Beliefs about Personality - Essay Example

 Beliefs about Personality I believe that personality is formed as people react to the information that they have in the world around them, and other people. After the information is perceived either internally or externally, it is evaluated by the individual and placed in a context that is concerned with the acquisition of the information as knowledge that will determine future behavior, which in effect determines their personality. This personality is never fully formed, according to my beliefs, but will constantly be regulated by the repetition of this process in what could be called a total or continuous process of learning, assimilating, developing, and regulating personal identity. This regulation process takes place in terms of the individual’s ability to judge themselves and their behavior and respond to these judgments. If a person sees that they are behaving properly and functioning well within a given situation, they are going to have different beliefs about the effectiveness of their personality to achieve goals. I think that this kind of self-confidence or positive self concept, is the reason that individuals strive to work hard to accomplish goals and garner what are seen to be significant positive outcomes from their behavior. To me, personality can be influenced by culture, but it is more specific and individualistic. Culture is sort of an external consideration, whereas personality is internal. A person’s personality is their schema of defining, relating to, and getting along with others in society. The argument between the classical and biological theories of personality development is basically a reflection of the societal argument between nature and nurture. Despite disagreements though, these theories have a lot in common and also work to inform each other in many ways as well. Although, it is arguable that the present domestic society favors the nature side of the nature/nurture equation in terms of theoretical explanations, there is still a balance between these theoretical opposites that assures one will not have complete dominance. Nevertheless, biological theories of personality development still have more of a sense of importance in the face of this perceived societal trend. Goals of counseling process The overall goal is the recovery of the client. Recovery is about counseling, but it is also about empowerment. Counseling can also help individuals with their problems and overcoming adversity, but as seen, a lot of the goals of the process focus mainly on recovery based interventions as a primary way of treating a given disorder, rather than counseling or pharmacology. Recovery is less concerned from this perspective, with treating the episodes and preventing them effectively, than it is with helping the individual cope with their disorder in terms of dealing with problems in life that are created by it. The overall goal of the counseling relationship is to move the client towards meeting the challenge of the future and making a more independent and productive tomorrow. The universal goal of counseling is not any specifically targeted advocacy of psychotherapies that have been proven to be particularly clinically effective terms of treatment for many disorders, including schizoid personality disorders; generally the accepted classical treatment is therapy, because these are after all many mental disorders that were named by a psychotherapist. But in psychotherapy, there is a lot of labeling. And in recovery, the client is more encouraged to “Recognize that the process of recovery can be a goal in itself as well as a possible predictor of what are considered to be traditionally good outcomes, so that the latter can be tested empirically. Such an approach is in keeping with standard scientific practice and thus may not be too difficult to endorse” (Roe et al., 2007). It is interesting, therefore, for me to think of recovery as a general goal. CBT can be seen in terms of specific achievement of the goal of recovery. The article, “Nicotine replacement therapy and CBT” looks at how CBT can help smokers in their withdrawal symptoms, which is directly applicable to both drug treatment outcomes of CBT and its outcomes with anxiety disorder, since smokers who are not smoking are often anxious about having another cigarette, either in that they want to powerfully, or are afraid of the cigarette. In this empirical study participants were “treated with cognitive-behavioral counseling, bupropion (Zyban[R]) did not improve one-year smoking cessation rates, but it did appear to reduce several withdrawal symptoms. In a study published in the Archives of Internal Medicine (2004;164 September 13), current smokers older than 20 years of age who did not have major depression or a recent history of alcohol abuse were treated for seven weeks with either bupropion or a placebo in addition to other therapies” (Nicotine, 2004). This shows demonstrable results through the method of CBT. Overall, a general goal of the counseling process is reintegration, or integration, into society. The client is seen from this perspective as an active player in the process rather than being molded by it: they have absorbed the ways in which the culture works for them individually as representatives, and are then more prepared to pass this knowledge on to the next generation. To do this, they must be secure in their own identity and self-concept as far as seeing a pattern of continuity within their own life: it is only natural for a person to see themselves as being part of this sort of continuance if they themselves view their personality traits and self-concept in similar terms of consistency. If the individual is unable to place themselves within a society, it may be due to a lack of this sort of consistency of roles that has been displayed throughout their own lives. It is difficult to generalize and make rules that accurately apply to the whole of the counseling process in society without taking the uniqueness of individuals, and the diversity of this society, into account. This creates an environment in which someone saying that they are special is not construed as some sort of sarcastic insult about their essential conformity. My function as a therapist As a therapist, I will be focusing on cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT). CBT encourages counselors to be honest with clients as well as honest with themselves. It encourages people to look into their own prejudices, beliefs and thought patterns. I am able to look into myself and see assumptions that I have about people and their background and language factors, and CBT helps me look at it all objectively and focus on my thoughts and behaviors. Our own cultural identities have much to do with these questions posed by CBT theory, and answers to these questions will vary with the individual respondent. Counseling is affected by these cultural factors in terms of the professional being able to reach the client in terms of communication, and therefore these are important considerations to face in the helping relationship between client and counselor. One strength of the theory is that it merges well with my counseling ethics. Although many scholars and thinkers equate ethics directly with morality, they are actually seen to be separate functions. I believe that one of the main functions I have in the client-counselor relationship is showing that I can empathize with the client. Communicating with empathy is also a non-invasive way of communicating with the client, who will not see truly empathetic communication as in any way threatening and will open up in a supportive atmosphere. It is only natural for the client, especially if the client is a child for example, to try to hide things that they consider to be shameful, and the attuned empathetic communicator will be able to circumnavigate the various facades of speech and gesture to see the underlying motivation and communicate effectively with the individual. Distinctions must be drawn between empathy, which is supportive and works towards open communication, and sympathy, which, while at times being supportive, does not lead as much to the sympathized or client as much as it does to the sympathizer or counseling worker who is engaged with the client. Characteristics of client-counselor relationship As mentioned above, optimally, recovery can be a result of positive characteristics in the client-counselor relationship, within a given counseling situation. In treatment the therapist will talk to the individual with the mental illness or disorder about their obstacles and empathize with them while not being judgmental towards them, with the client being encouraged to open up about their experience instead of trying to get rid of them with self-harming behavior. By doing this, the patient will also establish bonds of trust and empathy with the professional and learn how to communicate and trust people better, but this could also be a risk in terms of transference and counter-transference, which is sometimes a problem in therapy and recovery. The person with the problem is not going to be a perfect fit in society at the end of the process, which is ongoing, so goals differ somewhat from traditional psychotherapy and counseling outcomes in the theory of recovery. The client-counselor relationship may face obstacles in its goal to establish trust and validity in the counseling role, so it may also behoove the worker to hire legal aid. The worker should also act as an advocate of the client. Perhaps the most important aspect of the client relationship with the professional counselor, to me, is empathy. Empathy is characterized by vicariously experiencing another person’s emotional state, whether it is joy or turmoil. It is a way of relating with people that lets them know that you know how they feel, and advocacy can be a part of this. It may seem like laws are too established to be challenged effectively, but in communicating with the bureaucratic legal system, showing patience is arguably more important than any other tactic which elicits a feeling of empowerment and assurance in advocacy. These are feelings to be trusted by the client. In terms of applying theoretical constructs to the client-counselor relationship from existing structures, boundaries are an important part of the client-counselor relationship as well as the relationship between professional counselors and administrators. Without these clearly defined boundaries, a professional relationship with the client or among professionals would be impossible. Even though the give-and-take of conversational interface with the individual may mirror at times the give-and-take of any other conversation in which trust is established and disclosures occur, professionalism must be maintained by the establishment of boundaries that reassure the client that he/she is dealing with someone with whom they can disclose information with the help of achieving goals. If this professionalism is not maintained, the client may begin to feel ill-at-ease. Although some make links between behavorialism and individualism in relation to the client relationship, as it is supported or not supported in mainstream society and culture, it is still very important to take nature based definitions of personality development into consideration, especially in the present atmosphere. In this atmosphere, a situation is found in which neuroscience is capable of providing many answers regarding mental development which seem to be relatively unassailable and less based in theory than in hard science. However, these theories have more to do with cognitive development as balanced against age than they do with predicting or correlating personality factors. The reason for this development is perhaps increasing closeness between personality and culture through mass-media and scholarly categorizations of generations. In any case, when dealing with the client, the professional must also take a broader and more general perspective. It is important to view society from macro as well as micro levels. Procedures and techniques CBT uses procedures of open therapy, active talking, and other ways to achieve overcoming perceived maladjustment. The technique explains maladjustment by looking at the ways in which client thought patterns affect their behaviors. For example, if someone is stuck in a negative pattern of insecurity, this may be undermining their effectiveness. Maladjustment in CBT is inherently correctable, because the theory looks at the client as having correctable thought processes that can impact behavior. Therefore, client maladjustment is basically a mental process that leads to self defeating behavior; maladjustment in the mind results in maladjusted behavior may influence the individual. This may be seen more in some than some others, and to me, I see all of the theories as basically leading to the same or similar place or end goal, which is the reintegration of the client into society. The “very instructive nature of CBT produces long-term results because it teaches clients rational self-counseling that they can apply not only to their current concerns, but to anything that might come their way. CBT also emphasizes getting better, rather than feeling better. When CBT clients are "better," they understand exactly why” (Basics, 2008). CBT basically intervenes in the established negative behavior patterns of the individual. It is important to note that, not all studies are all pro-CBT. “Hayes illustrates the weaknesses of the behavioral model's assumptions and applications, out of which the cognitive model ascends because of its ability to more effectively address the internal dynamics of the person” (Grenlee, 2006). In terms of professional counseling advocacy, there is even abuse and neglect that goes on within facilities regarding the population of clients receiving certain services themselves, and this is perhaps the most disturbing and bad sort of abuse. CBT seeks to overcome obstacles and find a new challenge of the future for the client, by moving them past cyclically negative behaviors and thoughts which have been leading to negative outcomes. Optimally, these negative outcomes and thoughts are changed by the CBT process and the client becomes better able to focus on more positive outcomes, and ways of thinking which can develop into more positive outcomes. REFERENCE Grenlee, D. (2006). Mindfulness and acceptance: the CBT tradition. Journal of Family Therapy. Roe, D, Rudnick A and K Gill (2007). The concept of being in recovery. Psychiatric Rehabilitation. Basics of CBT (2008). http://www.nacbt.org/basics-of-cbt.htm Nicotine replacement therapy and CBT (2004). Nutrition Health Review. Read More