Personality: Psychology and Central Traits Essay examples

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My Persona
The scientific study of behavior and mental processes, psychology (Psychology 2nd Edition, 4), I sometimes find myself wondering who I really am. What makes me act the way I sometimes act? What makes me who I am? What is my personality like? I find myself asking these questions when I’m in bed late night or even just when I’m outside taking a brisk walk. These questions are very difficult and can’t be answered in exact words. Nevertheless I will use some theories of Sigmund Freud, Gordon Allport, and Abraham Maslow to answer some of these questions and many more as precisely as possible.
The Unaware Mind
Sigmund Freud believed that the mind was divided into three parts: the preconscious, conscious, and unconscious minds (Psychology, 519). The three levels are the id, ego, and superego. I feel that all these stages are in a state of battle constantly in taking control. The id functions as a pleasure principle; the ego is the executive director; and the superego is the Moral watchdog as the book likes to call it. As I learned about this three dimension iceberg, I feel that my ego is winning the battle, with my id right behind it in second. My id sometimes demands that pleasure drive at any time of the day; id is part of the personality present at birth and completely unconscious (psychology, 520). On the other hand my executive director (ego), part of the personality that develops out of a need to deal with reality, mostly conscious, rational, and logical (psychology, 521), knows I must obtain this drive but it has to be moderately or else I will find myself in some sort of trouble that I shouldn’t even be in. My superego is in last, it is the part of one’s personality that acts as a moral center (psychology, 521), and I make choices that mostly just wanted to obtain pleasure but not get into trouble with anyone or anything. Still I rarely if ever make decisions that will jeopardize my health risk or life. As I’ve gotten older I have been able to break my life down in perspective how Freud found his ways of splitting our personality up into three states.
Trait Theory Personality
Trait is a consistent, continuing way of thinking, feeling, or behaving, and trait theories attempt to describe personality in terms of a person’s traits (Psychology, 534). There were three levels that Allport categorized his traits. The first being the Cardinal traits, this trait is one that controls a person’s whole life, sometimes to the point where a person is precisely known for that trait. For instance, in my case I would be known for having the trait of just wanting to be playing baseball. These kinds of traits are known to develop later in life. Secondly are the Central traits, which are individual features that people describe a person’s characteristics with. These central traits best describe me as being outgoing, talkative, athletic, etc... These central traits are much broader when it comes to describing a person than having a Cardinal trait which narrows the group of words to one specific trait. Lastly are the Secondary traits in which Allport described as being related to attitudes or preferences and only appear under certain circumstances. Some of these secondary traits that I find myself in is being impatient while I’m in line or just standing in one place for a long time. Initially Allport had an initial list of over 4,000 personality traits but theorist Raymond Cattell reduced those 4,000 down to around 170 personality traits that we can all relate too. They then narrowed it to the Five-Factor theory of
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