The Field of Personality Psychology - Research Paper Example

Personality Development: Depression Introduction Personality is often characterized by the comparatively lasting patterns of thoughts, emotions, and behaviors that differentiate people from one another; the common view held in personality psychology is that personality emerges early in life and continues to shift significantly throughout an individual’s lifetime (Caspi, Roberts & Shiner, 2005). Studies in the field of personality psychology have shown that adult personality traits can be traced back to infant temperament, which implies that individual differences in behavior or disposition often appear early in life, even long before the development of language or the awareness of self-representation. Personality development has traditionally been a major topic of discussion in psychology, with most prominent thinkers in the afore-mentioned field being particularly interested in the manner in which individuals develop their unique personalities. Generally, psychological theories attempt to explain why individuals often think, behave and feel the way they do; specifically, different theories focus on different aspects of personality development including cognitive, moral and social development. For instance, Freud’s theory focuses on the stages of psychosexual development while Erik Erikson’s eight-stage theory builds on Freud’s theory to describe the stages of psychosocial development. People often have varying personalities; nevertheless, is a person varies considerably from an average person in the way they think, observe, feel or relate with others, their disposition reflects a personality disorder (Ingenhoven & Abraham, 2010). Personality disorders are a vast range of mental illnesses that are characterized by long-term patterns of unhealthy and inflexible thoughts and behaviors, which could trigger a series of problems with relationships and work. This explains why people with personality disorders often find it extremely difficult to interact with others and to deal with everyday stresses and problems; personality disorders often lead to stormy relationships with other people. Shifts in how an individual feels and distorted believes regarding other people often trigger odd behavior that may not only be distressing while upsetting others. Mental health problems such as depression and substance abuse have been identified as having a basis in personality disorders; this paper provides a comprehensive analysis of the psychoanalytic theory of personality development through the psychodynamic view of depression. Clinical diagnosis Different personality disorders have different symptoms, ranging from mild to severe; these symptoms get worse, depending on the level of stress the individual may be facing at a particular time in their life. In most cases, people with personality disorders often have trouble acknowledging that they actually have a problem because their thoughts are pretty normal to them; consequently, they often see other people to be the cause of all their problems. Personality disorders typically originate in adolescence and advance into adulthood (Shiner, 2009), and may range from mild to moderate or severe. While the causes of personality disorders remain unclear, they have mostly been linked to genetic factors and childhood experiences; experiences of distress or childhood fear, because of neglect or abuse have largely been cited as common factors (Easton et al. 2011). Ethical and cultural considerations A vast number of cultural and ethical issues underpin diagnosis, thereby influencing the diagnostic process in turn; interacting with patients with mental disorders inevitably requires an understanding of their varied cultural backgrounds (Yeung & Kam, 2008). For instance, it is often difficult to distinguish between the sane and insane people in psychiatric facilities, thereby raising concerns about reliability of diagnostic processes for mental disorders. Occasionally, the attitudes and prejudices of the psychiatrist, probably as a result of their unique cultural backgrounds and beliefs, may influence their diagnosis of mental illnesses. Certain classes of patients such as elderly people that live alone are more likely to be diagnosed with symptoms of depression, even though they could be interpreted differently by a different psychiatrist. Some of the common ethical considerations in diagnosis of mental disorders are labeling and stigma; labels such as “mentally ill” are increasingly used to exclude people in society, thereby leading to stigmatization. A psychiatric diagnosis completely alters an individual’s identity, consequently subjecting them to unnecessary prejudice and discrimination; in that context, a label such as “schizophrenic” endures for life. Psychoanalytic theory of personality The Freudian psychoanalytic personality theory holds that human behavior and personality results from the interaction of three components of the mind namely the id, ego and superego (Sletvold, 2013). Freud describes the id as the most primitive structure of the mind that functions unconsciously and since it operates on the pleasure principle, the id always seeks instant gratification; unlike the id, the ego is less primitive and functions in partial consciousness. Besides that, the ego operates with reason on the reality principle and it normally controls the id by ensuring that urges are only satisfied when it is appropriate to do so; unlike these two structures, the superego functions consciously and operates on the moral principle, regulating the id on the basis of social learning and issues of morality. According to Freud, the id, the ego and the superego are always in constant conflict, which results to internal struggles throughout childhood (Asante, 2011); Freud later conceptualizes that it is these childhood struggles that eventually influence the development of personality and behavior. The first stage of psychosexual development, the oral stage, lasts from birth to one and a half years of age and its principle erogenous zone is the oral cavity; at the oral stage, babies principally experience their physical environments through the mouth. This stage enables the infants to develop a mastery of sucking, eating, biting and talking that is crucial in the early developmental stages of breastfeeding and speaking. Ineffective mastery of the oral stage leads to a fixation that is reflected through behaviors such as drinking, smoking and nail-biting, among other mouth-based aggressive behaviors that manifest later in adulthood. The anal stage, which starts at around one and a half years and lasts up to three years of age, revolves around a mastery of the excretion system, thereby leading to proper toilet training. A fixation in the anal stage often arises as a result of an improper mastery of the excretion system, or in children that were harshly punished in the course of their toilet training process; anal fixation is reflected in anal retentive or expulsive personalities in which individuals become excessively tidy or extremely messy. The third stage in Freud’s psychosexual development process, the phallic stage, starts at three years and lasts to five years of age and its principle erogenous zone is the genital organ; in this stage, children develop their first sexual desires ever and direct them to the opposite sex parent. Boys develop the Oedipus complex in which they become jealous of their fathers whom they perceive as competition for their mother’s attention (Smadja, 2011); similarly, girls become jealous of their mothers in competing for their father’s attention, in what is termed as the Elektra complex. Mastery of the phallic stage enables children to shift their attention towards more appropriate sexual desires; fixation in the phallic stage adversely affects children’s relationships with their parents. The latency stage, which lasts from five years to twelve years of age, is characterized by children’s dominant sexual feelings for the opposite sex; the goal of this stage is to help the child to consolidate character traits developed in the previous stages. A successful mastery of all the previous stages is required for the emergence of a mature adult personality before the onset of puberty (Asante, 2011); children that are unable to master this stage, to shift their centers of pleasure to other things such as schooling or friendships, often develop fixations on behaviors that are socially inappropriate. The genital stage is the last phase of Freud’s psychosexual development process that begins at twelve years of age and lasts through to adulthood; the main center of pleasure in this stage is the explosion of sexual hormones in the body during puberty. Mastery of the genital stage requires adolescents to create effective connections with their peers, to rise above their introverted, juvenile sexuality to consensual, mature sexuality; children who do not master this stage develop fixations on sex and often have unsuccessful relationships in their adulthood. Psychoanalytic view of personality development The five psychosexual development stages play a critical role in the formation of personality and behavior in adulthood; usually, the id seeks pleasure from each of the different centers of pleasure or erogenous zones at each of the five stages, which leads to the conflict between biological drives and social expectations (Cortina, 2010). A child’s ability to resolve these internal conflicts influences their adulthood coping and functioning capacity; on the other hand, a child’s inability to resolve these conflicts results to fixation at one or more of the psychosexual stages. Fixation in any of the psychosexual stages results to complex issues in the development of personality and behavior as in the case of the Oedipus complex for the boy child and its equivalent of Electra complex for the girl child, as a result of fixations in the phallic stage. In the course of a child’s development, the ego applies a range of defense mechanisms to deal with the anxiety that accompanies the numerous conflicting impulses that are triggered by the id and the superego; common defense mechanisms include repression, reaction formation, projection, displacement, regression and denial, among others. Repression involves preventing harmful or painful thoughts from coming to the conscious level while displacement entails directing impulses towards a less threatening or more acceptable person or object. Psychodynamic view of depression Sigmund Freud held the position that if an individual’s needs are not adequately met in the oral stage of psychosexual development as outlined in his theory of psychosexual development, the individual is more likely to be vulnerable to depression later in their adulthood, as a result of low self-esteem and excessive dependence on others. On the other hand, Freud also theorized that if an individual’s needs are met excessively in that same oral stage of psychosexual development, the individual may also be vulnerable to depression because they are more likely to be excessively dependent on others. In that respect, both an excess of negative experiences and excess of positive experiences during the first year of infancy could both pre-dispose an individual to depression in their later life as adults. According to Freud’s psychodynamic view of depression, individuals are always victims of their own feelings; this implies that individual’s thoughts about unsettled childhood conflicts were the primary cause of feelings of self-hatred that characterize depressives (Schottenbauer, et al., 2008). The implication of this assertion, therefore, is that while individuals’ defense mechanisms such as repression and displacement may enable them to cope with emotional turmoil, they may also result to depression. Individuals often suffer two types of losses namely actual loss and symbolic loss; actual loss may be something like the death of a loved one while symbolic loss may include things like loss of status or position. Individuals that are excessively dependent on others are at a higher risk of developing depression after experiencing such losses in life; it is common for such individuals to displace onto their self rather than at the loss, thereby affecting their self-esteem. The excessive feelings of self-hatred in the aftermath of a loss often thoroughly undermine individual’s sense of self-worth, consequently affecting their self-esteem levels; it is this loss of self-esteem that sets individuals on the path to depression. It is widely acknowledged by psychodynamic theorists that depressives traditionally react to losses by developing excessive feelings of self-hatred, strongly believing that they are largely to blame for the loss they have just experienced. Freud also extends his argument that depressed individual’s thoughts concerning unresolved conflicts in their childhood contribute significantly to their feelings of self-hatred, thereby making them to re-experience losses that occurred in their childhood; Freud argues that the depressives’ dominant super-ego is responsible for their excessive sense of self-guilt. Atypical scenario that effectively illustrates the psychodynamic theory of personality development is the case of neurotic parents that are inconsistent, cold, angry, inconsiderate, thereby creating an unpredictable and hostile environment for the infant (Kim, Cicchetti, Rogosch & Manly, 2009; Johnson, Liu & Cohen, 2011). In such a case, the infant often feels neglected, confused, helpless, and eventually angry; however, since the child also knows that those same parents are his/her only means of survival. Consequently, the child effectively represses those feelings of anger towards the parent and instead directs them inwards towards him/herself; this triggers self-hate, which progressively results to the formation of a sense of low self-worth and eventually a low self-esteem. The child starts believing that he/she is unlovable and strives to project a perfect front to make up for the perceived flaws that make him/her unacceptable, thus becoming neurotic/susceptible depression and anxiety (Kim, Cicchetti, Rogosch & Manly, 2009). Contemporary views The psychodynamic view of personality development has undergone significant shifts over its long history, giving rise to the many shades of the original theory that are prevalent today (Cortina, 2010). The object-relations theory, which focuses on the manner in which people comprehend and mentally represent their connections with others, is one such variation of the initial psychodynamic theory of personality development. The “objects” in this theory refer to the representations of people; the basic view of the object relations theory is that childhood relationships eventually form a backdrop for people’s later dispositions and other aspects of their personality. These Neo-Freudian theorists have expressed the view that the quality of an individual’s infantile relationships with significant others such as mothers during the first year of life is a great indicator of the likelihood that an individual may lose their self-esteem in response to losses in adulthood. The Neo-Freudian theorists’ argument suggests that individuals that did not have positive experiences with their mothers in their first year of life are more susceptible to suffering low self-esteem, and therefore depression (Johnson, Liu & Cohen, 2011). With regards to depression, the object relations theory holds that it results from the problems individuals experience in developing representations of healthy relationships; in other words, depression reflects an ongoing internal struggle within the depressives, to establish and maintain an emotional contact with objects of their desire. Psychodynamic therapy The psychodynamic therapy is of the three leading types of therapy used in the treatment of depression, the others being the cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and interpersonal therapy (IPT) (Rivera & Darke, 2012). Unlike CBT and IPT, which focus on understanding and modifying specific processes of behavior, psychodynamic therapy is based on the idea that behavior is influenced by the unconscious mind and previous experiences. Psychodynamic therapy is not as intense as the formal psychoanalysis and it involves open-ended sessions that seek to unravel the conscious and unconscious unresolved conflicts through self-reflection and self-examination. Rather than helping the patient to resolve the conflict, psychodynamic therapy aims to enable the patient to find relief from mental stress by resolving larger symptoms of depression (Bakali, Wilberg, Klungsøyr, & Lorentzen, 2013). The therapist strives to help the patient to establish connections between their previous experiences and their current dispositions while equipping them with advanced response mechanisms (Schedler, 2010); eventually, the patients become confident in their capacity to cope with situations in more positive and effective ways. References Asante, K. O. (2011). What Is Successful Development: An Overview Of Old And New Theoretical Perspectives.Researchers World, 2(3), 131-134. Bakali, J. V., Wilberg, T., Klungsøyr, O., & Lorentzen, S. (2013). Development of group climate in short- and long-term psychodynamic group psychotherapy. International Journal of Group Psychotherapy, 63(3), 366-93.  Caspi, A., Roberts, B. W., & Shiner, R. L. (2005). Personality Development: Stability and change. Annual Review of Psychology, 56, 453-484. Cortina, M. (2010). The future of psychodynamic psychotherapy. Psychiatry, 73(1), 43-56.  Easton, S. D., Coohey, C., Oleary, P., Zhang, Y., & et al. (2011). The effect of childhood sexual abuse on psychosexual functioning during adulthood. Journal of Family Violence, 26(1), 41-50.  Ingenhoven, T.J.M. & Abraham, R.E. (2010). Making diagnosis more meaningful. the developmental profile: A psychodynamic assessment of personality. American Journal of Psychotherapy, 64(3), 215-38.  Johnson, J. G., Liu, L., & Cohen, P. (2011). Parenting behaviours associated with the development of adaptive and maladaptive offspring personality traits. Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, 56(8), 447-56. Kim, J., Cicchetti, D., Rogosch, F. A., & Manly, J. T. (2009). Child maltreatment and trajectories of personality and behavioral functioning: Implications for the development of personality disorder. Development and Psychopathology, 21(3), 889-912.  Rivera, M., & Darke, J. L. (2012). Integrating empirically supported therapies for treating personality disorders: A synthesis of psychodynamic and cognitive-behavioral group treatments. International Journal of Group Psychotherapy, 62(4), 500-29.  Schedler, J. (2010). The Efficacy of Psychodynamic Psychotherapy. American Psychologist, 65(2): 98 –109. Schottenbauer, M. A., Glass, C. R., Arnkoff, D. B., & Gray, S. H. (2008). Contributions of psychodynamic approaches to treatment of PTSD and trauma: A review of the empirical treatment and psychopathology literature. Psychiatry, 71(1), 13-34.  Shiner, R. L. (2009). The development of personality disorders: Perspectives from normal personality development in childhood and adolescence. Development and Psychopathology, 21(3), 715-34.  Sletvold, J. (2013). The ego and the id revisited freud and damasio on the body ego/self. International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 94(5), 1019-32. Smadja, E. (2011). The OEdipus complex, crystallizer of the debate between psychoanalysis and anthropology1. International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 92(4), 985-1007 Yeung, A., & Kam, R. (2008). Ethical and cultural considerations in delivering psychiatric diagnosis: reconciling the gap using MDD diagnosis delivery in less-acculturated Chinese patients. Transcultural Psychiatry, 45(4):531-52. Read More