Personality Theories: Personality Disorders and Their Diagnoses
Personality theorists often differ on how the term personality should be used. In fact, Gordon Allport, one of the first psychologists to focus on personality, had more than fifty different definitions for the term. According to Engler (2014), Allport's basic idea was that personality is the true nature of an individual that influences the way they behave and think. Carl Rogers, another influential psychologist, believed that personality is the organized and persistent individual perceptions that determine their experiences. Sigmund Freud, popularly referred to as the father of psychoanalysis, argued that personality is often concealed and it is not conscious or easily known. In light of all these conflicting definitions, one thing is evident: there are a variety of personality theories which attempt to define what personality is and how it influences the lives of people. The American Psychological Association, APA (2015) defines personality as the differing characteristic thought patterns that individuals possess, which influence the way they feel, think, and behave. APA posits that psychologists first have to learn differences in personality traits before they understand how these traits combine to make the individual. This text takes a look at three personality theories: the psychodynamic, humanistic, and social cognitive theories, and how they help us understand human personalities. It also examines psychological disorders and their diagnoses and whether people with these disorders should be given psychiatric labels.
How the psychodynamic, humanistic and social cognitive...
Myers Briggs Evaluating the Myers Briggs Type Indicator The Myers Briggs Type Indicator, introduced in 1943 by the social scientists from which it draws its name and revised frequently thereafter, is a questionnaire-based instrument designed to provide personality profiling data on its respondents. As the discussion hereafter will demonstrate, it can be used to produce useful general personality trait outlooks or for diagnostic purposes where mental illness may be present. Characteristics, Uses and
In fact, it is important to understand that the MMPI-2 must be administered as a whole and that one cannot consider scores on any one area of the test in isolation from a subject's other results. Moreover, it is important to recognize that while the scales may carry official names, they do not only measure the suggested disease. For example, the schizophrenia scale appears to measure the degree of alienation
Personality theories and PTSD Alternative Theoretical Positions and Applications The idea of personality is broadly accepted as being fundamental in psychology, but its dynamics as well as the ways that it may be identified and assessed are questions in which psychologists have been in substantial disagreement. Millon had been focused on perpetually creating a systematic program to describe standard as well as abnormal personality functioning and also to determine various kinds of
Anxiety Disorders Diagnosis of anxiety disorders Diagnosis Differential diagnosis Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) Ethical issues in Psychopharamacology In this paper, we present an elaborate analysis of anxiety disorders involving symptoms, diagnosis as well as the differential diagnosis. The aim of this paper is however to discuss the Psychopharamacological of anxiety disorder with specific discussion of the medication for every case. The ethical considerations on Psychopharamacological are also presented. Anxiety disorders are noted by Oakley-Browne (1991) as
32) The overall diagnostic and symptomatic patterns described by these points indicate that BPD is a serious disorder and is "...classified as a major personality disorder involving dramatic, emotional, or erratic behavior; intense, unstable moods and relationships; chronic anger; and substance abuse." (Boucher, 1999, p. 33) There are a number of criteria which, in line with DSM-IV, are used to identify and characterize this disorder. The first of these criteria refers
The DSM explicitly "strives to be atheoretical, using merely observationally referent terms. The hope with this is to make the manual as acceptable as possible to professionals with different theoretical orientations (Gilles-Thomas 1989, Lecture 2). Specific criteria and systematic descriptions are offered as guidance for making diagnoses. "Essential features, associated features, prevalence rates, sex ratios, family patterns, and differential diagnoses are listed" and it is noted when "alternative or
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