Compare and Contrast the Personality Theories of Erikson, Adler, and Jung

Personality Theories of Erick Erikson, Alfred Adler, And Carl Jung

Personality Theories of Erik Erikson, Alfred Adler, and Carl Jung

How do we develop our personalities? There has been a lot of controversy in how we become who we are. For generations, competing theories have aimed to better understand this secret process. The theories of Erik Erikson are base don personality development through exposure to social environments, while

Erik Erikson's theory of personality is based on the psychosocial model of development, where psychosocial development characterizes the nature of the individual's personality based on predefined stages. Thus, Erikson believed that one's social environment heavily impacted psychological development. Throughout the stages, the growing child defines his or her personality through what is known as ego strength or quality (Cherry 2011). Essentially, when the child masters a stage, he or she can move on to the next. When a child does not master a stage, there is a growing sense of inferiority which can plague future personality development in later stages. The stages defined by Erikson are very defined. First is the stage of Trust vs. Mistrust, where infants learn to trust their caregivers or are left with a large sense of mistrust depending on the social environment which they are raised in. Next, there is the Autonomy vs. Shame and Doubt stage, where young children begin to separate from their families and try to be more autonomous in their own actions. Children will embrace potty training, and be more active in choosing what they like. Children who master this stage with a good social environment are more confident, while others who do not continue to have insecurities in their choices. Another stage during the preschool years is initiative vs. guilt, where children increase their power over their decisions. Like the previous stage, a strong social support system will help the children master this stage, while a weak one will make them carry feelings of inferiority. This continues into the school years of middle childhood with Industry vs. Inferiority, where "through social interactions, children begin to develop a sense of pride in their accomplishments and abilities" (Cherry 2011). Adolescence sees further development with Identity vs. Confusion, where the past development structures allow or restrict the child from creating a unique personality and identity. There other stages later in life, Intimacy vs. Isolation, Generativity vs. Stagnation, and Integrity vs. Despair, continue to show how social worlds impact the personality development of an individual throughout their lives.

Alfred Adler also puts focus on the social environment in terms of personality development, and he does share the notion of the individual's need to master their own inferiority as a way to increase confidence in personality development. However, Adler has an increased role of competitiveness in this process, as individuals are said to try to compete with those around them as they strive to overcome their weaknesses. According to Adler, "each of us is born into the world with a sense of inferiority. We start as a weak and helpless child and strive to overcome these deficiencies by becoming superior to those around us" (Heffner Media Group 2011). Rather than using a social support system around us to benefit positively, we use it as a mark of competition that we wish to beat out. Adler was also different from Erikson in the fact that parenting styles and birth order play a huge role in later personality development within children. He believed that pampering and neglect in parenting can cause major damage to the development of the personality later in life.