Chapter 1: Section 2: Major Theoretical Approaches

Why Study Personality?

If we know a person is confident, or outgoing, or friendly, what do we need to study?  Why is it important to research and theorize about personality?1.2

To answer these questions, you need to understand a little about the field of psychology in general.  Psychology is the study of thoughts, emotions, and behavior, and their interaction with each other and the world.  There are five basic goals of psychology:

1. Describe – The first goal is to observe behavior and describe, often in minute detail, what was observed as objectively as possible





As you can see, the ultimate goal of psychology is to improve the quality of life through a better understanding of individual differences and similarities.  Personality is concerned a great deal with all five of these goals, but we will spend the majority of the text discussing the first three.  In other words, personality theory is concerned with observing individual characteristics, understanding how these different characteristics came about, and finally, how they are impacting the individuals quality of life.

We will, however, delve into the last two goals when we discuss personality disorders and treatment later in the text.

Personality Theories

So we’ve defined personality, we understand why it is important to study personality, and we know what our ultimate goal is, but how do we get started?  Although the concept of personality seems like a simple one, hundreds and hundreds of years have gone into studying it and we still don’t all agree how it develops or even the important characteristics.

Personality theories are attempts at understanding both the characteristics of our personality characteristics and the way these characteristics develop and impact our life.  As we progress through the theories, keep the following questions in mind, as they represent the basic idea behind personality theory and development:

1. What are the basic personality traits?

2. Can individual traits be grouped into categories or clusters?

3. How do these traits develop?  What role does biology, environment, and the individual play?

4. What role do states play in an individual’s personality?  Why do people respond differently to similar situations?

5. Can we use what we know about personality to make predictions?  Can we use assessment devices to determine personality?

6. Can personality be changed?  If so, under what circumstances should this be attempted, and how do we go about bringing about change?

If you can answer these questions for each of the theories we discuss, then you will have a solid grasp of introductory personality.  So, lets get started…