Se RMP OF INE Sen OF Ulal OF THE SOUIU, The concept of personality - The term personality has its orgin from the Latin word persona which means a “mask’. It can be also called as a theatrical mask used by the actors in the drama while playing the roles of different characters. But, in our daily life, we are using the term personality mostly to mean the overall get up of an individual giving more importance to his/her physical appearance or attractiveness. How can we define the term personality ? It can be defined as “the sum-total of an individuals attributes or qualities”. These attributes include all those that constitute the whole person, starting from his/her physical appearance to his nature, temperament, interest and choice pattern, liking and dislikings, gestures and postures, communication style, dressing sense, attitude, action and behaviour etc. All these comprises one’s personality. Let us put a glance to the term “mask”. what happens when we use a mask ? It replace our original face and we use it to play the role of some other person that is not exactly, the “me”. We are also required to change our voices and many other things to suit the “targeted character” in the drama. Once our “roles” are over, we returned back to our original role and personality. What is most important here is that this temporary “role playing behaviour can bring minor changes in our nature and temporament also. The possibilities are always there and it cannot be ignored. Can there be a distrinction between our Inner self and outer self ? This has been the frequently raised question in many minds ? The reality is that there is a definite gap between these two selves. The reason being, we, as human beings have a born tendency to appear nice before others. We all want to show socially approved pattern of behaviour because in our sub-conscious mind, theet social appr . a en of behavion 'S always there, This desire motivate US to Snow a neon our ale This indicae the fact that most of us uSuallY 4399? Self and the external self to fulfill some of our personal, © ological and social ; cholog) Needs. This, certainly justify the use of the term- ‘mask create os ity Defin jersonality ined The term ey has been defined differently by many eminent _chologists, aoe scientists and Sociologists. The following are some of the “st popular definitions of the term Personality. According to George. Herbert (1936), “Personality is the product of our interactions with varieties of people at different situations of our life, but the major influence being exerted by family members.” ) According to Mc Arthur, (1985)., the term personality can be defined as “the relatively consistent and enduring aspects of our behaviour that cause US to resemble others in some ways and to be unique in other ways.” ii) According to warren, (1962) personality can be defined as “the entire mental organization of a human being at any stage of his development.” According to Nelson & Miller (1995), personality can be defined as “an individual's unique and relatively stable patterns of behaviour, thoughts and emotions.” ¥) Morton Prince has defined the term personality as “the sum-total of all the bilogical innate dispositions, impulses, tendencies, appetites and instincts of the individual and the acquired disposition and tendencies acquired by experience.” vi) According to G.W. Allport, personality can be defined as “the dynamic organization within the individual of those psychophysical systems that determine his unique adjustment to his environment.” Allport’s definition is considered to be one of the most exhaustive definition f personality. This definition has focussed on three major aspects like the following :a) Personality as the dynamic organization, b) Psychophysical system and c) One's unique adjustment to his. summarized as follows : Personality is the sumn-total of n individual which are dynamic and subject to e adjustment to his/her adjustment. nality is a social phenomenon ‘cial interaction. It indicates the uniqueness of an individual. Personality is never static, it is subject to change. It is the sum-total of all the traits and characteristics, qualities or attributes of a person. According to the Interactionists Perspective, our behaviour in any given situation is usually a complex function of our internal factors and the situational factors in the environment This definition can be the physical and mental traits of al change and they help in making uniqu' All these definitions point out the fact that persor and it is greatly influenced by our st world around us. This perspective has now been accepted by most psychologists. However, certain traits of our personality continue in a consistent manner. The factor of individual difference carries a great value in this regard. Approaches to study personality : How to study one's personality ? It is a fact that most of the characteristics that identify and define us as individuals are the product of social interaction. In as much as each individual interact with others throughout his/her life-span, and because no two interactions are the same, personality undergoes a constant process of modification. In addition to this, our own involvement in the roles we play is also likely to create some kind of effect on us and upon our relationships with others. in this process, as we move from one situation to another, and from one role to another, we reveal many aspects of ourselves - our personality, to others to ourselves as well. There are mainly four major approa ly personali ches to study personality. i lowing: ity. These includei) The type and the Trait Approach ii) The Psychodynamic Approach iii) The Behaviourist Approach iv) The Humanistic Approach i) The Type and the Trait Approach What is the necessity to understand and to differentiate between different types of personality pattern ? Why psychologists are interested to categorise people on the basis of their personality characteristics ? Even though we know that there can be no comparision between two individuals, still then, there are certain traits or characteristics that may be common. The term type refers to categories where as the term trait refers to characteristic pattern. Approaches to study personality ‘on the basis of both types and traits can throw some light in finding out the similarities or differences, if any, among individuals in relation to their behavioural dimension. The first attempt to study personality on the basis of types was made by the Greek physician Hippocrates. He had the belief that the body constitution of the individual determines the way he or she is expected to behave. So, he had classified personality types under four categories. They are the following : i) The Sanguine : Those who are cheerful, active, quick in action. ii) The plegmatic : Those who are slow, dull, calm and inactive. iii) The Choleric : Those who are short tempered,- Irritable, aggressive. iv) The melancholic : Those who are sad, depressed and pessimistic. ; Such a typological classification of personality was made by Hippocrates on the basis of the predominant fluid in the body of the particular individual, i-e., whether it is blood, phlegm, yellow bile or black bile. (after Hippocrates, the next attempt to classify personality was taken by Kretschmer(1925). He was @ psychiatrist by profession and he wanted to to classify Personality on the basis of an individual's body form and structure. He had observed both the normal individuals as well as mental patients. According to him, aSchizophrenic and manic depressive patients have different types of body Constitution. Because certain body types gives rise to certain types of mental disorders (He then classified normal individuals under 3 categories which include the following ) i) Asthenic Type: — These people are tall, thin. They are shy, eee, gentle, idealistic and imaginary, non-expressive. ii) Athletic Type : These people are tall, well-built, active, joyful, practical and adjustive, have patience. iii) Pkynic Type : These people are short statured, fatty, round-faced, thick-necked. Are jovial, easy going, mobile, tolerant, popular with sense of humou,r are expressive. So, like Hippocrates, Kretschmer also believed that there is direct and positive Correlation between our body structure with that of our nature and temperament. After Kretschmer, the next classification of personality was made by sheldon in the year 1942. His theory is popular in the name of the somato type theory of personality. Sheldon strongly believed the interlink between one’s body Constitution with personality type. He classified human personality into 3 types like : i) Endomorphy : Fond of food, like comfort and relaxation, jovial, amiable, are apprehensive with sense of insecurity. iil) Mesomorphy : Like hard work, adventurous, Pain-staking, calm and cool, Energetic, competitive mind etc. iii) Ectomorphy : Unsocial, Inactive, thoughtful, shy, non-adventurous, impatient. Shelon’s classification was based on the belief that there is close connection between one’s Physique and temperament. These classifications of Personality made by Hippocrates, Kretschmer and Sheldon, even if they are not accepted to-day, stile then credit should be given to | }at least for initiating the doo re nal "t0.a deeper understandng and study of human Next important typological diy) sio _ even to day his classification ms epi Oy pcos ung: EV aS accepted bi hologists and other at hologists Y Psychologis sonal all eer one has occupied a Prominent place in understandng tne ae «The Extroverts Personality. Jung has classified personality into two ike : The and the Introverts basing on their overall tendency wie responding to the external world, by Carl General Characteristics of Extroverts : ) Easy and outgoing vi) Take interest in other people ) Sociable and friendly Vii) Like to be involved in new tasks i) Lively and active Vili) Sportive and Jovial \) Men of action and practical ix) Expressive Insensitive to social criticism x) Less emotional These are the general characteristics of Extroverts. They prefer to give more portance to their, success and want to avoid failure. They do not feel easily embarassed or insulted. They seemed to be more confident of themselves and ke to discuss their views with others. Leaders, actors, entrepreneurs belong to this group. General characteristics of Introverts \) Like to stay in their own world (ix) Self-critical Imaginative (x) _ Repressive type ') Socially sensitive (xi) Thoughtful/moody ’) Shy, reserved type (xii) Magnify failures ") Less expressive (xiii) Not very friendly ‘) Indecisive (xiv) Tendency to compare© Psychology, Class-X!l ——— vil) Prefer to stay alone (xv) Can't easily mix with others (xvi) Emotional These are the overall characteristic pattern of the introverts. They usually do not want to talk more and they never prefer to tell their personal or private problems or feelings to others. It is commonly assumed that scientists, philosophers, poets, artists, painters etc. belong to this group. ality was based on his personal observa! in his clinical field. viii) Self analytical Jung's classification of persons tions of people in different settings as well as his experiences i In oul to classify people strictly into any spe vulnerable to situations. At different si and contradictory attitude and behaviot think of another category the Ambiverts. The Ambiverts - This category of people possess characteristics of both the Extroverts and Introverts. Depending upon the need and demand of the situation, they exhibit different characteristics. Practically speaking, the majority of the people falls in this category. Hence, the same individual show both the tendency or characteristic pattern of extroversion and Introversion. This typological division of personality is just an explanation of human nature and temperament on the basis of their overall reaction and behaviour pattern. As personality is multidimensional, this typological division is not at all exhaustive in explaining the concept of personality. Trait Approach - This approach focusses mainly upon identifying the key dimensions of personality along which people differ from each other. If we are able to identify these dimensions, then it will become easy on our part to find out “how much they differ from other’. The term trait’ refers to a stable and enduring attributes of a person that are more or less consistent and are revealed in different situations. It refers to a common tendency on the part of an individual that motivates him to act and behave in typical ways. It has been estimated that more than rr real life situation, we have observed that it is practically very difficult ecific category. Because, human beings are ituations they exhibit completely opposite ur, Rather, it will be more appropriate to ;a 000 traits can be describe 40, dy these trats, A d. Allport and Warren have done extensive research to study » Apart from these tw explain the t /0, cattell, and Eyesenck et. al have also tried to erm personality on the basis of “traits”. ) n this context, c , I attell has differentiated between two different type of traits namely- i) Source Traits and ii) _—_ Surface traits By source traits, it is eats those attributes or qualities that are there ata deeper level and these traits are the actual traits of a person. By surface traits, cattell believed that these are the attributes of a person as exhibited by him directly in his action pattern/ According to this trait approach, these traits determine the differences In personality dimension. It is only because, these traits are found to be relatively stable over time and they are reflected more or less consistently across situations. Hence, depending upon the strength and weakness of these traits along with their combination, we can identify the basic differences among individuals. While discussing the salient features of this trait approach, itis very important to know the works of Allport, Cattell and Eyesenck whose contributions were note worthy. Contributions of G. Allport : Gordon Allport is considered as the champion of the trait approach. He was of the opinion that an individual's personality can be divided into many different categories and these categories vary in relation to their strength and importance. He had explained three major categories of traits in this regard. These traits include the following :\ i) The Central Traits ii) The Cardinal Traits iii) The Secondary TraitsThe Central Traits are generally few in number. Yet, these are very strong traits and they are strong enough not to be influenced or affected by situational factors. Practically speaking, these traits determine the “uniqueness” in an individual's Personality. Cardinal Traits are those traits that are limited to either one or two dominant traits that determine the entire personality of an individual. In contrast to the central and the cardinal traits, the secondary co are those Uraits that exert very little and weak influence upon ne behaviour ce an individual. These secondary traits are considered to be the least important traits of one's personality. ) Later on Allport has developed the concept of functional autonomy in the year 1965, to explain the reason as to why many individuals show interest to show definite patterns of behaviour, intentionally in order to get desired results. Allport viewed that the way an individual react and respond to different situations is dependent upon his/her personality traits. While expressing these traits, parental training and social conditioning play an important role. Because of this, people having same type of personality traits may express it differently. Contributions of R. B. Cattell - Raymond Cattell has proposed his own unique trait theory of personality after conducting research on thousands of persons to find out the key dimensions of personality. He used the factor analysis technique to analyse the response pattern of his subjects. His intention was also to find out the Possibility that might exist between different traits on the basis of which he could identify important Cluster of traits. With this intention in mind cattell did collaborative work with Dreger in the year 1977 and was able to identify sixteen source traits and 35 surface traits which he considered as more stable traits less affected by environmental factors. He described these sixteen traits in terms of opposing tendencies like disciplined vrs undisciplined, cool vrs. calm etc. Later on, he used these materials for assessingpersonality a the form of a self-administered questionnaire which is popularly known as Sixteen-Personality Factor Questionnaire (SPFQ). Contributions of H. J, Eysenck - Eysenck is a popular British Psychologist. He attempted to describe the basic dimensions Of personality. He wanted to classify various dimensions into major dimensions. These major dimensions include many other contractory traits. These two dimensions include the following: i) Neuroticism Vrs Emotional Stability ii) Extraversion Vrs Introversion i) Neuroticism Vrs Emotional Stability : As the name indicates, both the terms stand opposite to each other. Neurotic people are those who are anxious, tensed, restless, moody and somewhat emotionally unstable where as those who é are emotionally stable, they have good control over their emotions and feelings. They appear to be calm, stable, easy and balanced. Both of them stand at the two extremes of a scale, ii) Extraversion Vrs Introversion : The tendency and behaviour pattern of both the categories are opposite to each other. While the Extroverted people are active, energetic, outgoing, impulsive, decisive & friendly etc., the Introverts are socially withdrawn type, shy, reserved, reflective, solitude-seeking, indecisive etc. Later on, after engaging himself in other research activities to know more about the functioning of the traits and its resulting impact on personality pattern, he has proposed the third dimension - psychotism. According to him, a person whose personality dimension is more towards psychotism, behaves in a typical manner that can be well differentiated from the other two dimensions. These people behave in an anti-social manner, they are emotinally unstable and unpredictable in relation to their personality pattern.fF th A comparision between the ‘type’ and the ‘trait’ Bepiossilateeetas the SuPerionity of the later. A descriptive approach, no doubt, helps in ovina we Concepts, varieties etc., But a more scientific and objective approach sy an better results. To conclude, trait approach to study personality is definitely Promising approach. = itely shows the An evaluation of both the approaches by psychologists definitely Preference towards the trait approach as it was accepted by almost majority ct ‘dea Psychologists. But, this does not mean that this approach is free from shortcomings. One such demerit is connected to the aspect that it fails to explain the ‘how’and ‘why’ factor of behaviour, i.e. what are the sources of the development of these traits and how they affect human behaviour and finally why studying te factors are important. Inspite of these limitations, the trait approach has it’s own importance in explaining basic dimensions of personality, This approach has become successful in inviting more comprehensive research relating to identifying other important dimensions of personality. New Developments in Personality Research The contributions of Paul Costa and Robert Mc Crae and Zuckerman (1994) has created a steer among psychologists with their popular Big Five Dimensions of personality. Why they are so named? What justification we can give? These three renowned scholars have identified five basic dimensions of personality that they consider central to final research on personality. These five key dimensions include the following : i) | Openness to Experience ii) Extraversion iii) | Agreeableness iv) Conscientiousness v) Emotional Stabilityi) Openness to Experience : Individuals high on this dimension are found to be openmined, flexible, imaginative, open to new ideas, interested to explore new things, simple and down-to-earth people. They donot want to limit themselves to any kind of narrowness that may create barrier to the path of their exposure to the big world. ii) Extraversion : It is same as that of Jung's concept of Extroversion. Individuals high in this dimension are found to be sociable, friendly, energetic, enthusiastic, outgoing, talkative and very much expressive. Individuals who score less in this dimension possess all those traits of an Introvert who are shy, reserved, less talkative, inexpressive, socially inactive etc. iii) Agreeableness : This dimension is expressed in the form of being a good human being with good nature. These people very much helpful, reliable, co- operative & supportive. Individuals: low in this dimension show the reverse of these traits or qualities. iv) -Conscientiousness : Individuals who are high on this dimension are found to be systematic, well-organized, responsible, disciplined, careful, duty conscious and ethically strong.)Those who score less or are low in this dimension exhibit just the opposite of these qualities. v) Emotional Stability : Individuals who are emotionally stable, are found to be calm and composed, balanced, emotionally mature and know the art of when to talk and when not to. These people also recognise other’s emotions and set their interaction pattern accordingly. On the contrary, those who are emotionally unstable, are found to be nervous, anxious, tensed, stressed, imbalanced and showing abnormal behavioural tendencies. Many researchers still believe these “Big Five factors” as the key dimensions of our personality and they also claimed that people across cultures can also be evaluated quite correctly on the basis of these five central dimensions. According to (Hogan & Roberts, 1996), these dimensions can also explain the causes behind various forms of behaviour and by this, the shortcomings of the previous trait approaches can be ignored. However, there are psychologists, who still are nota little difference of as acclaimed greater ality psychologists. to continue ready to accept this model whole heartedly. But, in spite of Opinion about this final description of personality dimension, it hi acceptance among Majority of the psychologists including person At least, it can provide sufficient impetus to those who are ready further research in this area. yy