Nida Anwar

Clinical Psychologist
SEM: 3, SPH,DIMC,DUHS
 Personality

 Personality can be defined as a dynamic and

organized set of characteristics that uniquely

influences person’s cognitions, motivations, and

behaviors in various situations.

 Theories of Personality

1. Trait Theories

2. Psychoanalytic Theory

3. Social-Cognitive Theories

4. Humanistic Theories

5. Behavioral Personality Theory

 Trait Theory

 Trait theorists believe that traits are prominent
aspects of personality that are exhibited in a wide
range of important social and personal contexts.

 Individuals have certain characteristics that partly

define their behavior.

 Traits are trends in behavior or attitude that tend to

be present regardless of the situation.
 Trait Theory

 Gordon Allport Trait Theory

 Gordon Allport was one of the first modern trait theorists.

 He worked through two of the most comprehensive dictionaries of

the English language available and extracted around 18,000
personality-describing words.

 From this list he reduced the number of words to approximately

4,500 personality-describing adjectives which he considered to
describe observable and relatively permanent personality traits.

 Allport organized these traits into three levels:

Cardinal traits Dominate and shape an individual’s
behavior, such as Mother Theresa’s
altruism. They are considered to be an
individual’s ruling passions. Cardinal
traits are powerful, but few people have

personalities dominated by a single trait.
Instead, our personalities are typically
composed of multiple traits.

Central traits These are general characteristics found in

varying degrees in every person (such as
loyalty, kindness, friendliness). They are
the basic building blocks that shape most
of our behavior.

Secondary traits They are not quite as obvious or

consistent as central traits. They are
plentiful but are only present under
specific circumstances. For example, a
friendly person gets angry when people
try to irritate him.
 Trait Theory

 Raymond Cattell’s Trait Theory

 In an effort to make Allport’s list of 4,500 traits more

manageable, Raymond Cattell took the list and
removed all the synonyms, reducing the number
down to 171.

 Cattell performed factor analysis to generated

sixteen dimensions of human personality.


 Trait Theory

 Hans Eysenck Three Factor Theory

 Hans Eysenck viewed people as having two specific

personality dimensions: extroversion vs. introversion and
stability vs. instability. After collaborating with his fellow
personality theorist, he added a third dimension to this
model: psychoticism vs. neuroticism.

 His Three Factor Personality Traits are:

 extroversion vs. introversion
 stability vs. instability
 psychoticism vs. neuroticism


Psychoticism Neuroticism


 Trait Theory

 The Big Five Theory of Personality (OCEAN)

 This model was developed independently by different theorists

 The abbreviation OCEAN is often used to recall Costa’s and
McCrae’s five factors, or Big Five personality traits:

 Openness:
 Conscientiousness: attention to detail
 Extraversion: Social, Out spoken
 Agreeable: Friendly
 Neuroticism: anxiety, fear, worry

 Psychoanalytic Perspective of Personality
SIGMUND FREUD


 Topology theory of Freud

• Unconscious: It is understood to be the large part of the

mind, which is hidden from view.

• Sub-conscious: It is represented by the waterline - but it is

the zone in which there are brief glimpses of the
unconscious.

• Conscious: The relatively small part which sticks of the

water is seen as equivalent to the small amount of conscious
awareness that the human experiences.

 Model Of Personality

 Elements Of Personality (Freud’s View):
• Id
• Ego
• Superego

ID EGO SUPEREGO

•
• Primary component of • Responsible for dealing Holds of our internalized
personality with reality moral standards that we

 acquire from parents,

• Works on pleasure
principle which strives
for immediate
satisfaction of all
desires, needs, wants
For example, if an infant
feels hungry, he will cry
till his want is satisfied.
society.
• Reality principle
weighs the cost of
doing something
• Discharges tension by
finding the object in the
real world created by
Id.
 Defense Mechanism

A defense mechanism is a tactic developed by the ego
to protect against anxiety. Defense mechanisms are
thought to safeguard the mind against feelings and
thoughts that are too difficult for the conscious mind to
cope with.



Electra Complex

Social Cognitive Theory

 Mischel’s Cognitive-Affective Model

 Bandura’s Reciprocal Determinism

 Rotter’s Social-Cognitive
Mischel’s Cognitive-Affective Model


 Bandura’s Reciprocal Determinism


 He proposed the concept of reciprocal determinism, in
which cognitive processes, behavior, and context all
interact, each factor simultaneously influencing and being
influenced by the others.

 Cognitive processes: refer to all characteristics previously

learned, including beliefs, expectations, and personality
characteristics.
 Behavior: refers to anything that we do that may be
rewarded or punished.
 Situational Factors: are the settings in which the behavior
occurs, includes rewarding/punishing stimuli.

 Rotter’s Theory of Locus of Control


 He described in his theory that how individuals view
their relationship to the environment.
 locus of control refers to our beliefs about the power we
have over our lives, and is a cognitive factor that affects
personality development.

 Locus of control can be classified along a spectrum from

internal to external; where an individual falls along the
spectrum determines the extent to which they believe
they can affect the events around them.

 Humanistic Theories

 Humanistic psychology believes that people have free
will. Personal agency is the humanistic term for the
exercise of free will. Personal agency refers to the choices
we make in life, the paths we go down and their
consequences.

 People are basically good, and have an innate need to

make themselves and the world better.

 Main theorist of this approach were Maslow and Roger



 Carl Roger Theory

 Carl Rogers Theory: believed that personality form as a result of our strivings to
reach our full human potential.

 Fully Functioning Person: Lives in harmony with his/her deepest feelings and
impulses

 Self-Image: Total subjective perception of your body and personality

 Conditions of Worth: behaviors and attitudes for which other people give us
positive regard.

 Unconditional Positive Regard: Unshakable love and approval

 Positive Self-Regard: Thinking of oneself as a good, lovable, worthwhile person

Behavioral Personality Theory


 Behavioral theories suggest that personality is a
result of interaction between the individual and the
environment. Behavioral theorists study observable
and measurable behaviors, rejecting theories that
take internal thoughts and feelings into account.

 B.F Skinner’s operant conditioning

 Pavlov’s Classical Conditioning
Personality Disorder Clusters


 Paranoid Personality Disorder



A pervasive distrust and suspiciousness of others such that their motives are interpreted as
malevolent, beginning by early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts such as:

(1) suspects, without sufficient basis, that others are exploiting, harming, or deceiving him or her

(2) is preoccupied with unjustified doubts about the loyalty or trustworthiness of friends or associates

(3) is reluctant to confide (reveal ) in others because of unwarranted fear that the information will be
used maliciously against him or her

(4) reads hidden demeaning or threatening meanings into benign remarks or events

(5) persistently bears grudges, i.e., is unforgiving of insults, injuries, or slights

(6) perceives attacks on his or her character or reputation that are not apparent to others and is quick to
react angrily or to counterattack

(7) has recurrent suspicions, without justification, regarding fidelity of spouse or sexual partner
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