Concept of personality: Etymologically, the word
personality has been derived from the Latin word "Persona". At first this word was used for the mask worn
by the actors to change their appearance but later on it
began to be used for the actors themselves. Since then the
term personality has been used to depict outward
appearance or external behavior etc. it is in this sense we
have developed a wrong notion about the term
personality. We often listen to such comment as this man
has a fine or magnetic personality or that man has a poor
personality. We try to paste such labels as fine, good or
poor on the individuals on the basis of their physical
make-up, manner of their walking, talking, dressing and
host of other similar characteristics.
Sometimes we use personality as equivalent to one‟s character. It is also a wrong notion.Personality is purely a psychological term and hence it is not proper to use it in reference to the study of ethical values. Thus, we can‟t take personality as an equivalent word out-wards appearance or behavior. It is a very superficial approach. Personality includes the totality of one‟s behavior should be taken into consideration.
Psychologically speaking personality refers to a person‟s unique and relatively stable qualities that characterize behavior patterns across different situations and over a period of time. Personality includes everything about the person, his physical, emotional, social, mental and spiritual make-up. It is all that a person has about him.
In this way, definitely, the term personality signifies something deeper than mere appearance or outward behavior. That is why; it has been defined by so many psychologists in so many ways according to their own points of view.
Some of these well-known attempts at defining personality are presented below:
According to R.B.Cattell, “Personality is that which permits a prediction of what a person will do in a given situation.”
According to Eysenck, “Personality is the more or less stable and enduring organization of a person‟s character, temperament, intellect, and physique, which determine his unique adjustment to the environment.”
According to Allport, “Personality is a dynamic organization within the individual of those psycho- physical systems that determine his unique adjustment to his environment.”
Nature of Personality: With all what has been said above we can conclude the following things about personality:-
1. Personality is something unique and specific.
2. The second main characteristic of personality is self-consciousness. The man is described as a person or to have a personality when the idea of self enters into his consciousness.
3. Personality includes everything about a person. It includes all the behavior patterns i.e., cognitive, conative and affective and covers not only the conscious activities but goes deeper to semiconscious and unconscious also.
4.It is not just a collection of so many traits or characteristics which is known as personality.
5. Personality is not static, it is dynamic and ever in process of change and modification.
6. Every personality is the product of heredity and environment.
The main approaches for the study of personality:
Psychologists studying personality try to answer certain things about the nature and origin of individual difference in personality. The study of personality is an effort to understand, explain and predict the similarities and differences in totality of person‟s behavior. The behavioral difference between the individuals and the consistency within each individual is the main concern of individual personality theories. Since personality theories are so many, we will examine only the major approaches and theories.
In short, personality refers to characteristics of a person that are stable across the situations and over time and make him or her unique. Personality has been studied through many approaches in which typological, psychodynamic, humanistic and cognitive are prominent.
• Theories which adopt Type-approach:
The viewpoints of Hippocrates, Kretschmer, Sheldon and Jung belong to this category. They hold that human personalities can be classified into a few clearly defined types and each person can be put in one or the other types according to his personality traits.
• Theories which adopt Trait-approach: Worth mentioning in this category is Cattell‟s theory of personality. This approach believes in the mathematical analysis and quantification of the personality constituents and helps in the prediction of human behavior in a particular situation.
• Theories which adopt developmental approach: These are the theories which try to explain the growth and development of personality. The psycho-analysis theory of Sigmund Freud and theory of individual psychology by Adler come into this category.
• The theories which adopt type as well as trait approach: Eysenck‟s theory of personality belongs to this category. He goes a step ahead to the approach adopted by Cattell. He does not only, mention the personality traits for assessing ones personality but also tries to give definite personality types.
Let us summarize the viewpoints of above mentioned theories.
Type Approach
Hippocrates Classification: an earliest theorist and ancient Greek physician Hippocrates classified personality into four categories. He assumed that human body contains four fluids and he classified people into four corresponding personality types:
Personality type | Dominance of fluid | Temperamental characteristics
Sanguine | Blood | Cheerful, energetic, optimistic and hopeful.
Melancholic | Black bile | Sad, pessimistic, emotionally as well as bodily weak.
Choleric | Yellow bile | Angry, irritable, passionate and strong.
Phlegmatic | Phlegm | Calm, slow, happy and indifferent.
Kretschmer’s Classification: He classified all human beings into certain biological types according to their physical structure and has allotted definit personality characteristics associated with each physical make-up as follows:
Personality Type | Body Type | Personality Characteristics
Asthenic | Thin and tall | Shy, sensitive, pessimistic, Reserved.
Athletic | Muscular and balanced body | Energetic, optimistic and adjustable.
Pyknic | Short, having fat body | Sociable, jolly, good natured.
Dysplastic | ill-balanced and under developed body | Underdeveloped secondary sex characterics and incompatible in sex relations.
