Chapter 15: Personality And Social Interaction

Funder (2006) defines personality as a person’s pattern of thought, emotion, and behavior, with psychological mechanisms and underpinnings. Studying personality within the field of social psychology makes logical senses. While the study of personality psychology seeks to determine the various ways that people differ from one another, and figure out individuals from the inside out, personality within social psychology seeks to figure out individuals from the inside out in varying contexts. Personality psychologists deal with one main challenge – there are so many facets to one’s personality that it is hard to view one’s personality within one single lens. Therefore, before exploring personality within the context of social realms, it is important to view the many facets and approaches to examining personality and its variations.

In order to have a personal theory regarding human behavior one must understand the different behaviors through the principals of psychology. Similar to a fingerprint, people are unique and their behaviors/personalities are all different. A person’s personality can have emotional impact in reference to the way they act, speak, react to different situations and the lives of people that they are involved with. Relationships can also be influenced by the way a person behaves and the personality they portray.

Burger (2008), says that there are many theories of personality and psychologists try to explain it with their own approaches. Discussed here will be the psychoanalytic approach, the trait approach, the biological approach the humanistic approach, the behavioural/social learning approach and the cognitive approach. They were devised to search for specific patterns in behaviour and ways of thinking about these

Over the last 100 years, the underpinning concepts in the fields of psychology and counseling were wrought. Within this period, these concepts have transformed and evolved from somewhat crude conceptions of the psyche toward more holistic interventions and approaches. As the profession continues to move forward, adaptations of the original theorists regarding the nature of man and the development of personality continue to emerge. These adaptations, along with the integration of new concepts and ideas, continue to contribute to the field. The author describes his view of man and human nature, personality development, and explores potential implications for counseling.

The word personality is known as quite a diverse concept and can be described differently in accordance to different people, it comes from the word persona which is a Latin term and is referred to as a mask which actors use when performing. Based on this it could be concluded that characteristics which are visible along with external characteristics (the aspects of us in which can be seen by others) is what personality refers to, (Schultz and Scultz, 2004). Another definition of personality by a different psychologist is “The dynamic and organized set of characteristics possessed by a person that uniquely influences his or her cognitions, motivations, and behaviours in various situations.” (Rychman, 1999: 5). There are many areas of personality

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

Chapter 10 is over personality. Personality is described as a pattern of enduring, distinctive thoughts, emotions, and behaviors that characterize the way an individual adapts to the world. The book goes over psychodynamic perspectives, trait perspectives, personological and life story perspectives, social cognitive perspectives, and biological perspectives.

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 person’s personality says much about who he or she is. People define personality in different ways. Researcher after researcher has tried to come up with the best definition for what personality truly means. Case studies, correlational studies, and experimental designs are some of the most commonly used methods of research. These methods help better define personality. The advantages and disadvantages of each method differ and can be helpful or hurtful to the research of an individual’s personality.

Personalities range from person to person. With millions of people it is hard to believe that each is individual in their own way, but sometimes people can be surprised. Everyone develops their own thoughts, feelings, emotions, attachments, and personalities from different aspects in life. The affects of environment, morals, and exposer to the world can affect personality. The aspects of environment, morals, and exposer to the world are all things that humans find interest or find value in in life. Personalities can be influenced by a multitude of things, from art to sports. The most influential to some is the role of family. Emily Corn finds that family has made the largest impact on her personality. It has caused an affect on work ethic,

In the text book the authors mention four internal factors that contribute to how a person’s personality might have been shaped. The main four external factors the display the biggest impact on one’s personality is the culture of the individual, social class family ties and lastly the individual’s peers (Cervone & Pervin, 2013). Culture plays a big part on shaping the personality, many of the experiences that occur when being a part of something bigger than yourself following its standards of living and applying the cultures practice to your everyday life. In cultures there are 3 main types of social class high, medium and low. Wherever an individual may fall in those three categories effects their perception of themselves as an individual in their culture. Family ties the most important of the four external factors in shaping a personality because they are always there for the individual their entire life. They are the ones the individual can look up to or fall back on, learn grow and achieve together with. Lastly the peers that a person affiliates themselves with is the last external factor on shaping a personality. The relationship an individual has with the peers in most cases are not as long lasting as family ties but still have the same benefits from them it just comes down to who the individual tends to affiliate themselves with to classify them as their peers, in which could lead to a strengthen or weaken their personality.

Characteristic theorists consider personality to be a steady and persevering example of conduct. They depict our disparities as opposed to attempting to clarify them. Utilizing component examination, they distinguish bunches of conduct propensities that happen together. Hereditary inclinations impact numerous attributes.

The following will reflect this researchers understanding and reflection on personality, how it defines one, what it means, and if one’s personality changes to fit certain situations. At the end this researcher may have a better insight into herself as well as the personalities of others. This insight can help her in her future endeavors.

To understand personality there are three main aspects that must be looked at: LArsen and Buss Definition of personality, The Six Domains of knowledge of personality, and Costa and McCrae's Five Factor Theory. In this essay I will first break down larsen and Buss definition and connect it to the domains, then connect the domains to the five factor thoery (FFT).

The study of personality traits is beneficial in identifying the many variables that exist from human to human; the combinations of these variables provide us with a true level of individuality and uniqueness. In the field of psychology, trait theory is considered to be a key approach to the study of human personality (Crowne, 2007; Burton, Westen & Kowalski, 2009). This paper aims to identify a number of significant contributors who have played crucial roles in both the development and application of trait theory. This paper then moves focus to these theorists, outlining their theory and analysing both the strengths and weaknesses of those theories. An illustration of the methods used in trait measurement is given and includes the