Lecture on Personality Psychology
Chapter 13: Personality Psychology
Definitions of Personality
Definition
Gordon Alpert’s Perspective:
Personality is defined as "a relatively enduring predisposition or traits influencing behavior across many situations."
Behavioral Influence
Personality traits are relatively stable across different situations; however, situational factors can cause variability in behavior.
Recognition that personality can change over time due to experiences or life events, such as chronic illness.
Psychoanalytic Theory
Freudian Theory Overview
Three core assumptions of psychoanalytic theory:
Psychic Determinism:
All psychological events have a cause; humans have limited control, as inner forces govern behavior.
Symbolic Meaning:
Every action and behavior carries symbolic significance; there are no true accidents in behavior.
Freudian Slip Defined:
A verbal mistake that reveals a thought or feeling.
Example: A class president thanking the principal "for everything she has done to us" reflects hidden sentiments.
Unconscious Motivation:
Much of human behavior is driven by unconscious drives and desires.
Analogy of Iceberg:
The conscious mind is represented by the part above water, while the much larger unconscious mind lies submerged.
Personality Structure According to Freud
Components of Personality:
Id:
Represents basic instincts and desires, follows the pleasure principle, seeking immediate gratification without regard for reality.
Ego:
Acts as the decision-maker operating on the reality principle, delaying gratification and reconciling desires of the id and moral demands of the superego.
Superego:
Represents the moral conscience; functions as the sense of right and wrong and can lead to feelings of guilt if it is overactive.
Roles and Interactions
Distress arises when conflicts occur between id, ego, and superego.
The ego is responsible for managing these conflicts and maintaining psychological balance.
Defense Mechanisms
Introduction to Defense Mechanisms
Defined as strategies employed by the ego to cope with anxiety and resolve conflicts between the id and the superego.
Implications and Need for Defense Mechanisms
Highlights ego's challenges in reconciling contrasting desires and maintaining stability in personality.
Overview of Defense Mechanisms
Definition: Unconscious maneuvers used to reduce anxiety stemming from the conflict between the id and the superego.
They provide coping strategies for anxiety-inducing situations where desires of the id and superego do not align.
Eight distinct defense mechanisms can be identified through examples.
Repression:
Description: Unconscious forgetting of memories, often involving painful or traumatic events.
Explanation: Serves to protect the individual from emotional pain by blocking out distressing experiences.
Example: Forgetting parts or even the entirety of a traumatic event, with the brain shielding one from the pain.
Alternative View:
Some suggest the absence of childhood memories is due to brain immaturity rather than repression alone.
Denial:
Description: Refusal to acknowledge or accept reality and specific events.
Examples:
Ignoring serious problems in relationships, careers, or health.
Denying the loss after a tragic or unexpected death.
Nature of Denial:
Often unconscious; acts as a strategy to protect from anxiety and distress.
Rationalization:
Description: Providing plausible reasons or excuses for behaviors that are unreasonable or anxiety-driven.
Examples:
Turning down a date due to claiming a lack of attraction, masking anxiety about the situation.
Refusing to socialize under the pretense of not having fun, hiding social interaction anxiety.
Function: Preserves self-esteem and protects against perceived failures.
Displacement:
Description: Transferring impulses from a threatening target to a safer one.
Example: Redirecting anger from a difficult boss to exercising, like running or using a punching bag.
Purpose: Allows emotional expression in socially acceptable ways and diffuses original tension.
Projection:
Description: Unconscious attribution of one’s undesirable traits onto others.
Examples:
Believing someone one dislikes also dislikes them.
A cheating spouse projecting infidelity fears onto a faithful partner.
Impact: Helps avoid confronting inner conflict by projecting feelings onto others.
Regression:
Description: Reverting to earlier, simpler behavioral stages under stress or anxiety.
Examples:
An older child thumb-sucking after a stressful event, such as a new sibling’s arrival.
Observed regression patterns in children during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Reaction Formation:
Description: Converting an anxiety-provoking emotion into its opposite.
Examples:
Excessively showing kindness to someone one secretly dislikes, masking real feelings.
Children teasing crushes, indicating deeper affection.
Function: Masks genuine emotions with exaggerated sentiments, preventing conflict in social interactions.
Sublimation:
Description: Channeling unacceptable impulses into acceptable and productive outlets.
Examples:
A person with a foot fetish becoming a podiatrist.
An angry individual taking up woodworking as a constructive anger outlet.
Purpose: Allows engagement with instincts while contributing positively to society.
Summary of Freud's Eight Defense Mechanisms
Mechanisms Identified:
Repression
Denial
Rationalization
Displacement
Projection
Regression
Reaction Formation
Sublimation
Importance for Students:
Students should identify these mechanisms and develop personal examples for deeper understanding, pertinent for exams and discussions.
Introduction to Psychosexual Stages
Discussion of the controversial nature of Freudian psychosexual stages of development and the psychoanalytic approach to personality development.
Overview of Freud's Theory
Freud posited that personality develops through five psychosexual stages, each highlighting sexually arousing body areas from infancy.
Concept of Fixations:
Individuals may become fixated at any stage due to under-gratification or over-gratification of needs.
Stages of Psychosexual Development
Stage 1: Oral Stage
Age Range: Birth to 18 months.
Focus: The mouth as the primary pleasure zone; pleasure from eating, drinking, sucking.
Fixation Effects:
Under-gratification: adult behaviors such as overeating or smoking.
Over-gratification: similar oral fixations as stress responses in adulthood.
Stage 2: Anal Stage
Age Range: 18 months to 3 years.
Focus: Control over bowel movements; pleasure from the control process.
Fixation Effects:
Harsh toilet training: leads to anal-retentive characteristics (excessively neat).
Lenient toilet training: results in anal-expulsive characteristics (messy).
Example: Reference to the "Odd Couple" as a metaphor for extreme anal retentiveness or expansiveness.
Stage 3: Phallic Stage
Age Range: 3 to 6 years.
Focus: Genitals become the primary pleasure zone.
Oedipus Complex:
Boys develop attractions to their mothers and jealousy towards fathers.
Desire to replace the father, mitigated by fear of castration (castration anxiety) leading to identification with fathers.
Electra Complex:
Girls attracted to fathers, jealous of mothers.
"Penis envy" generates feelings of inferiority and a longing for relationships with fathers; believed to instigate lasting inferiority in females.
Stage 4: Latency Stage
Age Range: 6 to 12 years.
Focus: Sexual impulses are repressed; period of calmness.
Observations that children typically perceive the opposite sex as unappealing or gross.
Critical view concerning the heteronormative perspective in Freud's theories.
Stage 5: Genital Stage
Age Range: 12 years and beyond.
Focus: Re-emergence of sexual impulses.
Successful navigation of previous stages leads to healthy adult relationships.
Failure to address earlier fixations may result in adult relational issues.
Conclusion on Freud’s Theory
Acknowledgment of the controversial nature surrounding Freud's psychosexual stages theory.
Recognition that while Freudian theory impacts personality study, it does not encompass all dimensions of personality development.
Indication of the ongoing relevance of psychoanalytic inquiry in exploring unconscious drivers behind behavior.
Mention of forthcoming discussions on alternative approaches to personality analysis beyond Freud's theories.
Carl Jung's Analytical Psychology
Collective Unconscious
Definition: A concept proposed by Carl Jung, referring to a shared reservoir of memories and urges that all humans inherit from their ancestors.
Archetypes: Universal, archaic patterns and images that derive from the collective unconscious and are the basic components of human's psychic constitution.
Examples: The hero, the wise old man, the great mother, the shadow.
Overview of Psychological Approaches
Examination of three psychological perspectives focusing on Alfred Adler and humanistic psychology.
Alfred Adler
Core Belief: Humans inherently strive for superiority rather than sex or aggression, contradicting Freud.
Concept of Lifestyle: Individuals create distinctive styles of life to achieve superiority.
Risk of Inferiority Complex:
Development of low self-esteem while attempting to reach superiority; vulnerable when pampered or neglected in childhood.
Pampered: Excessive indulgence leads to behaviors like the 'spoiled brat' concept (e.g., character from Willy Wonka).
Neglected: Results in a desperate need for attention due to lack of it during formative years.
Inferiority Complex
Definition: Feelings of inadequacy that can drive overcompensation, where individuals try to assert their superiority aggressively.
Humanistic Psychology
Focus and Philosophy
Concentration on the whole person and the uniqueness of each individual.
Rejects deterministic views (like Freud's unconscious influences) and emphasizes free will, contrasting directly with psychoanalytic theory's emphasis on psychic determinism and unconscious drives.
Core Motive
Self-Actualization:
The intrinsic drive to realize one's full potential.
Freudian view sees this goal as dangerous due to potential conflicts with societal norms and primitive urges; humanistic perspectives view it positively as the ultimate healthy aspiration.
Basic Assumptions of Humanistic Psychologists
Individuals possess free will.
Humans are inherently good and want to improve themselves and society.
The motivational drive for self-actualization is fundamental.
Key Humanistic Psychologists
Carl Rogers
Model of Personality: Components:
Organism: Innate genetic foundation, paralleling Freud’s Id but with a more positive view.
Self (Actual Self): The self-concept, or beliefs about oneself, including what one perceives to be true about themselves.
Conditions of Worth: Expectations for behavior based on societal and parental approval, akin to Freud's superego.
Formed during childhood as individuals internalize caregiver approval-disapproval.
Concept of Congruence
Definition: The alignment of one's actual self (how one perceives themselves) with their ideal self (the person one wishes to be) and experiences and desires.
Ideal state leads to happiness especially when unconditional positive regard is received.
Unconditional Positive Regard
Definition: Acceptance and support without conditions or judgments, crucial for positive self-regard and self-realization.
Consequences of Incongruence
If conditions of worth are internalized without unconditional positive regard, individuals face anxiety and are not fully functioning, leading to lives where actions mismatch genuine selves, creating a gap between the actual and ideal self.
Abraham Maslow
Hierarchy of Needs: Different needs must be satisfied sequentially:
Physiological Needs: Basic requirements such as hunger and thirst.
Safety Needs: Seeking security and stability.
Belongingness and Love Needs: Encompasses love, acceptance, and combating loneliness.
Esteem Needs: Needs for self-esteem, achievement, and respect from others.
Self-Actualization Needs: Achieving one's fullest potential.
Application of Hierarchy
Prioritization of needs; basic physiological needs must be satisfied before higher-level needs (e.g., security must precede educational pursuits).
Self-Actualized Individuals
Only about 2% of the population achieve this state (e.g., notable figures include Thomas Jefferson, Martin Luther King Jr., and Mahatma Gandhi).
Characteristics of Self-Actualized Individuals:
Creative and spontaneous.
Fully accept themselves and others.
Focus on real-world problems instead of self-centered concerns.
Exhibit a preference for few deep friendships over many superficial ones.
Experience peak moments of profound connection and tranquility with the world.
Trait Theories of Personality
The Big Five Factors (OCEAN)
Overview: A widely accepted model of personality that organizes personality traits into five broad dimensions.
Five distinct factors:
O - Openness to Experience: Describes individuals' readiness to try new things and be imaginative, independent, and interested in variety.
C - Conscientiousness: Reflects a person's level of self-discipline, organization, and goal-directed behavior. Individuals high in conscientiousness are often organized, careful, and disciplined.
E - Extraversion: Characterized by sociability, assertiveness, and energetic behavior. Extraverts tend to seek stimulation and enjoy social interaction.
A - Agreeableness: Indicates how well people get along with others. Agreeable individuals are typically cooperative, trusting, and good-natured.
N - Neuroticism: Pertains to emotional instability, anxiety, moodiness, and irritability. Individuals high in neuroticism tend to experience negative emotions more frequently and intensely.
Conclusion
Discussion provides a thorough understanding of Freudian, Jungian, Adler's, humanistic, and trait theories of personality and motivation. These diverse approaches highlight the complexity of personality psychology.
Upcoming focus on specific personality disorders and related testing methods.
Overview of Personality Disorders
Diagnosis of Personality Disorders
Considered the most commonly diagnosed category among mental health disorders.
Understanding personality disorders is crucial for effective interaction with and support of affected individuals.
Treatment and Management
Therapeutic Interventions
Patients may undergo various therapies, including:
Serum therapy:
Utilizes serum solutions for alleviating symptoms.
Medication:
Medications prescribed to manage symptoms effectively.
Patient Outcomes
Monitoring Symptoms:
Key for healthcare providers to assess symptom improvements over time.
Patient feedback is critical.
Key Metrics Include Improvement Status at:
6 months
1 year
Longitudinal tracking helps gauge treatment effectiveness.
Future Communications
The speaker intends to capture detailed themes related to personality disorders and share further instructional materials or videos in future communications.