Personality

This unit includes the following chapters.

“Why It Matters: Personality” is an introduction on personality psychology.

“What is Personality?” defines personality and describes early theories about personality development.

“Freud and the Psychodynamic Perspective” describes the assumptions of the psychodynamic perspective on personality development, including the id, ego, and superego; defines and describes the defense mechanisms; and defines and describes the psychosexual stages of personality development.

“Neo-Freudians: Adler, Erikson, Jung, and Horney” summarizes the contributions of Neo-Freudians to personality theory, including Adler’s inferiority complex, Erikson’s psychosocial stages, Jung’s ideas of the collective unconscious and archetypes, and Horney’s coping styles.

“Humanistic Approaches” explains the contributions of humanists Abraham Maslow and Carl Rogers to personality development.

“Biological Approaches” explains biological approaches to understanding personality, including the findings of the Minnesota Study of Twins Reared Apart, heritability, and temperament.

“Trait Theorists” discusses the early trait theories of Cattell and Eysenck; and describes the Big Five factors and categorizes someone who is high and low on each of the five traits.

“Putting It Together: Personality” gives a summary of the learning objectives covered throughout this unit.