People go through life trying to overcome various obstacles on their way to what they perceive as an aim or a better life. The path of each individual is unique and is characterised by transformation of each person in a different way. The path an individual has gone through also tells a lot about personality development and rationale for certain decisions. The aim of this essay is to examine my personality from three different psychological theories in order to explain certain features of my personality. In this context attention is paid to approaches of Freud's psychoanalysis, Alport's trait theory and Skinner's behaviourism.
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In the eyes of my relatives, I am the youngest of three children raised by a single mother. Unlike most of the youngest children, I was always very responsible. I can be characterised as a perfectionist. I cannot stand a messy house or when things are out of order. My father never took part in my life, since he was incarcerated. The neighbourhood I lived in was quite dangerous.
Looking at my case from Freud's psychoanalytical perspective, my id, subconscious self is still struggling with the absence of a father figure in my life. It is still angry with his absence and unconsciously the lack of a responsible male figure in my early life has affected my instinctual evaluation of all males. In this regard, subconsciously I am programmed to dominate any kind of relationship because of the trust issues the absence of my father has caused. In my id, I am still angry that he was not there for me, and my family was not complete. In terms of super-ego, my moral values and criteria and quite high, I want everything to be in order and done right both in terms of inter-personal relationship and order in the house and working place. It can be argued that my super-ego is obsessed with perfection of order and normality. According to psychoanalysis, the main struggle is between my sub-conscious grievance of the absence of my father, subsequent denial of normality and super-ego desire for perfection and achievement of ideal. My ego tries to balance in between arguing that life is not ideal, people make mistakes, so perfectionism in its pure form is impossible. When many things go wrong at the same time my ego is over-burdened which results in diverse defensive mechanism. The most particular one is displacement, meaning that if something goes wrong in one aspect of life and I do realise that I cannot help it, I switch to perfecting of another one. For instance, if a relationship with someone goes wrong, I can find myself concentrating on improvement something in house or work.
In terms of Alport's traits, my cardinal trait, which affects all of my interactions with other people, might be the lack of trust and a fear of being unable to control the situation. This can be explained in terms of the lack of security of father's protection in childhood. Among the central traits would be perfectionism, necessity to be able to make my own decisions, independence and self-reliance. In terms of secondary traits, I am conscious to feelings of other people, always put myself in other situation. In this context, I am quite emotional and empathic. I also transform my necessity to place everything in order on other people, thus I do my best to make them feel better and thus in order. Concerning the "Big 5", I am more consistent and cautious of new experiences. Instead of adventures, I prefer something stable, secure and enduring. In terms of consciousness, I am more logical and organised rather than impulsive. On the other hand, in terms of extraversion, I am easy-going and quite open. In terms of agreeableness, I am friendly and compassionate with people and understand their problems. Concerning neuroticism, I think I am more sensitive than secure, no matter how much I would like it to be different.
According to Skinner's behaviourist approach, my perfectionism and general tendencies of behaviour are due to the previous experiences of my body and learned lessons of rewards and punishments for certain actions. Although my mother was raising us on her own, punishment was not something of a norm. On the other hand, my father's crime and his incarceration, living in the rough neighbourhood and viewing what happens if someone commits crime or acts outside prescribed norms taught me that, for any misconduct, the severe punishment will follow. In this regard, the punishment of other people for their misconducts was the main driving force of behaving appropriately. On the other hand, the rewards system worked perfectly well. For all my school achievements, my elder siblings would play games with me and involve me more activity in their lives, which served as motivation for my good behaviour.
Work Cited
Davey, Graham. Applied Psychology. Chichester: Blackwell. 2011. Print.
