The Theory Of Personality Psychology

His theory suggests that unconscious forces act to determine personality and behavior. In which is a part of the a person’s personality where they 're unaware “conscious awareness”, such as infantile wishes, desires, demands, and needs that are hidden because of their disturbing nature. He states that “the unconscious is responsible for a good part of our everyday behavior” (Robert 13). Freud would argue that personality is formed during childhood and that everyone’s personality is among three necessary structures of the human mind: the id, ego, and superego. According to Freud, children go through five stages the oral stage (0 to 18 months), anal stage (18 months to 3 years), phallic stage (3 to 6 years), latency stage (6 to puberty), genital stage (puberty to

Personality and how we behave have been of much interest to psychologists for a long time now and because of this there have been many theories and theorists that have been developed. Personality is defined as consistent behavior patterns and intrapersonal processes originating within and individual (Fritzley, 2012, p. 10). There are six main approaches to personality psychology they include: biological approach, humanistic approach, behaviorist approach, trait approach, psychoanalytic approach and cognitive approach. Each approach shines a little light onto why we behave the way we do and how our personalities are formed, the approaches contain many different theories from

Funder (2007), states that personality is a combination of how people think, feel and behave, with the psychological mechanisms behind those patterns. Therefore, it can be defined as consistent behaviour patterns and processes which happen in the mind of the individual. These behaviour patterns suggest that there are individual differences and that personality is consistent. The combination of these areas, and confliction of these is what psychologist’s try to understand.

Sigmund Freud, a well-known psychologist portrays an interest in the Psychodynamic approach to Psychology. Freud developed a theory relating to personality in the aftermath of his observation of patients experiencing a disorder called conversion hysteria. He took particular interest in the unconscious

The psychodynamic perspective focuses on the role of the unconscious mind in the development of personality. Freud believed that the personality develops in a series of five stages that develop the three divisions of personality. In the oral stage, the fixation is in the mouth, and would be the cause of his introverted nature; likewise, in the anal stage, Roberto would discover his reserved nature, while the phallic stage, he would further refine his reserved nature as a sense of humility in his actions, also defining his mild mannered portion of his personality. In the latency stage, his social skills would refined and he would become introverted. Freud would think that Roberto’s mild-mannered, reserved, and invertedness is caused by intense suppressing of the id by the ego, having Roberto adopt the personality that he does; however, Karen Horney would classify Roberto’s personality in respect to her theory of neurotic personalities- personalities typified by maladaptive ways of dealing with relationships- with moving away from people by withdrawing from personal relationships.

Freud developed the psychoanalytic theory of personality development, which argued that personality is formed through internal conflicts among three fundamental structures of the human mind: the id, ego, and superego. According to this model of the psyche, the id is the set of uncoordinated trends; the super-ego plays the critical and moralizing role; and the ego is the organized, realistic part that mediates between the desires of the id and the super-ego (Wikipedia, 2017).

Characteristics of personality through Freudian stages are oral, anal, phallic latency and genital. Oral stage is driven to satisfy ones needs of hunger and thirst. As personality begins to flourish individuals fixated within the oral stage remain corrupted with issues of dependency, attachment, and substance abuse in some cases. Anal stage is just that, defecation. Many children learn self-control readily while others over learn meaning they find pleasure in holding their bowels to have some sense of control. While some attempt to regulate in order to sustain freedom of action. Phallic stage is where sexual energy is fixated on the genitals. One begins analyzing themselves and masturbation and gender identity begins being explored.

“We are influenced by our own internal forces, forces of which we are unaware, have feelings towards, or urges we do not quite understand “(Freidman, 2012, p. 17). This is the struggle that personality psychology tries to understand, how and to what extent the unconscious forces plays a role in human behavior. It is believed that people are responsible for their own actions. There is a continuous struggle with personality psychology and the comprehension of and to what extent unconscious forces play in human behavior. “Meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances; if there is any reaction both are transformed” (Carl Jung 1993, p.57). There are various questions that are asked about the issues in personality psychology such as, “How important are social influences on the self, such as parental deprivation or excessive praise? Is the sense of self merely an inconsequential epiphenomenon or secondary perception arising from other forces that really matter? What is the core of who we are? A second core issue with the studies of personality studies is does each person require a unique approach? “Gordon Allport argued that a key aspect of the study of personality must focus on the individual and thus be idiographic” (p.18). To generalize an individual is a complication in itself because the personality of each person is complex in its own way so how can we generalize? Obtaining an answer to that question is still a dilemma. Allport complained

Burton, western & Kowaslki (2015) describes Personality as the enduring patterns of thought, feeling, motivation and behaviour that are expressed in different circumstances. In other words it can be defined as differences in characteristics in a person, including their way of thinking, likes, dislikes, sociability, openness, feelings and behaviour, which make them the person they are and differentiates them from others. All these traits when brought together is known to be the personality of that particular person.

Personality is looked at everyday purposely and accidently. Whether you are judging how your new professor for the semester will be, or if you are studying your best friend for a project, personality is studied abundantly. While there are many ways to define personality, there is not a worldwide definition around. Personality is the unique combination of patterns that influence behavior, thought, motivation, and emotion in a human being (boundless.com). That is one of many ways of defining personality. When examining personality, there are four main approachable theories including: The Psychodynamic Approach, The Trait Approach, The Social-Cognitive Approach, and The Humanistic Approach.

“A trailblazer of modern-day psychology,” Sigmund Freud presented new ways of thinking about human nature, pioneered new techniques of understanding human behavior, and created the most comprehensive theory of personality and psychotherapy ever developed (Himmat, 1997).

Personality is a pattern of relatively permanent traits and unique characteristics that gives both consistency and individuality to a person’s behavior (Feist & Feist, 2008).

Both Sigmund Freud and Alfred Adler were pioneers and both had a phenomenal impact on the world of psychology. However, while they were raised in the same era, came from the same city and were educated at the same university, they had decidedly different views regarding personality theories (Schultz, 1990, p. 120). Freud and Adler were both colleagues in the psychoanalytic movement that Freud started. However, because of personality differences and vastly contrasting views about personality theories (Mosak & Maniacci, 1999, p.6) Adler left to begin his own faction, which he called Individual Psychology. It is my intention to briefly describe the main areas of their theories, compare and contrast their ideas of personality development, explore what types of experiences contributes to unhealthy development and what types of interventions they would have each prescribed to patients experiencing difficulties in their lives. However, while both Freud and Adler continue to influence many areas of contemporary personality psychology, only one of them can truly be called a humanitarian.

Personality is deeply complexing subject that cannot be easily summed up. There is no concrete right answer, or only one way to evaluate any given subject, as every aspect of personality has more than one view point or angle. Famous psychologists such as Freud, Adler, Jung, Erickson, Eysenck, and Skinner all shaped and conducted the research that would come together and be taught to generations as the foundations of personality and the theory of personality. To better understand the idea of personality, we are going to examine the six different cornerstones of personality. They consist of Nature versus Nurture, The Unconscious, You of the Self, Development, Motivation and Maturation. In this, no one theory is more valid than the other, and no one research has more validity than the other. In this paper each cornerstone will be examined using scholarly research.

The purpose of this paper is to provide an analysis of the work of Sigmund Freud and a neo-analytical theorist. This paper will compare the work of Freud and Karen Horney and begins with an introduction to the study of personality and an identification of the key elements in Freud and Horney’s theories. The paper then moves into an analysis of where Horney and Freud would find agreement and disagreement. Finally, an analysis of improvements from Freud to neo-analytical theory will be discussed.