to disguise the identity of a character, but rather was a convention employed to
represent or typify that character.

While there are many different theories of personality, the first step is to understand exactly
what is meant by the term personality. Personality is the particular combination of emotional,
attitudinal, and behavioral response patterns of an individual. A brief definition would be that
personality is made up of the characteristic patterns of thoughts, feelings and behaviors that
make a person unique. In addition to this, personality arises from within the individual and
remains fairly consistent throughout life.

Some of the fundamental characteristics of personality include:

 Consistency - There is generally a recognizable order and regularity to behaviors. Essentially,

people act in the same ways or similar ways in a variety of situations.

 Psychological and physiological - Personality is a psychological construct, but research

suggests that it is also influenced by biological processes and needs.

 Impact behaviors and actions - Personality does not just influence how we move and
respond in our environment; it also causes us to act in certain ways.

 Multiple expressions - Personality is displayed in more than just behavior. It can also be seen
in out thoughts, feelings, close relationships and other social interactions.

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PERSONALITY THEORIES

The study of personality has a broad and varied history in psychology, with an abundance of
theoretical traditions. The major theories include dispositional (trait) perspective,
psychodynamic, humanistic, biological, behaviorist and social learning perspective. There is no
consensus on the definition of "personality" in psychology. Most researchers and psychologists
do not explicitly identify themselves with a certain perspective and often take an eclectic
approach.

Critics of personality theory claim personality is "plastic" across time, places, moods, and
situations. Changes in personality may indeed result from diet (or lack thereof), medical effects,
significant events, or learning. However, most personality theories emphasize stability over
fluctuation. The definition of personality that is most widely supported to date is attributed to
the neurologist Paul Roe. He stated personality to be "an individual's predisposition to think
certain patterns of thought and therefore engage in certain patterns of behaviour".

TRAIT THEORY
According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychiatric Association,
personality traits are "enduring patterns of perceiving, relating to, and thinking about the
environment and oneself that are exhibited in a wide range of social and personal contexts."

Theorists generally assume

a) traits are relatively stable over time,

b) traits differ among individuals (e.g. some people are outgoing while others are reserved), and

c) traits influence behavior.

The trait approach to personality is one of the major theoretical areas in the study of
personality. The trait theory suggests that individual personalities are composed broad
dispositions. Consider how you would describe the personality of a close friend. Chances are
that you would list a number of traits, such as outgoing, kind and even-tempered. A trait can be
thought of as a relatively stable characteristic that causes individuals to behave in certain ways.

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Unlike many other theories of personality, such as psychoanalytic or humanistic theories, the
trait approach to personality is focused on differences between individuals. The combination
and interaction of various traits forms a personality that is unique to each individual. Trait
theory is focused on identifying and measuring these individual personality characteristics.
Gordon Allport’s Trait Theory

In 1936, psychologist Gordon Allport found that one English-language dictionary alone
contained more than 4,000 words describing different personality traits.1 He categorized these
traits into three levels:

 Cardinal Traits: Traits that dominate an individual’s whole life, often to the point that the
person becomes known specifically for these traits. People with such personalities often
become so known for these traits that their names are often synonymous with these
qualities. Consider the origin and meaning of the following descriptive terms: Freudian,
Machiavellian, narcissism, Don Juan, Christ-like, etc. Allport suggested that cardinal traits are
rare and tend to develop later in life.2

 Central Traits: These are the general characteristics that form the basic foundations of
personality. These central traits, while not as dominating as cardinal traits, are the major
characteristics you might use to describe another person. Terms such as
intelligent, honest, shy and anxious are considered central traits.

 Secondary Traits: These are the traits that are sometimes related to attitudes or preferences
and often appear only in certain situations or under specific circumstances. Some examples
would be getting anxious when speaking to a group or impatient while waiting in line.

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TYPE THEORY
Personality type refers to the psychological classification of different types of people.
Personality types are distinguished from personality traits, which come in different levels or
degrees. For example, according to type theories, there are two types of people, introverts and
extraverts. According to trait theories, introversion and extraversion are part of a continuous
dimension, with many people in the middle. The idea of psychological types originated in the
theoretical work of Carl Jung and William Marston, whose work is reviewed in Dr. Travis
Bradberry's Self-Awareness. Jung's seminal 1921 book on the subject is available in English
as Psychological Types.

Building on the writings and observations of Jung, during World War II, Isabel Briggs Myers and
her mother, Katharine C. Briggs, delineated personality types by constructing the Myers-Briggs
Type Indicator. This model was later used by David Keirsey with a different understanding from
Jung, Briggs and Myers. In the former Soviet Union, Lithuanian Aušra
Augustinavičiūtė independently derived a model of personality type from Jung's
called Socionics.

The model is an older and more theoretical approach to personality, accepting extraversion and
introversion as basic psychological orientations in connection with two pairs of psychological
functions:

 Perceiving functions: sensing and intuition (trust in concrete, sensory-oriented facts vs. trust
in abstract concepts and imagined possibilities)
 Judging functions: thinking and feeling (basing decisions primarily on logic vs. considering
the effect on people).

Briggs and Myers also added another personality dimension to their type indicator to measure
whether a person prefers to use a judging or perceiving function when interacting with the
external world. Therefore they included questions designed to indicate whether someone
wishes to come to conclusions (judgment) or to keep options open (perception).

This personality typology has some aspects of a trait theory: it explains people's behaviour in
terms of opposite fixed characteristics. In these more traditional models, the sensing/intuition
preference is considered the most basic, dividing people into "N" (intuitive) or "S" (sensing)
personality types. An "N" is further assumed to be guided either by thinking or feeling, and
divided into the "NT" (scientist, engineer) or "NF" (author, humanitarian) temperament. An "S",

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by contrast, is assumed to be guided more by the judgment/perception axis, and thus divided
into the "SJ" (guardian, traditionalist) or "SP" (performer, artisan) temperament. These four are
considered basic, with the other two factors in each case (including always
extraversion/introversion) less important. Critics of this traditional view have observed that the
types can be quite strongly stereotyped by professions (although neither Myers nor Keirsey
engaged in such stereotyping in their type descriptions), and thus may arise more from the
need to categorize people for purposes of guiding their career choice. This among other
objections led to the emergence of the five-factor view, which is less concerned with behavior
under work conditions and more concerned with behavior in personal and emotional
circumstances. (It should be noted, however, that the MBTI is not designed to measure the
"work self", but rather what Myers and McCaulley called the "shoes-off self.") Some critics have
argued for more or fewer dimensions while others have proposed entirely different theories
(often assuming different definitions of "personality").

Type A and Type B personality theory: During the 1950s, Meyer Friedman and his co-workers
defined what they called Type A and Type B behavior patterns. They theorized that intense,
hard-driving Type A personalities had a higher risk of coronary disease because they are "stress
junkies." Type B people, on the other hand, tended to be relaxed, less competitive, and lower in
risk. There was also a Type AB mixed profile. Dr. Redford Williams, cardiologist at Duke
University, refuted Friedman's theory that Type A personalities have a higher risk of coronary
heart disease; however, current research indicates that only the hostility component of Type A
may have health implications. Type A/B theory has been extensively criticized by psychologists
because it tends to oversimplify the many dimensions of an individual's personality.

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PSYCHOANALYTICAL THEORY

Psychoanalytic theories explain human behaviour in terms of the interaction of various

components of personality. Sigmund Freud was the founder of this school. Freud drew on the
physics of his day (thermodynamics) to coin the term psychodynamics. Based on the idea of
converting heat into mechanical energy, he proposed psychic energy could be converted into
behavior. Freud's theory places central importance on dynamic, unconscious psychological
conflicts.
According to Freud, the mind can be divided into two main parts:

1. The conscious mind includes everything that we are aware of. This is the aspect of our
mental processing that we can think and talk about rationally. A part of this includes our
memory, which is not always part of consciousness but can be retrieved easily at any time
and brought into our awareness. Freud called this ordinary memory the preconscious.

2. The unconscious mind is a reservoir of feelings, thoughts, urges, and memories that
outside of our conscious awareness. Most of the contents of the unconscious are
unacceptable or unpleasant, such as feelings of pain, anxiety, or conflict. According to
Freud, the unconscious continues to influence our behavior and experience, even though
we are unaware of these underlying influences.

Freud divides human personality into three significant components: the id, ego, and super-
ego. These interact to create complex human behaviour.

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The Id

The id is the only component of personality that is present from birth. This aspect of personality
is entirely unconscious and includes of the instinctive and primitive behaviors. According to
Freud, the id is the source of all psychic energy, making it the primary component of
personality.

The id is driven by the pleasure principle, which strives for immediate gratification of all desires,
wants, and needs. If these needs are not satisfied immediately, the result is a state anxiety or
tension. For example, an increase in hunger or thirst should produce an immediate attempt to
eat or drink. The id is very important early in life, because it ensures that an infant's needs are
met. If the infant is hungry or uncomfortable, he or she will cry until the demands of the id are
met.
However, immediately satisfying these needs is not always realistic or even possible. If we were
ruled entirely by the pleasure principle, we might find ourselves grabbing things we want out of
other people's hands to satisfy our own cravings. This sort of behavior would be both disruptive
and socially unacceptable. According to Freud, the id tries to resolve the tension created by the
pleasure principle through the primary process, which involves forming a mental image of the
desired object as a way of satisfying the need.

The Ego

The ego is the component of personality that is responsible for dealing with reality. According
to Freud, the ego develops from the id and ensures that the impulses of the id can be expressed
in a manner acceptable in the real world. The ego functions in both theconscious, preconscious,
and unconscious mind.

The ego operates based on the reality principle, which strives to satisfy the id's desires in
realistic and socially appropriate ways. The reality principle weighs the costs and benefits of an
action before deciding to act upon or abandon impulses. In many cases, the id's impulses can be
satisfied through a process of delayed gratification--the ego will eventually allow the behavior,
but only in the appropriate time and place.

The ego also discharges tension created by unmet impulses through the secondary process, in
which the ego tries to find an object in the real world that matches the mental image created
by the id's primary process.

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The Superego

The last component of personality to develop is the superego. The superego is the aspect of
personality that holds all of our internalized moral standards and ideals that we acquire from
both parents and society--our sense of right and wrong. The superego provides guidelines for
making judgments. According to Freud, the superego begins to emerge at around age five.

There are two parts of the superego:

1. The ego ideal includes the rules and standards for good behaviors. These behaviors include
those which are approved of by parental and other authority figures. Obeying these rules
leads to feelings of pride, value and accomplishment.

2. The conscience includes information about things that are viewed as bad by parents and
society. These behaviors are often forbidden and lead to bad consequences, punishments
or feelings of guilt and remorse.

The superego acts to perfect and civilize our behavior. It works to suppress all unacceptable
urges of the id and struggles to make the ego act upon idealistic standards rather that upon
realistic principles. The superego is present in the conscious, preconscious and unconscious.

The Interaction of the Id, Ego and Superego

With so many competing forces, it is easy to see how conflict might arise between the id, ego
and superego. Freud used the term ego strength to refer to the ego's ability to function despite
these dueling forces. A person with good ego strength is able to effectively manage these
pressures, while those with too much or too little ego strength can become too unyielding or
too disrupting.

According to Freud, the key to a healthy personality is a balance between the id, the ego, and
the superego.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

Understanding Yourself and Others, An Introduction to Temperament - 2.0 by Linda V. Berens

A Dictionary of Human Behavior : Our Minds and Our Motives by Paul D. Hugon

A Textbook of Abnormal Psychology by P N Roy

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