TOPIC FOUR

PERSONALITY
4.1Meaning of Personality
The word personality comes from the word persona which means mask. It’s the sum total of what a person
is, why he is the way he is and the way he is. It consists of all the relatively stable and distinctive styles of
thoughts, behavior and emotional responsiveness that characterize a person’s adaptation to the surrounding
circumstances. It is the dynamic organization within the individual that determines characteristic behavior
and thought.
Personality considers the following traits;
-Physical characteristics - Abilities

-Intelligence - Interests

-Temperaments -Attitudes

-Level of motivation -Habits

-Aspirations -Beliefs

-Moral character -Dispositions

-The ways of thinking, feeling, and interacting with others.

4.2 Fundamental Qualities of Personality

1. Consistency
Personality is stable and does not change over a period of time. It’s from stability that we are able to predict
behavior and give an individual identity.
2. Integration
Personality is a unity or whole and it is total or indivisible. The general pattern of an individual’s total
behavior is his personality. Various aspects of personality are integrated e.g. physical, social, cognitive,
emotional, morals, assets and liabilities.
3. Individuality
Every person is a unique entity and distinct from the rest due to heredity and environment, and even
identical twins can never be the same in their personality.
4.Dynamism

Personality is consistent over a period but can also change over a long period. It is a growing and changing
entity as the individual interacts with his physical and social environment.
4.3 Rational for the Study of Personality
1. Psychologists belief that personality can play an important role on whether one experiences success
or failure in life. Teachers constantly interact with students with the particular objective of
facilitating their success at school and in their world of work.
2. It is important for teachers so that they enhance understanding of themselves as well as students
they are teaching.
3. It enables us to be able to predict student’s behavior and deal with them in a productive and
meaningful way.
4. Personality traits are acquired through learning therefore development of learning can be controlled.
Students need to be exposed to appropriate behavior or experiences that are likely to influence their
personality development.

4.4 Determinants of personality

1) Heredity

Inherited genes lay down the blue-print or potentiality for personality. Physical characteristics like
complexion, hair, color, color of eyes, height, and temperament are.Inherited genes lay down the blue-
print or potentiality for personality. Physical characteristics like complexion, hair, color, color of eyes,
height, and temperament are inherited.Genes also lay down the potentials toward the quality of the
central nervous system. This means that the quality of the brain and intellectual functioning has genetic
heritability to it. Thirdly genes determine the biochemical balance of the body.

Teachers should note that each pupil possesses a distinctive personality from all other pupil. Physical
traits, emotionality, sociability activity levels and intellectual functioning are all influenced by the
genetic potentials inherited by every child. These innate potentials cannot develop beyond the set limits
and therefore have realistic for every child

2) Environmental determinants of personality

Children find themselves growing up in many different environment .Each environment leaves its
owns mark owns the malleable human being of courses the most important environment influences
are those that impact the child early in life during the formative period when the self – concept is
beingformed. Many of these influences are experiences at home as the children interact with the
parents, sibling and other person in the home. The home is usually the first social environment that
the social encounters. It provides the child with the earliest social experiences as he interacts with
mother, father sibling and other people.These people normally referred to as significant other in the
child‟s life lay down the foundations of trust or mistrust.

3) Type of parenting styles

1. Autocratic- produce children who are dependent and fearful.
2. Permissive- produce children who are care free, irresponsible and dependent.
3. Democratic- produce children who are responsible and independent. The school also is an important
agent of personality development. Teachers and peers behavior play a significant role in the development
of personality. The way a teacher handles students has an effect on the future personality of children. The
persistent failure in academic achievements leads to frustration hence aggression.
4. Culture- personality is molded by our customs, beliefs, rituals and religious faith. The internalization of
societal values, beliefs and customs influence our behavior or personality. Our sex roles in our society
where men are socialized to be independent, assertive and aggressive while women are socialized to be
dependent, submissive and caring, affect our personality.

4.5 PERSONALITY THEORIES

4.5.1 Psycho-Analytic Theory of Personality by Sigmound

Freud (1933)
This theory emphasizes childhood experiences as important in shaping adult personality. It stressed the
role of the unconscious in motivating human behavior. He believes that we are controlled by external
forces e.g. wishes, tears, emotions and conflicts. His theory aims at making the unconscious process known
so that any individual can understand his behavior and make changes. Freud believes that human behavior
is energized by psychic/mental energy that is used to think, learn and perform other mental functions.
He believes that a child is driven by two kinds of biological instincts/motives:
 Heroes.
 Thanatos.

HEROS
It is the life instinct that helps the child to survive as it directs life sustaining activities e.g. respiration,
eating, sex and the fulfillment of other bodily needs.
Thanatos
It is the dead instinct, which is the set of destructive forces present in all human beings. Such activities as
aggression, fight, murder, suicide, arson, war etc are driven by death instinct/thanatos. He believed that
heroes are stronger than Thanatos thus enabling us to survive rather than destroy ourselves.

4.5.1.1 Levels of Personality

According to Freud, there three levels of personality:
a) The conscious b) Pre or subconscious c) Unconscious
The Conscious
This is being actively aware of what is going on.
Pre-Conscious or Sub-Concious
The pre-conscious contains life experiences that can be brought to consciousness if sufficient attention is
directed to them e.g. a student may consciously attend to a lesson but is not actively aware that he has a
parent, name, name of teacher etc. The pre-conscious has a function of blocking unconscious experiences
from engaging at the conscious level and serves as the buffer zone between the conscious and unconscious.

The Unconscious
This contains events, ideas and experiences that have been repressed and therefore are not really available
at the conscious level but will manifest itself in a persons’ behavior. Freud strongly regarded this level of
being responsible for most of man’s behavior.
The contents of the unconscious mind can be accessed through four ways:
 Dream Analysis

Dreams can be either hidden latent or manifest dream. You get the latent dream from the manifest dreams
the counselor uses to identify the problem.
 Hypnosis

Refers to taking the mind of the client in order to tell you the cause of the problem. The client is made to
think deeply.
 Slip of the tongue /pen

Analyze the information from slips to understand the conscious mind.

 Free association -patients discusses anything that comes to mind whether negative or positive

4.5.1.2Structure of Personality according to Freud

He divides personality into three;
1) The id
2) The ego
3) The super-ego
THE ID
It is the legislator of personality. At birth, personality is all id which is a reservoir of psychic energy or pool
of biological drives that arise from food, water, warmth, sex pain avoidance etc. The id communicates basic
needs and their major function is to serve the instinct by seeking objects that satisfy them. It is an
unconscious force with no link to objective reality. It represents the most unseen aspect of a child because
it seeks one thing only -gratification of biological drives. It seeks immediate satisfaction of needs without
regards for logical reality or morality. It operates on the pleasure principle.
The id is like a demanding impulsive and selfish child. It’s the animal nature of man which seeks its
pleasure, no inhibitions/control and cannot hide deprivation of any kind. Its irrational, illogical, hedonistic
seeking, has no ability to solve problems no distinction between what is right and wrong and is a very
powerful force throughout life.
THE EGO
It is referred to as the executive of personality. It begins to develop soon after birth but does not become
apparent the ego of about 6 months. Its primary role is to serve a mediator between the id and reality. It
restrains the impulsive id long enough to find realistic method of satisfying needs. It engages in a realistic
proof of planning as it seeks ways and means of respect to the pressing demand of the id.
Unlike the id, the ego is logical, tolerant and conscious component of personality. It serves the reality by
seeking the best time to obtain the mostpleasure with the least pain or damage to the self. It develops as
a result of the interaction between a child and its environment. He stressed that the ego is both the master
and servant of the id which is reflected by its ability to delay gratification until reality is served. It seeks to
restrain divert and protect the id. It perceives, learns, remembers and reasons.

THE SUPER-EGO
It is referred to as the judiciary (moral arbiter) of personality. It emerges in childhood between the age of
3-6 years. It is the moral arbiter because it represents the ideal and moral standards of society as conveyed
to the child by his parents and is equivalent to the conscience. It’s an internalized code of conduct, social
and moral values. It strives for perfection by obeying the morals and is tormenting and inflexible. It
constantly commands the sexual and aggressive urges be repressed and pleasure be postponed in
pursuit of moral perfection. It backs this commands with rewards for good behaviour (pride and self-
esteem) and bad behavior (guilty and inferiority) e.g. refusing to steal when nobody is watching or doing
the best job without being supervised.
CONCLUSION
The ego must perform a delicate balancing art in serving the 3 masters i.e. the pleasure seeking id, the
perfection seeking or moralistic super-ego of reality. The super-ego monitors the ego so that it does not
violet any moral principles and giving in problems solving strategies that are morally acceptable.

4.5.1.3 Anxiety and Ego Defense Mechanism

When the ego cannot reconcile the divergent demands of id, the super ego and the reality a state of psychic
distress called anxiety appears. Anxiety arises when the ego realizes that expression of the id impulse will
lead to some kind of harm to itself or the super ego is making impossible demands. Anxiety serve as an
alarm signals that tell the ego that something must be done to resolve the conflict, which is referred to as
defense mechanism. A defense mechanism is a mental strategy that the ego uses to block the harmful
impulses while at the same time reducing anxiety.
There are special strategies that are used as safe guard (protection) against anything that pauses as threat to
personality. Defense mechanism is necessary if an individual to preserve a relatively consistent self-
esteem but should not be used in excess as they can blind the individual to objective reality and prevent
him coming to terms with the changes in the environment.

Characteristic of Defense Mechanisms

1. Un-pleasant
2. Universal-everybody uses
3. Unconscious
4. Adaptive
5. Self-deceptive because the individual flees from threatening situation
6. Distort reality.
7. Prevents an individual from learning more effective and rational ways of coping with frustrations

Common Defense Mechanisms

1.Repression
Most basic of the defense mechanism. Its pushing unacceptable id impulses back into the unconscious. It is
banning from conscious memory, traumatizing, dangerous or embarrassing thoughts, events and desires
preventing arousal of anxiety. The ego is saying what I don’t know or remember can’t hurt me eg a student
forgets a notebook studying for a coming exam, or if you have financial problems you tend to forget the
wallet. The content of the experiences are not forgotten but remains unconscious, inactive and can
influence future thoughts and behavior emerging in dreams, sleep etc.

2.DENIAL
An individual rejects intolerable reality by denying its existence. Its refusal to acknowledge a threat and is
the most primitive defense mechanism and are normally used by children or disturbed adults e.g. the death
of someone close may initially be refused because of shock and disbelief.

1. PROJECTION
This is where an individual unconsciously attribute to others the undesirable characteristics or urges or
impulse he disapproves. Its best understood by the proverb “a bad workman blames his tools” e.g. a teacher
who is incompetent will destructively criticize his colleagues.

2. DISPLACEMENT
This is the transfer of unacceptable emotions or feelings from the appropriate target to a much safer one or
less threatening objects.eg a teacher who is frustrated by his head teacher may vent to may vent his anger
by beating his wife or children ie running away from more threatening to less threatening.

3. REACTION FORMATION
This is reverse formation where the feelings in the conscious are the opposite of those in the unconscious. It
is the replacement of anxiety producing impulse or feeling by is direct opposite. It’s doing or feeling the
opposite of what one wants to do or feel e.g. a person who is afraid of a graveyard may whistle happily as
he passes by or a mother who gets an unwanted baby but shows too much affection to the child.

4. SUBLIMATION
It is a kind of displacement in which forbidden impulse are re-directed towards the pursuit of socially
acceptable or desirable goals.eg a student may want to beat up a teacher but it seems wiser not to and
decides to go and watch boxing matches walkout in the gym or sexual desires may lead one to dance or
converse with members of opposite sex.

5. COMPENSATION
It is similar to sublimation and is a mechanism by which we handle our deficiencies of weakness by
making up for them e.g. An unmarried man/woman may resort to career development or adopts or works
with children

1. RATIONALIZATION
It’s finding a perfect reason for failure which is not the real reason to avoid guilt and inadequacy. It’s using
excuses to justify what may be considered capable behaviour e.g. the sour grape story of monkey who
wanted the bananas and struggles the whole day without success and finally said that the bananas were not
ripe anyway.

2. REGGRESSION
It is reverting or going back to earlier ways or childlike pattern of behavior to resolve frustrations e.g. an
abused wife may run to her home if she cannot cope with the stress of marriage or an adult and is frustrated
and resorts to crying, biting the thumb or if sexually frustrated resorts to masturbation.

3. IDENTIFICATION
This is attributing others positives traits to one-self. It is associating with someone popular, powerful hand
beautiful etc and is enjoying those characteristics vicariously
 4.5.1.4 Personality Development and stages according to
Sigmund
Freud development an extensive theory about the shaping of adult personality by early life
experiences. An individual has a certain amount of physic energy libido that can be devoted to a
number of different activities. He argued that at each stage in child’s life drive for pleasure or
sexual instinct revolves around the particular area of the body. It is believed that adults
personality is shaped by the way in which the conflicts between early sexual urges or desires and
the requirements imposed by the society are solved. This activities include weaning, toilet
training an prohibitions against masturbation. Failure to resolve any of this conflicts is what it
is called fixation or arrested development. This is a case in which person becomes stuck in one
stage and repeats the conflicts in symbolic ways. Over gravitation or under gratification leads
to fixation.He associated the id striving pleasure in infancy and childhood with manipulation of
body parts for pleasure and hence exerting a relief.
The major areas for such satisfaction are called erogenous zones (mouth, anus and genitals).
Freud gave the following stages of psychosexual development.

Psycho-Sexual Stages of Development

1. Oral stage (birth-1year)
2. Anal stage (1-3 years)
3. Phallic stage (3-6 years)
4. Latenly stage (6-12 years)
5. Genital stage (12 years and above)

THE ORAL STAGE

It is the first stage where the child’s sexual pleasure focuses on the mouth through activities eg
sucking, spitting, chewing, biting and leaking. This is demonstrated by a child’s tendency to
place object e.g. his fingers in the mouth and engages in other oral activities which are
unnecessarily of nutritional value. He believed that oral activities are methods of gratifying the
sexual instincts. Sucking goes beyond the basic satisfaction of hunger as it is a source of intense
pleasure.
Fixation at the oral stage can occur when babies repeatedly experience anxiety over whatever
food will be given or withheld and may come to learn that they are totally dependent on their
mothers or care givers. This lesson may lead to future oral personality where the individual will
engage in activities as smoking, drinking, chewing gum, gossiping, nail-biting, over eating, oral
sex being an orator (too much or too little satisfaction).

ANAL STAGE (1-3 YEARS)

The libido (psyche energy) concentrates on the anus as the sphincters muscles begin to mature.
The baby derives pleasure from the process of elimination or bowels movements or by
withholding or expelling feaces. Voluntary defecation becomes the primary method of gratifying
the sex instinct. The child derives pleasure in excretion by expelling the feaces which was
causing as tension. Itis a crucial event as stage because it’s the first conflict between the id
impulses and the rules of the society.
During toilet training, the anal region becomes source of frustration and reward where the
children are rewarded for going to the toilet at the night places and are punished for not doing so.
If this conflict is not resolved satisfactorily,fixation may occur. Strict toilet training may lead
to the child to repress and urge to defecate in a free and enjoyable manner leading to anal-
retentive personality and will engage in activities as:
- Excessive orderliness
- Neatness
- Micer
- Opstinate
- Stinginess.

Loose toilet training on the other hand leads to anal expulsive personality who in future will be:
Generous Untidy Disorganized Throws temper tantrums cruel etc.
Freud believed that the emotional climate created by the parents in their attempts at toilet
training is very important for it may have a lasting effect in the child’s personality.

THE PHALLIC STAGE (3-6 YEARS)

Phallic comes from the word phallus which means penis for boys and clitoris for girls. At this
stage, the child’s erotic pleasure focuses on the genitals. Libido flows to this area as children
derives pleasure from fondling their genitals. Freud says that all children at this age develop a
strong incestuous desire for the parent of opposite sex. Four years old boys develop an intense
sexual longing for the mother. They do this by showing their mothers their male organs which
they are proud to hold. At this stage also, the boys become jealous and if have their way, they
would destroy their chief-rivals for maternal affection who are their fathers. Freud called that
desire Oedipus complex but the child will reject the desire to kill out of fear of retaliation from
his father who may harm his treasured genitals organs (castration anxiety). He also concludes
that there was a time when girls used to have penises but were taken from them as punishment.
The boy adapts his father’s attitude, behaviours, interests and moral values so that his fathers
will not hurt him. The child at this stage acquires a sex role by identifying with the father.
By becoming like the father he hopes to win his mother’s sexual love vicariously which lessens
the chances of construction for the boy is no longer a risk, interests and moral values so that his
father will not hurt him. The child at this stage acquires sex role by identifying with the father.
By becoming like the father, he hopes to win his mother’s sexual love vicariously, which
lessens the chances of castration for the boy is no longer a rival.

Girls have Electra- complex to resolve. Here the girl discovers that she lacks a penis and
blames the mother for their castration or penniless condition. This makes he feel inferior and
jealous. The discovery results to a transfer of affection from the mother to the father. She
perceives her mother as a rival and longs to overthrow her so that she can have a sexual
relationship with her father and be given the love and the attention her mother receive from her
father. She envies her father for possessing a penis (penis envy). She will choose him as a sex
object in the hope that he will share with her the valid organ that she lacks. She resolves this
conflict be having a baby boy instead of a penis from the father.
Fixation at this stage leads to sexual problems eg masturbation, lesbianism, and promiscuity

THE LATENCY STAGE (6-12 YRS)

During this period, sexual interest is sublimed and the child is sexually dormant. The sexual
traumas of the phallic stage are forgotten and all available libido is channeled into some
socially acceptable activities e.g school work and plays that consume most of the child’s
physical and psychic energy. The child is busy learning a range of social, cultural and cognitive
skills that are appropriate to its sex. Boys will play with boys and girls with girls. They will
 want nothing to do with the opposite sex as they are less concerned with their bodies. No
specific region of the body is identified as a source of pleasure. They interact with their parents,
siblings, teachers and other leaders to develop system of values.

GENITAL STAGE (12 YRS AND ABOVE)

It is the last stage with the onset of puberty, there is maturation of reproductive system,
reproduction of hormones and hence re-activation of the genital zones as areas of sexual
pleasures.
The focus in this last period is on the pleasure of sexual intercourse with the underlying aim of
reproduction. At this stage, the person is capable of forming a deep and mature love
relationship and assuming a place in the world as a fully independent adult.

4.5.1.5 Contribution of Psycho-Analysis Theory to Education

1. Students need to know that the feelings they are experiencing are experienced by others
and should not consider themselves as strange and abnormal.
2. Teacher needs to help students become socialized by showing them how to delay
gratification, when to express their emotions, and how to be masters of their
environment and human desires.
3. The importance of human values e.g immorality and justice should be impressed upon
students so that they can differentiate themselves from animals and that their education
is both to liberate the mind and body of man.
4. Psycho-analysis has given freedom to respond in the form of free association where we
use to express our feelings and problems freely and that sharing of problems can be
therapeutic and liberating
5. This theory recognizes the importance of unconscious motivation in the development of
behavior patterns.
6. It emphasizes the importance of early childhood experiences in the development of
adult personality that sexual difficulties are often involved in personality mal-
adjustment and disorders.
7. Certain Freudian concepts e.g anxiety, depression, defense mechanisms have been used
by educationist in explaining human behavior.
4.5.2 Social Learning Theory of Personality ( Albert Bandura 1977)
This is a social cognitive theory that stresses observational learning. It is a process of learning
complex patterns of behavior by watching other people performing them. Behavior is formed
and modified by patterns of social interaction as we observe others. This leads to the imitation or
modeling of the behavior of an adult. We acquire cognitive representations of behavior patterns
that we see which then serves as a model of our own behavior, therefore imitation is a powerful
mechanism of social learning children e.g. we learn languages after hearing words and sentences
and reproducing them.
The basis in social learning theory for changes in behaviour is cognitive where people choose to
imitate a model based on their perceptions on the consequences of an act as their anticipation of
what the consequences for behaving in a specific way of living. We observe what others do and
what happens to them then proceed to do the same thing or to avoid that particular behavior.
The extent to which learners observe and imitate a models behavior can be explained using if
mechanisms
-Attention -Retention -Reproduction -Motivation