Compare And Contrast The Humanistic Perspective Of Personality

Personality, which is defined as the unique and relatively stable ways in which people think, feel, and behave, is something that is quite difficult to gauge and measure-something that is to be expected, considering it is somewhat of an abstract concept-however, psychologists have developed four different perspectives of personality as a way to “measure” personality; those four perspectives are as follows: the psychoanalytic perspective-whose main focal point is on the role of the unconscious mind in the development of personality, the behaviorist perspective-which focuses mainly on the effect a particular environment has on a person’s behavior, the humanistic perspective-which focuses primarily on the conscious life experiences and choices

To set the obvious aside, the main difference between the psychoanalytic perspective and the humanistic perspective lies in their definitions. As mentioned perviously, the psychoanalytic perspective is defined as being the personality perspective whose focus is on the role of the unconscious mind in the development of personality; the humanistic perspective, on the other hand, is defined as the personality perspective whose focus lies in the conscious life experiences and choices of every individual person in personality development.

Moving on, another way the two perspectives are different lies in the utilization of scientific psychology and scientific methodology by both perspectives. Psychoanalysis is based upon the theories and work of Sigmund Freud, whose theories and work was based upon clinical observation and individual case studies, while humanism is based upon the ideal that psychology should be focused on the subjective perceptions of the world an individual lives in as opposed to study of behavior, the unconscious mind, thought processes, or the anatomy and mechanisms of the human brain, and, all people strive to fulfill their innate capacities and capabilities or to self-actualize; in other words, the psychoanalytical perspective utilizes scientific psychology and scientific methodology, as Freud’s theories were based on observations he had while working with his patients and on individual case studies he conducted, while, in contrast, the humanistic perspective is based upon the idea that psychology focus on the worldview with of each individual person and thereby rejects the use of scientific psychology and scientific