PSY 121 Lecture Notes - Lecture 26: 18 Months, Tabula Rasa, Jean Piaget
Document Summary
Chapter outline: studying personality, psychodynamic theories of personality, the modern study of personality, animal personalities, genetic influences on personality, environmental influences on personality, cultural influences on personality, culture and violence, the inner experience. Complex set of psychological qualities influencing individual characteristic patterns of behaviour across different situations and over time. Theories of personality used to both understand and predict behaviour. Oldest approaches classify people according to types or traits of personality. Hippocrates and galen, the four basic humours (fluids) associated with temperament. Powerful inner forces shape personality and motivate behaviour: all behaviour is motivated by psychic energy. Psychic energy in forms of libido (sexual desires) and thanatos (death instinct: eros operates from birth and manifests in stages. Linked to pleasure in different erogenous zones and some conflicts to be resolved (e. g. , oedipus complex: too much gratification or too much frustration at any stage leads to fixation, fixation linked to adult personality characteristics.
