PERSONALIT

Y THEORY
Is the sum total of all the factors of
physique and constitution and all the
enduring, underlying tendencies that
determine the characteristics behavior of
a person.
 The term is derived from the Latin word

“persona” which denotes the masks first

used in Greek drama and later adopted by
Roman players to distinguished the role
of the player.
 Personality is defined as the
characteristic set of behaviors,
cognitions, and emotional patterns that
evolve from biological and
environmental factors. While there is
no generally agreed upon definition of
personality, most theories focus on
motivation and psychological
interactions with one's environment. 
 Personality, a characteristic way of thinking,
feeling, and behaving. Personality embraces
moods, attitudes, and opinions and is most
clearly expressed in interactions with other
people. It includes behavioral characteristics,
both inherent and acquired, that distinguish
one person from another and that can be
observed in people’s relations to the 
environment and to the social group.
 The meaning of personality vary, for it is used to
embrace everything that is involved or contributes to
an understanding of the individual. One refers
personality to the social stimulus- value of a person,
things like superficial attractiveness or “having a lot
of personality.”

 Personality also refers to the acquired habits of an

individual, or the characteristics ways in which he
does things.
 Character and temperature have been both used
synonymously with personality, although these terms
generally have distinctive meanings.
 Character may refer to the cognitive aspects of

personality, that is, striving of an individual, but more

commonly it refers to those aspects of personality
that are considered good or bad.
 TEMPERAMENT- is also an aspect of personality.

It ordinarily denotes the emotional makeup of an

individual, his susceptibility to emotional stress,
whether he shows affection or sympathy readily or
not.
PERSONALITY TYPES
 Early attempts to put order into the variety of
differences among persons appear to have led to
systems of classifications.
 EXAMPLE:

Writings of THEOPHRASTUS (370-287 B.C), a

pupil of Aristotle, are a series of verbal portraits of
universal types of human beings, such as the “
penurious man” and the “the flatterer”, which build
up a picture of characteristics behavior based upon
one central and dominating motive.
 HIPPOCARATES
 Classical theory of temperament is
another example of classification. He
distinguished the following and
attributed it to man’s behavior to
predominance in the body of one of
the humors.
Types of Temperament Characteristics

 Sanguine blood
 Melancholic black bile
 Choleric yellow bile
 Phlegmatic phlegm
 Sanguine personality type is described primarily as being
highly talkative, enthusiastic, active, and social. Sanguine
tend to be more extroverted and enjoy being part of a crowd;
they find that being social, outgoing, and charismatic is easy
to accomplish. Individuals with this personality have a hard
time doing nothing and engage in more risk seeking behavior.

 Melancholic individuals tend to be analytical and detail-

oriented, and they are deep thinkers and feelers. They are
introverted and try to avoid being singled out in a crowd. A
melancholic personality leads to self-reliant individuals who
are thoughtful, reserved, and often anxious. They often strive
for perfection within themselves and their surroundings,
which leads to tidy and detail oriented behavior.
 Choleric individuals tend to be more extroverted.
They are described as independent, decisive, and
goal-oriented, and ambitious. These combined with
their dominant, result-oriented outlook make them
natural leaders. In Greek, Medieval and Renaissance
thought, they were also violent, vengeful, and short-
tempered
 Phlegmatic individuals tend to be relaxed, peaceful,

quiet, and easy- going. They are sympathetic and care

about others, yet they try to hide their emotions.
Phlegmatic individuals also are good at generalizing
ideas or problems to the world and making
compromises.
 EMIL KRAEPELIN

 Treated mania and melanchalia as a

single disorder (the manic- depressive-
psychosis) and distinguished it from
dementia praecox (schizophrenia), he
established a basic dichotomy of
functional psychoses.
 PIERRE JANET
 Set forth a similar dichotomy between hysteria and
psychastenia (obsession and anxiety) for the neuroses.
Although neither of these two systems has stood the
test of time well, they have continued to influenced
psychiatric and psychological thought. Their early
acceptance, coupled with the distinctions between
predisposing and exciting factors in the development
of mental disease, led to a search for those
characteristics of normal personality that would
predispose an individual to develop one or the other of
the major neuroses or psychoses.
 Temperamental traits
 Often become exaggerated when a younger is
under stress: a rough- tough kid may become
aggressive; a child who is usually fussy about
food may develop a whole new set of dislikes.

 Teachers as well as parents should not ignore

their distress. But they don’t have to take it so
seriously that they rush the child to a
psychiatric emergency room.
 Sometimes when a child has a significant problem,
parents wonder if it is too late to help him. Every
parent, no matter how caring and conscientious, makes
mistakes- I certainly do.
 As attentive as you are, you cant always know

everything about your son or daughter.

 Children are constantly developing and changing,

which means uncertainly and error are inevitable parts

of parenthood.
 Bad things happen despite your most conscientious

efforts.
A Spectrum of Aggression could cover this Range:

 Mild Verbal aggression

 Moderate Hitting or pushing

without injuring

 Severe Inflicting pain or injury on

others
Some Principles
 A troubled child is not “sick”
- emotional problems are different from
physical ones.
 Nature is just as important as nurture

- child’s personality is formed by

combination of nature and nurture
 Different is not the same as abnormal

-the child doesn’t have to be average.

 CHILD’S
TEMPERAMENT
NRECKI AND
WERNICK
 PSYCHODYNAMIC
THEORIES OF
PERSONALITY
SIGMUND FREUD
 The author of psychoanalysis, formulated a theory of
personality structure with components common to all men
without destroying the uniqueness of the individual. He did
this by grouping both the conscious and unconscious
impulses of men according to their probable origins.
 The free association and dreams of patients enabled him to

project their associations and dreams as leading from their

patients present state back to his childhood and infancy, they
gave particularly good date from which to consider the
origins of impulses.
Freud distinguished three levels of psychodynamic theory..

 Conscious
-perception
-reasoning
-memory
-intention
-imagination
 Preconscious
-aspects which can readily be called to awareness
 Unconscious
- hidden motivation
-conflicts
-instinctual urges
Three Divisions of Personality
Structure