Personality is the characteristic thoughts, feelings, and behaviors distinctive to every person. It is relatively stable throughout life, and is shaped by both nature and nurture. There are limitless combinations of genetic inheritance and life experiences, resulting in the uniqueness of personality. One of the many contributors to personality is health care. Health care encompasses both nature and nurture, as it deals with health related to genetic inheritance as well as health related to our experiences. When considering Maslow’s hierarchy of needs as a theory of personality development, health care is a basic need, specifically a physiological need and a security need. When basic needs are unmet, personal growth is extremely difficult, making it nearly impossible to meet one’s full potential. Access to quality health care encourages positive personality development. Because our personality develops during childhood and adolescence and then remains quite constant for the rest of our lives, childhood and adolescence are the most critical years, regarding personality development, to have access to health care. Prior to childhood, though, the prenatal environment and infancy have an impact as well: even before we see the world or know how to speak, our personalities are forming. Prenatally, for example, it has been suggested that our temperament is inherited (Dennis & Hassol, 1983, p. 34). Proper prenatal care is important for preventing birth defects because the nine-month period in the intrauterine environment is a time of incredible development. Cells are dividing rapidly, forming organs, including the brain, which is the control center for personality. It is recommended that pregnant women have at least one prenatal visit d... ... middle of paper ... ...rtant consideration, as well. Providing equal access to high quality health care is perhaps the biggest investment we can make in our country because it would dramatically increase the number of healthy Americans. Children that are in good physical and mental health are more likely to develop positive personality traits, such as altruism, ambition, optimism, and compassion. When more people possess these positive traits, our entire society benefits. As stated by Abraham Maslow in his work Toward a Psychology of Being (1962, p. 5), “…sick individuals make their culture more sick [and] healthy individuals make their culture more healthy. Improving individual health is one approach to making a better world.” Ensuring that children and adolescents, specifically, all have access to age-appropriate, high quality health care is truly an investment in our nation’s future.
Abraham Maslow, a researcher in psychology contributed to the field f science by analysis how motives are organized in a hierarchy and describes the formula for a healthy personality. The Maslow Hierarchy of Needs is a systematic arrangement of needs, according to priority, in which basic needs must be met before less basic needs are aroused. Many stages are arranged in the hierarchy; from progressively less basic needs are at the top of the pyramid, towards regression of lower needs that are not being satisfied at the bottom. The lowest stage on the pyramid, physiological needs, is defined as the most basic needs for dealing with the maintenance of the body, such as hunger, thirst, and so forth (Weiten, 2013). One of the individuals who achieved the need was Joe. He was brought to the hospital for immediate blood transfusion because his white blood count has significantly decreased, which could lead to infection. This is an example of physiological needs because going to the hospital is maintaining the human body, which is extremely necessary for survival (Walker & George,
From the moment a person is born, his or her personality begins to take shape. As they grow and develop, they may become extroverted, introverted, kind, strict, or take on any number of traits that will define who they are. However when certain traits, such as lack of empathy, recklessness, and anxiety, seem to cause strange patterns of behavior that interfere with their daily lives and relationships with other people, it is easy to assume that some form of mental disorder may be the culprit. What many people fail to realize is that instead of it being a mental issue, it may be something in their personality. Although mental disorders and personality disorders are associated with one another, clinicians often pay more attention to mental disorders and disregard the fact that a personality disorder may have been the catalyst for the development of a certain mental disorder, such as depression and schizophrenia. If signs of a personality disorder can be identified in early childhood or adolescence, which is when they are most ignored, this will not only make the disorder more manageable for the person and everyone close to them, but it will also prevent the disorder from spiraling out of control and affecting their adult life.
Humanistic psychology relies on client centred therapy and the idea that each individual has the potential to achieve a position in their psyche named self actualisation. Humanistic psychology differs from psychodynamic theory in that it is optimistic about the human psyche and does not view conflict as inevitable. Humanistic psychology assumes people attach meaning to their unique perspectives on the world and that behaviour is strongly influenced by this. Carl Rogers defined the healthy personality as being one that had congruence between the perceived self and the experienced self and that the individual in question experienced unconditional positive regard from their parent or guardian. He defined an unhealthy personality as being one which lacked these components. Abraham Maslow alternatively suggested a hierarchy for which a person’s healthy personality could be measured by stages of psychological and physical needs (see diagram 2). He suggested that, for a person to achieve self actualisation and become a fully functioning person, they must first satisfy all the needs of each level in the pyramid before moving onto the next
Unlike many of his colleagues at the time who were focusing on psychopathology, or what is wrong with individuals, he focused on how individuals are motivated to fulfill their potential and what needs govern their respective behaviors (McLeod)). Maslow developed the hierarchy over time, adjusting from a rigid structure where needs must be met before being able to achieve a higher level, to where the individuals can experience and behave in ways across the hierarchy multiple times daily depending on their needs. The hierarchy is comprised of 5 levels; Physiological, Safety and Security, Love and Belonging, Esteem, and Self-Actualization. The bottom two levels are considered basic needs, or deficiency needs because once the needs are met they cease to be a driving factor, unlike psychological needs. Loving and Belonging and Esteem needs are considered psychological needs, and are different from basic needs because they don’t stem from a lack of something, but rather the desire to grow. Maslow theorizes that individual’s decisions and behavior are determined based on their current level of needs, and the ideal level to achieve full potential culminates in self-actualization; however, operating on this level cannot be achieved until the preceding levels of needs have been
Environment determines to some extent the personality of a person. There are numerous factors in the environment which could determine variations in the personalities of different individuals. There are factors which are inherent to the environment and there are those determined by the manner by which individuals enter into a particular environment. In much the same way, how an infants entrance into the world determines in large part how parents and others will respond. In this paper particular view will be taken on the matter of timing that an infant is born.
Two proponents most noted for humanistic approaches to personality are Abraham Maslow and Carl Rogers. Both the Person-Centered Theory (Rogers) and the Hierarchy of Needs (Maslow) considered that humans ' true nature was good and that each has the potential for growth. A comparison of the two approaches demonstrates a compatibility between theory and practice. Furthermore, each approach focuses on individual choices and rejects the theory that biology will determine human potential.
A layman would define personality as an individual’s characteristics in terms of how they think and behave. Many theorists, however, interprets personality differently resulting in various personality theories. Personality is determined by traits which are behaviours displayed by a person in most given situations. How a person reacts to common circumstances may also be used to foresee future behaviours. Traits are then categorized into types that allow easier comparisons to be made between each individual’s attributes. The focus of this paper would be on the biological aspects of personality whereby traits are thought to be inheritable through genetics and associated with the central nervous system. Behavioural genetics are research that makes use of results from studies done on family, twins and adoptions. The findings of how both genes and environment influences personality from the studies will be discussed. Some researchers found possible issues with the representativeness of such studies. The outline of Eysenck’s biological model of personality and arousal, Gray’s BAS/BIS theory and Cloninger’s biological model of personality will further explain the biological effect on personality.
Hartshorne, Joshua K. “How Birth Order Affects Your Personality”. Scientificamerican, 22 June 2002. Web. 30 April 2014.
...f expensive unanticipated medical events that could impair their quality of life. This will help maintaing the work force knowing that 81% of the uninsured are from working families. This proposal will also help creating a healthier America and establishing a new culture of following a healthier behavior. According to Cockerham "an important fact of health behavior includes contact by healthy people with physicians and other health personnel for preventive care".
Psychodynamic and behavioural approaches are the two major approaches to personality, however, they view personality from different perspectives. Psychodynamic approach makes the argument that personality is caused by forces in the unconscious that are not learned. The individual has little control over their behaviour as it is predetermined, and early childhood plays a crucial part in shaping a person’s personality. Behavioural approach, on the other hand, recognises personality as learned and focuses only on present behavioural matters. Because of
In the centre of the humanistic approach stands the subjective experience of individuals, the emphasis is that humans rather choose how to behave based on their free will (Derobertis, 2013). The approach rejects that behaviour is bound by past or current circumstances or ruled by uncontrollable forces, but rather believes that humans make decisions regarding their actions based on their own choices and that people are generally good (Glassman & Hadad, 2009). The main dominator of personality development is the self-actualization (Rogers, 1959). The pioneers of the humanistic approach are Carl Rogers, Abraham Maslow and George Kelly. Carl Rogers named the person seeking treatment a client and not a patient, he established the client-centred
Personality is the study of an individual’s unique and relatively stable patterns of thinking, feeling, and behaving over time and across situations and it is what distinguishes one individual from another. In the past changes in personality were thought to have only occurred in the developmental stages of childhood and solidifies in adolescence. After the teenage years it was thought to be set like plaster or the change seen to be inconsequential or absent( Srivastava, John, Gosling, and Potter, 2003). However, recent studies have suggested that changes in personality traits continue to occur throughout an individual’s lifespan due to multiple reasons.
The Biological approach to personality places emphasis on the genetic influences related to the development of an individual’s personality. Some may believe that children and their parents can have very similar personalities, for example a young boy having his father’s anger (Stelmack, 1990). Though this approach has often been questioned by psychologists, it is not disregarded all together. Some believe that genetics do have a role in an individual’s personality development; however environments, as well as personal experiences all work in forming personality.
Personality is the expression of a person’s traits according to ones feelings, mentality and behavior. It involves understanding individuals’ traits such as withdrawal and willpower and how various parts of an individual link together to form personality. Personality expresses itself from within an individual and is comparatively regular throughout in an individual’s life. Different people have different personalities dependent on factors such as environment and genetic composition. Our personality is dependent on the success or failure of our development in the eight stages of life. This is proposed by Erik Erikson. Success in the development stages lead to virtues while the failure leads to malignancies.
Personality involves a blend of characteristics that make one unique. In reviewing personality, we consider the influence of the interactions that one is engaged in, the nature or the environment of one's upbringing and genetics. The characteristic traits may change over time while some of them becoming a lasting part of a person’s personality. In this essay will analyze the theories that relate to the character and the various stages that children undergo during development. We will use the same theories and developmental stages in analysis my progress from childhood up to date.