Dr. Chandana Kasturiarachchi - Theories of personality

By
Dr. Chandana Kasturiarachchi
Senior Lecturer – Academic Head
(PhD, MPhil, PGDE, Dip. in Eng., B.Sc. Business Admin., Cert. in Leadership,
HETC)
Dr. Chanadana Kasturiarachchi -chacmb@gmail.com 1

Theories of Personality
Theories
of
Personality

Personality
The major theories include;
•dispositional (trait) perspective,
•psychodynamic,
•humanistic,
•biological,
•behaviorist,
•evolutionary, and
•social learning perspective.

Personality
•"Personality is the dynamic organization within the
individual of those psychophysical systems that
determine his characteristics behavior and thought"
(Allport, 1961, p. 28).
•“The characteristics or blend of characteristics that
make a person unique” (Weinberg & Gould, 1999).

Personality
•Each person has a unique psychological structure
and that some traits are possessed by only one
person; and that there are times when it is impossible
to compare one person with others. It tends to use
case studies for information gathering.
•Sigmund Freud's psychodynamic theory of
personality assumes there is an interaction between
nature (innate instincts) and nurture (parental
influences).

Personality
There are too many theories to count, but generally, they fall into
four broad categories:
Psychoanalytic, also called psychodynamic
Trait
Humanistic
Social cognition
These theories of personality are all very different, and some are
more useful than others.

Freud's Psychoanalytical theory
Freud's
Psychoanalytical
theory

• Sigmund Freud's psychoanalytic theory of personality argues that
human behavior is the result of the interactions among three
component parts of the mind: the id, ego, and superego.
• Sigmund Freud is considered to be the father of psychiatry. Among
his many accomplishments is, arguably, the most far-reaching
personality schema in psychology: the Freudian theory of
personality. It has been the focus of many additions,
modifications, and various interpretations given to its core points.
Despite many reincarnations, Freud’s theory is criticized by many
(e.g. for its perceived sexism) and it remains the focus of hot
discussions on its relevance today.

• Psychoanalysis was founded by Sigmund Freud (1856-
1939). Freud believed that people could be cured by making
conscious their unconscious thoughts and motivations, thus
gaining "insight". The aim of psychoanalysis therapy is to
release repressed emotions and experiences, i.e. make the
unconscious conscious.
• Some of the more popular methods include: Dream analysis —
In psychoanalysis, dream interpretation is used to reveal
unconscious thoughts.
• Freud thought that repressed ideas and feelings rise to the
surface of the mind through dreams. However, the content of
dreams is often altered.

Activity
• What do you mean by Personality Development? ප ෞරුෂ
වර්ධනය
• What do you mean by fundamental structures of the human
mind: the id, ego, and superego?
• Explain.

Sigmund Freud:
•Freud developed the psychoanalytic theory මපනෝ
විශ්පේෂන නයාය of personality development,
which argued that personality ප ෞරුෂත්වය is
formed through conflicts among three
fundamental structures මානසික වුහ of the
human mind: the id, ego, and superego.

I. Freud—1856-1939
Father of psychoanalysis.

Sigmund Freud (1856-1939)
-Austrian, doctor
-father of psychoanalysis
One of the first psychologists to study human motivation
-Psychiatry vs. Psychology
-up until 20th century frontal lobotomies were performed on
patients

The Psychodynamic approach was the first theory on personality
(early 1900s)
•We are driven by unconscious forces (sexual
and aggressive forces).
•අපේතනික බලපේගයන්

Activity
•What do you mean by unconscious/ conscious?
•Explain by giving examples.

What is the iceberg analogy of
consciousness?

III. Levels of Consciousness: Iceberg theory
• 1. Conscious mind – like the top of the iceberg, only a small
portion of our mind is accessible to us. සවිඥානක මනස
• 2. Preconscious mind – material that is unconscious, but can
be easily brought into awareness. Moves back & forth easily
between conscious & unconscious. පුර්ව සවිඥානක මනස
• 3. Unconscious mind – is completely outside of our awareness
(could produce anxiety if made conscious). අවිඥාන මනස

• 1. සවිඥානක මනස - අයිස් කන්දේ මුදුදන් දමන්, අදේ සිදේ සුළු
දකාටසක් පමණක් අපට භාවිතයට ගත හැකිය.
• 2. පුර්ව සවිඥානක මනස - පහසුදවන් අවද ෝධ කර ගත හැකිය.
සවිඥානක හා අවිඥානාර්ථයන් අතර පහසුදවන් ගමන් කළ හැකිය.
• 3. අවිඥාන මනස - අපදේ දැනුවේභාවය සම්පූර්ණදයන් පිටත ය

Structures of Personality
• 1. Id – “pleasure principle” unconscious impulses that want to be gratified,
without regard to potential punishment.
• 2. Ego “reality principle” – tries to satisfy id impulses while minimizing
punishment & guilt.
• 3. Superego – the “moral principle” of our personality which tells us right
from wrong our conscience

•1. Id - විය හැකි විපාක දනාසලකා කටයුතු කිරීම
•2. Ego "යථාර්ථය මූලධර්මය" - දඬුවම්ප සහ වරදකාරිේවය
අවම කරමින් අදන්ක ආදේගයන් තෘේිමේ කිරීමට
උේසහ කරයි.
•3. Superego - අපදේ හෘදය සාක්ිය අනුව කටයුතු කිරීම,
අපදේ දපෞේගලිකේවදේ "සදාචාරාේමක මූලධර්මය" ව

Id Ego and Superego

Another way of looking

People are born with a certain number of instincts සහජ
බුද්ධියක් or DRIVES ධාවක (human instinctive behaviour)
The human mind has 3 aspects which influence behaviour:
Ego
Superego
Id

ID- unconconscious part of the mind
(this part of the mind seeks to bring us pleasure) සන්ුෂ්ිය
-primitive parts of our personality including aggression and sexual drives
EGO-conscious part of the mind (Rational Self). Decides what action to take
for positive means and what to do based on what is believed is the right thing
to do. Aware of reality. යථාර්තය
SUPEREGO- unconscious part of the mind that
acts as our conscience. Reminds us of what we should do.
The ID and the SUPEREGO are in constant conflict. Your DRIVE tells
you to do one thing , while SOCIETY tells you to do something else.

Sigmund Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis, compared the human mind to an iceberg. The tip above the
water represents consciousness, and the vast region below the surface symbolizes the unconscious mind. Of
Freud’s three basic personality structures—id, ego, and superego—only the id is totally unconscious.

The mind is like an iceberg, it floats with one-seventh of its bulk above water" (S. Freud)

Freud’s Psychosexual Stages
• STAGE
Oral (0-18 months)
Anal (18-36 months)
Phallic (3-6 years)
Latency (6 to puberty)
Genital (puberty on)
• FOCUS
Pleasure centers on the mouth-
sucking, chewing, biting
Pleasure focuses on bowel and
bladder elimination; coping with
demands for control
Pleasure zone is the genitals; coping
with incestuous sexual feelings
Dormant sexual feeling
Maturation of sexual interest

Activity
•How do you plan to use Sigmund Freud ideas for the
development of the personality of a student?
•How do you use the concepts of unconscious/
conscious for that?
•Explain by giving examples.

Jung's analytical theory
Jung's analytical
theory

JUNG
Jung
Jung (1921, 1933) emphasized the importance of the unconscious in relation to
personality. However, he proposed that the unconscious consists of two layers.
The first layer called the personal unconscious is essentially the same as
Freud's version of the unconscious.
What is the theory of Carl Jung?
The theory of the collective unconscious is one of Jung's more unique theories;
Jung believed, unlike many of his contemporaries, that all the elements of an
individual's nature are present from birth, and that the environment of the person
brings them out (rather than the environment creating them).

• His commitment to knowing the nature of the psyche through
direct, personal experience and revelation resulted in the
precedence he gave to dreams and visions and the idea of
understanding them through investigations of philosophy, religion
and literature.
• The death-blow to Jung's Christian faith came when he felt
nothing at all at his confirmation, the religious initiation of which
he had been led to expect much.
• A good deal of his later work can be viewed as a quest to replace
the faith he had lost.

• Jung proceeded to devise an experimental method, called
the Word Association Test, which could be seen as providing
an objective, scientific basis for some of Freud's ideas.
• Jung used the psychogalvanometer as a tool for hitting upon
a complex.

• In psychology a complex is generally an important group of
unconscious associations, conflicting beliefs that stand on their own
like a splinter identity, or a strong unconscious impulse, lying
behind an individual's condition. Jung described a "complex" as a
node in the unconscious; it may be imagined as a knot of
unconscious feelings and beliefs, detectable indirectly, through
behavior that is puzzling or hard to account for. Complexes such as
the 'Guilt Complex' drain energy and integrity from the conscious

• Ego. What is unconscious tends to be projected onto others:
attributed to other people or external situations. The projection may
lead to an erroneous perception such as when you think your friend is
angry while he himself feels quite content. To resolve the complex may
give significant relief.
• The inferiority complex, in particular, has become widely understood
and used due to the importance it holds in Adler's Individual
Psychology.

Dr. Chandana Kasturiarachchi
Dr. C. Kasturiarachchi -chacmb@gmail.com 39
2/16/2021

Dr. Chandana Kasturiarachchi - Theories of personality

Recommended

Recommended

More Related Content

What's hot

What's hot (18)

Similar to Dr. Chandana Kasturiarachchi - Theories of personality

Similar to Dr. Chandana Kasturiarachchi - Theories of personality (20)

Recently uploaded

Recently uploaded (20)

Dr. Chandana Kasturiarachchi - Theories of personality