Personality Classic Theories - Essay Example

Trait refers to an enduring tendency of behaving in a certain way (Friedman, & Schustack, 2001). The big five dimensions of Personality include; Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism also known as the OCEAN. Openness trait features characteristics such as insight and imagination. Conscientiousness traits include high levels of thoughtfulness and goal-directed behaviors.  Agreeableness traits include features such as kindness, affection, trust as well as, and other personal behaviors. Extraversion trait, on the other hand, includes features such as sociability, talkativeness, assertiveness, and emotional expressiveness, and Neuroticism traits include features such as anxiety, moodiness sadness, and irritability. The five dimensions are significant because they accurately describe personality.

            Social cognitive theory, on the other hand, asserts that an individual can learn behaviors through modeling, observation as well as, and interactions. It is evident that personalities are shaped by interactions which include cognitive factors, behaviors as well as environmental factors. Cognitive factors include beliefs, values, feelings as well as thoughts; environmental factors, on the other hand, are social influences such as family, media, and peers while behaviors include outward actions. Conversely, there are various ways in which people can react to the environment. For instance, different people can choose different environment or an individual’s personality can shape how he/she interpret and react to events. Personality traits can be stable and consistent in a given period of time (Friedman, & Schustack, 2001). For example, it is evident that at the age of 20-30, both men and women usually become less emotional, self-disciplined as well as, and cooperative (Pervin, Lawrence, & Oliver pg. 123). In summary, this paper will discuss two theoretical approaches to personality as well as, answer the key developers and promoters of those theoretical approaches. The two theoretical approaches to personality that will be discussed in this paper include; Schema theory and Kurt Lewin’s Field theory (Friedman & Schustack, 2009).

            Kurt Lewin was known to be the key developer of Field theory. Field theory mainly emphasized the importance of individual personalities, situational variables as well as interpersonal conflict. Lewin’s Field theory majorly proposed that people’s behavior is a result of the environment where these people live. This theory has been identified to have a greater impact on social psychology, the environment interacting as well as supporting the nation of the individual traits. Today, Lewin has been known to be the father of modern social psychology as a result of his pioneering work which utilized various scientific methods along with experimentation that looked at the social behavior of individuals. Research has also shown that Lewin was also a seminal theorist whose enduring impact on psychology made him one of the preeminent psychologists of the twentieth Century (Friedman, & Schustack, 2001).

            Conversely, in psychology, schema theory represents knowledge regarding a certain concept. For instance, the objects and the relationship it has with other objects, events, the sequence of events as well as, and the sequence of sections. Schema theory asserts that all knowledge is organized into units, and within these units of knowledge, the information is stored in the schemata. Research shows that linguistic, and cognitive psychologists along with psycholinguists are today using the conceptual schema to help them in understanding the interaction of the various key factors that affect the comprehension process (Friedman, & Schustack, 2001). The schema which is activated in a given situation has been identified to be a major determinant of an individual’s expectations, actions in the situations as well as, and inferences. These kinds of schemas may exist at a different level, which in turn may be used in influencing other people’s behaviors. For instance, the theory asserts that children may progress through a series of cognitive stages as they grow, and in each stage, the content of the knowledge as well as their nature of reasoning may become more sophisticated as time goes by.

            These two classical theories have both weaknesses and strengths. Some of the strengths may include, giving people an idea of what is right and what is wrong. The two classical theories are significant in understanding the personality of individuals, therefore I prefer all of them. All these theories help an individual in understanding the behavior of other people. For instance, in an organization or workplace, there are different people from different cultures and backgrounds, as a result, understanding these people may be a hard task for the managers as well as the staff within the place, therefore understanding both the two theories may be essential in understanding their behaviors (Friedman & Schustack, 2009).