Birth order and Personality Environment determines to some extent the personality of a person. There are numerous factors in the environment which could determine variations in the personalities of different individuals. There are factors which are inherent to the environment and there are those determined by the manner by which individuals enter into a particular environment. In much the same way, how an infants entrance into the world determines in large part how parents and others will respond. In this paper particular view will be taken on the matter of timing that an infant is born. When an infant is born determines in large part the emotions of his or her parents and relatives. Moreover, whether or not the infant is the first child, has older siblings, or is the youngest child to be born to the family impacts the environment he or she is to grow up in. These three different scenarios are descriptive of birth order. A persons rank by age among his or her siblings is called birth order (Sulloway, 2001). Birth order thus determines the environment into which a child is born and the responsive and adaptive responses of the child. This cycle of interaction extends all the way up to adulthood (Stewart, Stewart, & Campbell, 2001). Thus, one can reasonably infer that birth order determines the relatively constant pattern of personality observed in individuals. Birth order therefore significantly affects the personality of the individual. This paper will take a closer look at this phenomenon through an introduction to the field of study regarding the link between birth order and personality. To set the stage, theories of birth order will first be briefly reviewed. The progress of studies from this initial theoretical stage has cause... ... middle of paper ... ...lted from competition between siblings. Sulloway (1996) held that siblings utilize differences in size and strength to overpower younger siblings. These younger siblings in turn resorted to counterstrategies in order to hold their ground against older siblings. Such a discussion is certainly reminiscent to Adler's own speculations. However, Sulloway's studies brought in a new dimension to the study of birth order. It was through his research that the Big Five Personality traits, namely Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism, were introduced into the study (Sulloway, 2001). Data was gathered reflecting the personality dispositions of individuals based on birth order. This served to give credibility to this particular area of study as the reliability of the Big Five measure lent credence to the questionability of birth order research.
Personality predispositions can determine levels of extraversion, which determine the levels to which one seeks social support, thus determining positive affect. Similarly, personality predispositions can determine levels of neuroticism that may influence one’s style of coping in the face of both positive and negative external factors which can determine negative affect (Diener, 1996). Happiness, a core aspect of positive subjective wellbeing, involves maintaining a superior level of positive affect in comparison to negative effect, based on specific positive or negative emotions linked to the recent experiences in one’s life (Emmons & Diener, 1985). Positive emotions such as joy and pride must trump negative emotions such as frustration and sadness in the recent past or present in order for an individual to feel happy. Life satisfaction builds on this and is a cognitive valuation of the quality of an individual’s experiences as a sum throughout their entire life (Emmons & Diener, 1985). Individual personality traits have been found to influence the different patterns and levels of life satisfaction, positive and negative affects and simply general, overall happiness (McCrae, 1983).
...n individual. The result can also be the same, though there is a variability among personalities. Both Kohlberg and Erikson have strong theories about how personalities are formed in early ages with direct focus on the parents.
A layman would define personality as an individual’s characteristics in terms of how they think and behave. Many theorists, however, interprets personality differently resulting in various personality theories. Personality is determined by traits which are behaviours displayed by a person in most given situations. How a person reacts to common circumstances may also be used to foresee future behaviours. Traits are then categorized into types that allow easier comparisons to be made between each individual’s attributes. The focus of this paper would be on the biological aspects of personality whereby traits are thought to be inheritable through genetics and associated with the central nervous system. Behavioural genetics are research that makes use of results from studies done on family, twins and adoptions. The findings of how both genes and environment influences personality from the studies will be discussed. Some researchers found possible issues with the representativeness of such studies. The outline of Eysenck’s biological model of personality and arousal, Gray’s BAS/BIS theory and Cloninger’s biological model of personality will further explain the biological effect on personality.
Psychodynamic and behavioural approaches are the two major approaches to personality, however, they view personality from different perspectives. Psychodynamic approach makes the argument that personality is caused by forces in the unconscious that are not learned. The individual has little control over their behaviour as it is predetermined, and early childhood plays a crucial part in shaping a person’s personality. Behavioural approach, on the other hand, recognises personality as learned and focuses only on present behavioural matters. Because of
“You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something- your gut, destiny, life, home, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life” (Steve Jobs, 1955). Throughout all of my 25 years blessed on planet earth, my personality have somewhat been compared to that of a roller coaster, filled with many ups and downs, positives and negatives, rewards and punishments. As such, I have frequently embarked on numerous journeys in a dyer attempt to discover and recollect the shattered fragments left of me. With this being said, the term personality however, could be defined as “the patterns of behavior and ways of thinking and feeling that are distinctive for each individual” (Tischler, 2007). At the completion of this paper, I intend to achieve answers to some pertinent questions for instance how has the development of personality affected or impacted on human nature. I also hope to discover the various transitions of my personality starting from infancy to present and the reason or motives behind such changes. Finally, I would like to be able to gain an in-depth understanding of a variety of Personality Theories especially the Psychoanalytical Theory of
Some factors that affect the child’s behavior are that they were born with certain character
“Fighting with siblings is certainly not a means to a desired end; it cannot be conceived as an attempt to achieve greater status or approval from parents since it has the opposite effect. In sum, the sibling rivalry model assumes that sibling aggression involves nonrealistic conflict and that an attack on a sibling involves angry aggression” (Felson pg.3). In other words, due to gender differences and the added parental effects, sibling rivalry can drive the aggression placed on the siblings from unequal treatment and jealousy rather than something realistic such as household duties, academic performance or extracurricular activities between siblings. According to Aggression and Violence Between Siblings, “nonrealistic conflict occurs when experiences of deprivation and frustration create a need for tension release; thus non-realistic conflict is expressive, or representative of some internal state of one of the participants, and the source of conflict is intrapersonal” (pg.
Why should we learn about the personality of other? It is a fact that we are communicating with so many different people with different personality everyday. As a result, in order to easily and successfully communicate without misunderstand each other, it is necessary for people to acknowledge some most popular personalities. Personality is the term that represent different kind of being human in styles of thinking, feeling and acting. There are four type of most popular personalities including Talker, Thinker, Driver and Feeler that people should be told about.
Personality involves a blend of characteristics that make one unique. In reviewing personality, we consider the influence of the interactions that one is engaged in, the nature or the environment of one's upbringing and genetics. The characteristic traits may change over time while some of them becoming a lasting part of a person’s personality. In this essay will analyze the theories that relate to the character and the various stages that children undergo during development. We will use the same theories and developmental stages in analysis my progress from childhood up to date.
This includes the components of where a child can establish their distinct, unique personality and are able to understand the difference of male and female. Erik Erikson’s research considers the influence of how parents and other external factors evolves a child’s personality.
...theories of nature and nurture as a precursor of personality may enable an individual to obtain a clear perspective of its evolution. However, in the study of personality, it is very important to understand the different theoretical approaches within its realm. It is important for the same reason that not one person is the same and neither are personalities; and for the very same reason why personality theorist’ differ when describing the concept and nature of humanity.
The Biological approach to personality places emphasis on the genetic influences related to the development of an individual’s personality. Some may believe that children and their parents can have very similar personalities, for example a young boy having his father’s anger (Stelmack, 1990). Though this approach has often been questioned by psychologists, it is not disregarded all together. Some believe that genetics do have a role in an individual’s personality development; however environments, as well as personal experiences all work in forming personality.
The six tenets of personality play important roles throughout our lifetime. Each tenet will be discussed and explained how they preform independently to make up the personality principles. The reports will differentiate between the various percentages according to each tenant studied. They will also detail the obvious effects of the varying six tenets in daily living and personal relationships. Emphases will be established about nature verses nurture by studies conducted in the psychology community. Results implicated genetic traits were more profound than environment. Theoretically, our genes help to determine the decisions and outcomes of everybody experiences. This held true throughout the different conclusions, bringing about the idea
Personality takes many shapes and forms and is affected by many factors. My understanding of personality is simply a genetic and environmentally determined set of psychological traits that influence our reactions in the world around us. Genetic because our parents possess a certain set of psychological personality traits that we tend to have in common with them so therefore in my opinion there are heritable personality traits. Personality is environmental because we each have our own separate experiences in the world and these experiences help form our unique personality. Neo-Freudians such as Jung have given us a wide array of ideas of how they believe personality is developed and formatted. Jung in particular has a very interesting
Personality is the expression of a person’s traits according to ones feelings, mentality and behavior. It involves understanding individuals’ traits such as withdrawal and willpower and how various parts of an individual link together to form personality. Personality expresses itself from within an individual and is comparatively regular throughout in an individual’s life. Different people have different personalities dependent on factors such as environment and genetic composition. Our personality is dependent on the success or failure of our development in the eight stages of life. This is proposed by Erik Erikson. Success in the development stages lead to virtues while the failure leads to malignancies.