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A Dynamic Systems Approach

to Personality
Lawrence A. Pervin
Rutgers University, Piscataway, NJ, USA

David Magnusson has been the most articulate spokesperson for a holistic, systems approach to personality. This paper considers three concepts
relevant to a dynamic systems approach to personality: dynamics, systems, and levels. Some of the history of a dynamic view is traced, leading
to an emphasis on the need for stressing the interplay among goals. Concepts such as multidetermination, equipotentiality, and equifinality are

shown to be important aspects of a systems approach. Finally, attention

is drawn to the question of levels of description, analysis, and explanation
in a theory of personality. The importance of the issue is emphasized in
relation to recent advances in our understanding of biological processes.
Integrating such advances into a theory of personality while avoiding the
danger of reductionism is a challenge for the future.

Keywords: Personality, dynamics, systems, levels, reductionism.

I consider three concepts relevant to a dynamic systems

approach to personality: dynamics, systems, and levels.
First, however, in order to place the discussion in context, let me quote from my epilog chapter in the second

Dynamics and Systems

In 19941 published a critical analysis of current trait theory, focusing in particular on the limitations of a such a
edition of The Handbook of Personality: Theory and Research static model of personality (Pervin, 1994). Prior to pub(Pervin & John, 1999). In this chapter I consider ten is- lication of the paper I sent it to a leading trait psycholosues that remain fundamental to the field. In considering gist for review. This person rejected the paper as being
the third, Parts versus Wholes (Systems), I expressed the of little merit, suggesting that terms such as "dynamic"
following view:
and "system" are meaningless, associated with the old
view
of clinical prediction, which had been demonstrat"Magnusson is the most articulate spokesperson for a
ed
to
be inferior to statistical prediction. According to
holistic, systems approach to personality, spelling out
this
person,
such terms were better dropped from the
in detail its theoretical and methodological implicafield
completely.
Interestingly enough, since then a pretions. What is most significant about a systems approach is that it emphasizes the dynamic interconnec- sentation of the five-factor theory of personality by
tions among parts and the multidetermination of complex behavior ... Such systems principles would
appear to be necessary to appreciate the complexity of
human personality functioning" (Pervin, 1999, p. 693).
I return to this point at the conclusion of my presentation, but first let me consider the concepts of dynamics,
systems, and levels as they relate to personality functioning.

Lawrence A. Pervin is a professor at the Department of Psychology,

Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ, USA. Together with Oliver P.
John he is editor of the Handbook of Personality: Theory and Research. Together they also wrote the volume Personality: Theory and
Research, and he authored Current Controversies and Issues in Personality. Pervin has made many important contributions to the field
of personality through his critical synthesis of current theories and
research practices and his thought-provoking theoretical work concerning a dynamic personality psychology.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Professor Lawrence A. Pervin, Department of Psychology, Livingston
Campus, Rutgers University, Piscataway, NJ 08854, USA (tel. +1 732
445-2376, fax +1 732 445-0036, e-mail pervin@rci.rutgers.edu).

172

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A Dynamic Systems Approach to Personality

McCrae and Costaneither of whom was the critic just
referred togreatly emphasizes dynamic processes
(McCrae & Costa, 1999). First, they describe personality
as "the dynamic psychological organization that coordinates experience and action" (p. 142) and then go on to
call their model "the FFT personality system," emphasizing how basic tendencies (the Big Five) get channeled,
through a variety of yet to be specified dynamic processes, into characteristic adaptations and development of
the self-concept. Since Mischel (Mischel & Shoda, 1995,
1999) also emphasizes the dynamic and system aspects
(CAPScognitive, affective personality system) of personality functioning from a social cognitive standpoint (and
psychoanalytic theory always has emphasized a dynamic, systems perspective), perhaps we indeed are
headed toward a rapprochement in current personality
theory.
Of course, the concept of a dynamic, systems approach to personality has a long history in the field. Robert Woodworth in 1918 entitled his book Dynamic Psychology and suggested that an understanding of cause
and effect, what he called dynamics, involved action or
processes in the system studied. Notice reference he
makes to a system. Also, it may be of interest to note that
he considered the topics of conflict and will, suggesting
that will problems arise from the conflict of two tendencies that may be equally balanced. Almost two decades
later, Lewin (1935) presented his Dynamic Theory of Personality, emphasizing concepts such as energy, tension,
need, valence, force, system, and conflict. Lewin viewed
the person as a complex energy system that is in constant
interaction with the environment. The person's goals or
needs interact with forces in the environment to produce
action, captured in his well-known formula B = /(PE).
Lewin also emphasized the importance of considering
the functioning of the system as a whole, suggesting that
the totality of the system has properties that cannot be
derived solely from the individual parts. Among his
many system concepts were those of differentiation, conflict (approach-approach, avoidance-avoidance, and
approach-avoidance), and fluidity. Finally, in this brief
historical overview note we should mention Atkinson
and Birch's (1970) attempt to account for changes in activity characteristic of what they called the molar stream
of behavior. Particularly noteworthy was the emphasis on
the interplay between motives such as those for success
and the avoidance of failure, which in today's literature
would be called the interplay between approach and
avoidance goals (Higgins, 1997; Sheldon & Elliot, 1999).
It is the interplay among such goals that helps to account
for the wide divergences in the adaptive level of func-

tioning of a person from situation to situation that I consider so important to appreciating the complexity of personality. In other words, it is the same personality functioning from situation to situation, although even minor
shifts in the dynamics can lead to significant changes in
affect and behavior (Pervin, 1983).
As I have noted elsewhere (Pervin, 1983), for some
time the concept of motive was lost to the field because
of the demise of the drive concept and the advent of the
cognitive revolution. Fortunately, personality and social
psychologists have moved away from a near exclusive
concern with "cool cognition" to a concern with "hot
cognition," that is, how affects and motives influence
and direct cognitive processes. No longer is the person
"left in thought," as was suggested (inaccurately, I might
add) of Tolman's rats; rather, cognition is viewed in
terms of its functioning in the service of motives and
affect regulation. Of particular importance here has been
an emphasis on the concept of goals and, as noted, the
interplay between approach and avoidance goals. Thus,
a dynamic approach to personality, at least in terms of
an emphasis on motivational concepts such as goals, has
returned to the field. This is an important development.
What lies ahead, however, is the task of developing better measures of personal goals, in particular measures of
powerful ("hot") goals and unconscious goals, such as
those that may be operative in the problems of will noted
by Woodworth and described by others, including myself, as problems of volition or self-regulation (Pervin,
1991). In addition, there is a need for greater consideration of the relationships among goals within the system. A beginning has been made here in research by Higgins (1997), Emmons and King (1988), Sheldon and Elliot
(1999), and others on goal conflict and relations between
approach and avoidance goals. The data suggest that
goal conflict is problematic for health and emotional
well-being, and that approach goals more than avoidance goals lend themselves to the development of intrinsic motivation.
Although an important start has been made, I think
that other efforts are necessary to place these developments within a systems perspective. Three general systems principles have always seemed of import to
memultidetermination, equipotentiality, and equifinality
(Pervin, 1999). The concept of multidetermination suggests that any complex activity involves the interplay of
multiple determinants, in this case, the interplay of multiple motives or goals. What is needed, then, is systematic investigation of the interplay of multiple motives or
goals as the person confronts various situations, that is,
a systematic investigation of the phenomena observed

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Lawrence A. Pervin

by the psychodynamic clinician in therapy sessions. The

concept of equipotentiality suggests that, from the same
starting point, a number of different outcomes are possible: The same motives or goals can lead to different
behaviors or actions depending on situational affordances and constraints. The concept of equiflnality suggests that the same endpoint can be reached through
different routes. That is, the same action can be expressive of different motives in the person at different times
or in the actions of different people in the same situation.
In other words, there is a complex relationship between
motivation and action or overt behavior. Similarly, in a
point relevant to the topic of levels to be considered, different biological variables may combine to lead to the
same phenotypic manifestations. The system principles
of equipotentiality and equifinality also address the
complexity of developmental processes in that children
with similar personality profiles may develop quite different adult personality characteristics depending on environmental influences; and similar adult profiles may
be the result of quite different childhood profiles in interaction with different environmental influences.

The Concept of Levels

A dynamic systems perspective invites consideration of
the concept of levels. This is particularly important today for two reasons. First, a number of personality psychologists suggest that different personality constructs
and approaches, such as traits, motives, personal narratives, trait theory, and social cognitive theory, lie at different levels (Buss & Cantor, 1989; Mayer, 1998; McAdams, 1999). I find many of these analyses problematic
since the concept of levels is not clarified, and specific
constructs or theoretical approaches are designated as
being at one or another level without a rationale for such
a designation. Eysenck's (1970,1990) description of the
hierarchical organization of personality from specific responses, to habitual responses, to traits, to types or superfactors seems to me to have a rational basis to it. Each
level involves different units of analysis, some more specific and others more general or global, with the units at
each level having connections to units at other levels.
But in what sense are traits and motives at different levels? Is one a more macro- or micro-unit than the otherand what are the connections between them?
Whereas some suggest that motives are derived from or
grow out of traits (McCrae & Costa, 1999), others suggest that traits can be derived from motives (Winter,

174

John, Stewart, Klohnen, & Duncan, 1998). Thus, if we are

to consider levels of personality constructs, we must
have some understanding of the levels concept and
some rational basis for assigning constructs to different
levels.
The second reason for considering the concept of
levels is the growing popularity of concepts from biology and neuroscience in the field of personality I consider
developments in these fields to be of tremendous importance for the field of personality, as witnessed by a new
chapter on biological foundations of personality in the
8th edition of my personality text (Pervin & John, 2001).
At the same time, however, I think that we need to be
clear in our own minds about the relation of findings in
biology and neuroscience to those in traditional personality psychology, most particularly whether we are talking about the same or different levels of description,
analysis, and explanation, and whether at times we are
running the risk of reductionism, that is, of reducing
phenomena best understood at one level of analysis to
those of another, supposedly "more basic" level of analysis.
There are cases in which the concept of levels is clear
to me. I have already noted Eysenck's description of the
hierarchical organization of personality In addition, one
can note the difference between microeconomics and
macroeconomics, molecular biology and cellular biology, the hierarchical organization of an administrative
structure, and the hierarchy ranging from individual, to
group, to society, to culture. In each of these cases there
are different units of analysis, generally ranging from
smaller and more specific to larger and more global,
with connections between levels and the various levels
being useful for different analytic and explanatory purposes. Note that in these cases one level is not considered
more ''basic," "scientific," or "valid" than the others:
They merely are different levels, with implications for
one another but each with its own advantages and disadvantages for analysis and explanation. There also are
cases in which the concept of levels does not seem to me
to be applicable. Thus, for example, to say that color vision is a result of the functioning of cones does not seem
to me to be a question of levels. Rather, a phenomenon
of interest is being explained in terms of a construct.
Also, the interaction of hormones and behavior between
mother and offspring in the regulation of maternal behavior (Bridges, DiBiase, Loundes, & Doherty, 1985;
Smotherman, Bell, Hershberger, & Coover, 1978) does
not seem to me to be a question of levels. Nor does an
analysis of the interactions among cognitions, affects,
behavior, or the brain and immune system in the proEuropean Psychologist, Vol. 6, No. 3, September 2001, pp. 172-176
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A Dynamic Systems Approach to Personality

duction of disease seem to me to involve the question of

levels (Maier & Watkins, 2000). In these two cases we
have different constructs being used to understand a
process involving all units of analysis. No one concept
can be reduced to or substituted for another, and no one
is more basic, scientific, or valid than another.
Now we come to the question of how we are to understand the relation between personality constructs
such as traits and temperament and biological constructs
such as neurotransmitters, hormones, and hemispheric
lateralization. Will extraversion, positive affect, and nonshyness as opposed to introversion, negative affect, and
shyness ultimately be explained by, and reduced to, the
functioning of various neurotransmitters and structures
of the brain? Or, will these constructs remain at different
levels of analysis with findings at one construct level having implications for understanding at the other construct
level but not being a substitute for them?
This is an important question for two reasons. First,
it is important for deciding how we go about conceptualizing and studying the phenomena of interest to us.
With the impressive gains in biology and neuroscience, it
is easy to slip from an analysis in terms of levels of a
system to a reductionistic explanation where what are
presumed to be higher-level phenomena are explained in
terms of lower-level constructs. Searle (2000), in his effort
to "unriddle the puzzle of consciousness/' is aware of the
danger of reductionism. Yet in his attempt to understand
how neuron firings at synapses "cause" the experience of
hearing a Beethoven symphony or worrying about how
we are going to pay our income taxes, he concludes that
"One thing we are certain of: Brains do it. Brains cause all
of our conscious states" (2000, p. 45).
Second, our interpretation of these relationships has
serious treatment and moral implications. As DeGrandpre (1999) and others have pointed out, it is very easy to
slip from the finding of an association or correlation between biological measures (e. g., /MRI, serotonin) and
psychological-behavioral phenomena (e. g., depression,
attention deficit disorder) to an interpretation of the former as the cause of the latter. He cautions against biological and neurological reductionism, citing, for example,
claims that "addiction is a brain disease/' suggesting
that "addiction is a developmental and psychosocial
problem as well as, in some immediate sense, a biological one, and so it cannot be separated from the socio-environmental context in which it develops and is maintained" (1999, p. 18). A recent article in the New York
Times similarly picks up on this theme under the headline "Seeing Drugs as a Choice Or as a Brain Anomaly"
(June 24,2000, p. B9). One scientist is described as view-

ing addiction as a brain disease, suggesting that it be

viewed and treated as an illness. Others are critical of
such a view. For example, one psychologist is quoted as
follows: "Since we can visualize the brain of someone
who's craving, people say, 'Ah hah, addiction is a brain
disease/ But when someone sees a McDonald's hamburger, things are going on in the brain, too, but that
doesn't tell you whether their behavior is involuntary or
not"(p.Bll).
My own view corresponds to that articulated by Cacioppo (1999; Cacioppo & Berntson, 1992) in terms of
support for a multilevel, integrative approach to understanding the phenomena of interest to personality psychologists. According to this view, each level of analysis
has its own strengths and limitations, with distinctive
contributions to be made to understanding and explanation. No single level is best for understanding the phenomena of interest and appreciation of the contributions
from all levels is desirable. Thus, for example, understanding and treatment of the problems of drug and alcohol abuse requires an appreciation of each of many
levelsgene, cell, learning, family, and sociocultural environment. As expressed by Zuckerman (1998):
"All types of phenomena may be studied at different
levels, from the most molecular to the most molar.
Each level has its own methods, constructs, and limitations. An analysis at one level may be perfectly compatible with one at another level. The cognitive, behavioral, and biological are complementary and not
conflicting modes of explanation" (p. 150).

Conclusion
It should be clear by now that I regard the holistic-interactionistic paradigm as proposed by David Magnusson
as providing a suitable general framework for a dynamic systems approach to personality. Such an approach
promises to unravel more of the dynamic nature of personality formation than conventional approaches.

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Lawrence A. Pervin
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