Psychology 3051 Psychology 305B: Theories of Personality Lecture 11.

Psychology 305 1

Psychology 305B: Theories of Personality

Lecture 11

2

Psychology 305 3

Questions That Will be Answered in Today’s Lecture

Lecture 11

Neoanalytic Perspective on Personality

1. How do neoanalytic theories differ from psychoanalytic theory?

2. According to Jung’s theory, what are the major components of the mind?

3. What personality types did Jung propose?

Psychology 305 4

• Similarities between neoanalytic theories and psychoanalytic theory:

How do neoanalytic theories differ from psychoanalytic

theory?

1. Both maintain that early childhood experiences influence personality development.

2. Both maintain that psychological conflicts and the success with which we resolve these conflicts

influence personality development.

Psychology 305 5

• Differences between neoanalytic theories and psychoanalytic theory:

1. Neoanalytic theories place less emphasis on the role that sex plays in personality development.

2. Neoanalytic theories place less emphasis on the id and more emphasis on the ego.

Psychology 305 6

3. Neoanalytic theories place more emphasis on the role of interpersonal conflicts (vs. unconscious

conflicts) in personality development.

4. Neoanalytic theories assume that personality development continues across the lifespan.

Psychology 305 7

• In class, we will consider 4 neoanalytic theories:

1. Carl Jung’s (1865 – 1961) neoanalytic theory (analytical psychology).

2. Erik Erikson’s (1902 – 1994) neoanalytic theory.

3. Karen Horney’s (1885 – 1952) neoanalytic theory.

4. Attachment theory.

Psychology 305 8

• Jung believed that the mind is comprised of 3 major components:

1. The ego

According to Jung’s theory, what are the major

components of the mind?

Similar to Freud’s conception of the conscious component of the mind.

Psychology 305 9

Primary functions:

(b) is responsible for one’s sense of identity and continuity across time.

(c) ensures that daily activities are carried out.

(a) contains information (e.g., thoughts, feelings, perceptions) that an individual is currently aware of.

Psychology 305 10

2. The personal unconscious

Similar to Freud’s conceptions of the preconscious and unconscious components of the mind.

Primary functions:

(a) contains information that an individual is not currently aware of but can readily retrieve and bring to conscious awareness.

(b) contains information that an individual has actively repressed and, therefore, cannot readily retrieve and bring to conscious awareness.

Psychology 305 11

3. The collective unconscious

Does not have an equivalent in Freud's conception of the mind.

The boldest, most mystical, and most controversial concept proposed by Jung.

The most distinct aspect of Jung’s theory.

Psychology 305 12

Primary function: contains the collective experiences of our ancestors (i.e., the shared experiences,

motivations, fears, and myths of our ancestors);

Is passed down across successive generations of the human species.

Is essentially the same for all humans.

this information is the most difficult to retrieve and bring to conscious awareness.

Psychology 305 13

In writing about the collective unconscious, Jung stated:

“[It is] the deposit of ancestral experience from untold millions of years, the echo of prehistoric world events to which each century adds an infinitesimally small amount of variation and differentiation ….” (1928, p. 162)

“It is detached from anything personal and is common to all [of us], since its contents can be found everywhere.” (1917/1966, p. 66)

Psychology 305 14

Jung used the term archetypes to refer to the information stored in the collective unconscious.

According to Jung, archetypes are images of universal experiences contained in the collective unconscious.

These images are emotional symbols that predispose us to react to common, recurring stimuli in predictable ways.

Psychology 305 15

Jung saw archetypes as the psychic counterpart to instincts. In comparing archetypes to instincts, he wrote:

“As animals of the same kind show the same instinctual phenomena all over the world, man also shows the same [archetypes] no matter where he lives. As animals have no need to be taught their instinctive activities, so man also possesses his primordial psychic patterns and repeats them spontaneously, independently of any kind of teaching.” (1975, p. 152)

Psychology 305 16

Jung believed that there are an indefinite number of archetypes among humans. Moreover, he argued that archetypes cannot be identified using traditional quantitative methods. Rather, they must be identified through the study of the symbolic communications of humans (e.g., dreams, art, religion, myths) .

Examples of archetypes identified by Jung include the mother archetype, the anima and animus archetypes, and the shadow archetype.

Psychology 305 17

What personality types did Jung propose?

• Jung proposed a personality typology that relies on 2 principle concepts:

1. Attitudes

A “readiness of the psyche to act or react [to experience] in a certain way.” (1921/1971, p. 414)

Jung identified 2 attitudes:

(a) Extraversion: an orientation toward the objective—the external world and other people.

(b) Introversion: an orientation toward the subjective—one’s own thoughts and feelings.

Psychology 305 18

2. Psychological Functions

Refer to ways of perceiving and evaluating both the external world and our subjective experiences.

Jung identified 4 psychological functions: Sensing, intuiting, thinking, and feeling.

Psychology 305 19

• Note: Jung described sensing and intuiting as irrational functions because they involve perception

rather than the evaluation of information. He described thinking and feeling as rational functions because they involve evaluation of information that is

perceived.

• Jung believed that each person has the capacity for both attitudes and may use all 4 psychological

functions.

Psychology 305 20

• However, he also believed that, for most people, one attitude and one psychological function become

dominant and direct behaviour. The nondominant attitude and psychological functions remain underdeveloped and become part of the personal unconscious.

• By combining each of the 2 attitudes with each of the 4psychological functions, Jung identified 8 personality types (i.e., ES, EN, ET, EF, IS, IN, IT, IF).

Psychology 305 21

• The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is a self-report measure that was developed in the 1920’s to

assess Jung’s personality types.

• The measure was originally designed to assess individuals on 3 dimensions derived from Jung’s theory:

Extraversion-Introversion, Sensing-Intuiting, and Thinking-Feeling.

• The measure was later modified to allow for the assessment of a 4th dimension: Judging-Perceiving.

Psychology 305 22

• This dimension indicates how an individual prefers to act in response to the information that he or she

perceives and evaluates.

• With the addition of this 4th dimension, the revised MBTI assesses 16 personality types (e.g., ESTJ, ESFJ, ESTP, ESFP).

Psychology 305 23

• Examples of different personality types:

Madonna: ESTP (Go-getter)

Bob Hope: ESFP (Performer)

Julia Roberts: INFP (Idealist)

Mother Teresa: INFJ (Counselor)

Margaret Thatcher: ENTJ (Leader)

Alfred Hitchcock: ENTP (Big Thinker)

Psychology 305 24

Questions That Were Answered in Today’s Lecture

Neoanalytic Perspective on Personality

1. How do neoanalytic theories differ from psychoanalytic theory?

2. According to Jung’s theory, what are the major components of the mind?

3. What personality types did Jung propose?