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| Personality is the sum total of the typical ways of acting, thinking, and feeling that makes each person unique. Some psychologists believe that personality can be described in terms of traits. Traits are relatively enduring and consistent ways of behaving. There is now consensus that five traits are useful in describing personality; these are neuroticism, extroversion, openness, agreeableness, and conscientiousness. One influential theory of personality, psychoanalytic theory, was developed in the late nineteenth century by Sigmund Freud. Freud's theory distinguished three levels of conscious awareness--the conscious mind, the preconscious mind, and the unconscious mind. According to Freud, the mind is composed of the following three parts: (1) the id, which operates on the pleasure principle and seeks to obtain immediate pleasure and to avoid pain; (2) the ego, which operates on the reality principle and seeks safe and realistic ways of satisfying the id; and (3) the superego, which opposes the id by imposing moral restrictions and striving for perfection. Freud suggested that when the ego cannot find ways to satisfy the id, it seeks a substitute. The process of substituting a more acceptable goal is called displacement; the displacement of a socially desirable goal is termed sublimation. Another process that allows individuals to operate in society without friction is called identification; we tend to model our actions after individuals who are successful in gaining satisfactions from life. Freud's theory also distinguishes five stages in the development of personality: the oral stage, the anal stage, the phallic stage, the latency stage, and the genital stage. According to Freud, events that happen as the individual passes through these stages can be critical in the formation of personality. Alfred Adler and Carl Jung were two associates of Freud. They both developed influential personality theories of their own. Jung differed with Freud over his emphasis on sexual motivation. Jung believed that the unconscious mind contains positive and even spiritual motives. He also felt that we each possess both a personal unconscious and a collective unconscious. Adler felt that the primary struggle in personality development was the effort to overcome feelings of inferiority in social relationships and to develop feelings of superiority. Karen Horney was another influential revisionist of Freudian psychoanalysis. She felt that anxious insecurity, which stems from inadequate childrearing experiences, is the source of all personality conflicts. Horney also rejected Freud's notion of penis envy, claiming that important female issues revolved around the power and privilege of males in society. Other personality theorists, the social learning theorists, emphasize classical conditioning, operant conditioning, and modeling in the development of personality. Albert Bandura, a prominent social learning theorist, believes that social learning is determined by the actions of behavior on the environment, and vice versa. Bandura also believes that behavior is self-regulated by our internalized cognitive standards for self-reward and limited by our perception of our own self-efficacy. Some psychologists believe that situations determine behavior; this is known as situationism. Social learning theorists have suggested a compromise termed interactionism, which says that behavior is influenced by a combination of personality traits and the situation. Members of a third group of personality theorists, humanistic theorists, believe that humans possess an inner-directedness that pushes them to grow. To the humanist, reality is subjective. The concept of "self" is central to the personality theory of Carl Rogers and other humanists. Our self-concept is our subjective perception of who we are and what we are like. Rogers distinguished between the self (the person I think I am) and the ideal self (the person I wish I were). Problems result when there are major discrepancies between the self and the ideal self, or when a person's self-concept is not congruent with the way he or she actually acts, thinks, and feels. Personality assessment is the use of psychological methods to learn about a person's personality. The most widely used method is the interview. Personality is also assessed by observing the person's behavior in a natural or simulated situation. Rating scales are used to help make observational methods more objective. The second most widely used method of personality assessment is the projective test, which psychoanalysts believe reveals the motives and conflicts of the unconscious mind. Objective personality tests, such as the MMPI-2, consist of questions that measure different aspects of personality. Objective personality tests are generally better at assessing personality than projective techniques, but all personality tests are only partly accurate. |