21. Theoretical and experimental approaches to the study of personality

Summary

Personality theory. The main periods of the development of personality psychology. The problem of personality in the writings of ancient philosophers. Studies of the problems of personality in the XIX century. (clinical period). Classification of theories of personality R. S. Nemova. Experimental theories of personality. Theories of the personality of Freudianism and neofreidism (3. Freud, C. Jung, A. Adler, K. Horpi, and G. S. Sullivan). The problem of personality in humanistic psychology (K. Rogers, G. Allport, A. Maslow). French sociological school. The concept of personality P. Jean.

The methodology of experimental research personality. Ways to collect experimental information about the individual. Factor approach to the assessment of personality traits. Typological approach. Using the methods of mathematical analysis in the study of personality. Works G. Olnorta and R. Kettella. The typological approach of S. Hathaway and J. McKinley

21.1. Personality theory

Theoretical research in the field of personality psychology began a long time ago, and they have their own history. At least, we can distinguish three periods in the development of the personality psychology: philosophical-literary, clinical and experimental.

The first period of research began with the work of ancient thinkers and lasted until the beginning of the XIX century. The main problems of the psychology of the individual in the philosophical and literary period were questions about the moral and social nature of man. The first definitions of personality were quite broad. They included all that is in man and what he can call his personal:

his biology, psychology, property, behavior, culture, etc. This understanding of the personality was partially preserved at a later time. For psychology, where there are many other, different from the person concepts and scientific categories, filled with specific content, this definition is too broad.

In the first decades of the XIX century. along with philosophers, psychiatrists began to deal with the problems of personality psychology. They were the first to systematically monitor the patient's personality in a clinical setting, to study the history of his life in order to better understand his behavior. In this case, not only professional conclusions related to the diagnosis and treatment of mental illness were made, but also general scientific conclusions about the nature of the human person. In the clinical period of studying the personality, the idea of ​​it as a special phenomenon was narrowed compared with the philosophical and literary period.

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house. The focus of psychiatrists turned out to be personality traits that are usually found in a sick person. Later it was found that many of the features found by them are present in almost all healthy people, but these features are moderately expressed in them, and in patients, as a rule, they are hypertrophied. This applies, for example, to anxiety and rigidity, lethargy and excitability.

Identification by psychiatrists was given in terms of such traits, with the help of which one can describe a completely normal, pathological, and accentuated (as an extreme variant of the norm) personality. Nevertheless, this approach from the point of view of psychology seems imperfect. The fact is that such definitions for a holistic description of a normal person were too narrow. In this type of definition, personal qualities were not included, which under any conditions, even if extremely pronounced, are always positive, “normal”. This, for example, abilities, moral qualities and a number of other personal properties.

It should be noted that up to the beginning of the XX century. philosophical-literary and clinical approaches to the study of personality were the only ones in which attempts were made to penetrate into the essence of this phenomenon. Only in the first decades of the 20th century. psychologists began to study the personality, who until that time had been mainly engaged in the study of the cognitive processes and human states. Since the beginning of the XX century. characterized by the rapid development of experimental studies in psychology, an attempt was made to introduce them to the mathematical-statistical data processing in order to accurately test hypotheses and obtain reliable facts. In this regard, the development of reliable and valid test methods for the study of a normal personality has become a priority task for psychologists for many years.

Let's take a closer look at some of the most well-known concepts and theories of personality, as well as their classification.

There are a variety of approaches to the classification of theories and concepts of personality. Moreover, we may encounter these differences not only in scientific works, but also in textbooks. So, R. S. Nemov counts at least 48 theories of personality, each of which can be assessed by five parameters, which are the basis for classification.

According to the method of explaining behavior, all existing theories of personality can be divided into psychodynamic, sociodynamic, and interactionist.

Psychodynamic theories are those that describe a person and explain a person’s behavior on the basis of his psychological or internal characteristics. From the point of view of sociodynamic theories, external situations play a major role in the determination of behavior. Therefore, in theories of this type, the intrinsic properties of the personality are not given significant importance. Interactionist theories are based on the principle of interaction of internal and external factors in the management of actual human actions.

The next reason for dividing theories into types is the method of obtaining data about an individual. From this point of view, all theories can be divided into experimental and nonexperimental. Experimental theories of personality include theories built on the analysis and synthesis of collected experimental

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by data. In their turn, non-experimental ones include theories, the authors of which rely on life impressions, observations and experience, and make theoretical generalizations without resorting to experiment.

Another basis for classifying a theory is the authors' point of view on a person as a structural or dynamic formation. The structural theory includes theories for which the main problem is to determine the structure of the personality and the system of concepts with which it should be described. Theories are called dynamic , the main topic of which is transformation, change in the development of personality, i.e. its dynamics.

There are also a number of theories of personality that have arisen in the framework of age and pedagogical psychology. Theories of this type are built on the consideration of a limited age period in the development of personality, as a rule, from birth to high school, t. from infancy to early adolescence. In addition, there are theories whose authors set themselves the task of tracing the development of a person throughout a person’s life.

Another basis for the classification of theories of personality is the fact that they pay primary attention: the internal properties, traits and qualities of a person or its external manifestations, such as behavior and actions. So, you can select the theory of features. According to the provisions of this group of theories, all people differ from each other in the set and degree of development of their individual, independent features, and personality description can be obtained on the basis of a test-logical or other method of identifying and describing personality features, for example, on the basis of summarizing the life observations of various people for this person.

The second method of assessing personality traits involves the union of all people in typological groups. In this case, people belonging to the same typological group will have similar psychological characteristics, and therefore, they are very similar to each other in their behavior. However, psychological characteristics peculiar to one or another typological group, in turn, make it unlike other typological groups.

It should be noted that, in addition to the considered R. S. Nemov, there are other classifications of theories of personality. So, B.V. Zeigarnik considers the existing theories of personality in their content-semantic and historical aspect, depending on the conditions of their origin and development. At the same time, she identifies the following groups of theories: theories of the personality of Freudianism and neo-Freudianism, humanistic theories of personality, theories of the personality of existential psychology, theories of the personality of the French sociological school, and others. Let us consider in general some of them.

One of the most common theories, which still influences the psychology of personality, is Freudianism. This theory arose during that period of personality research, which was defined by us as clinical. The creator of this theory is 3. Freud. Subsequently, on the basis of Freudianism, a number of theories emerged, which can be conditionally combined into a group of theories of neo-Freudianism.

Freud worked for several years in the clinic of the famous French neurologist J. Charcot in Salpêtrière (Paris) and the Bernheim Clinic in Nancy, where

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acquainted with the therapy of neurosis. Since the beginning of the 90s. 3. Freud worked with I. Breuer, applying the method of hypnotic catharsis. Subsequently, Freud withdrew from the practice of hypnotic suggestion and moved on to the study and interpretation of dreams, freely arising associations, reservations, forgetting. The interpretation of this material Freud called the method of psychoanalysis. In it, he saw a new method, a new technique of psychotherapy.

The method of psychoanalysis is that by long conversations with the patient, the real cause of his illness is brought to his consciousness; he becomes aware of what has been repressed. There occurs, according to Freud, a catharsis. Later Freud extended his concept to the psyche of a healthy person. Within the framework of this theory, Freud dwelt on the mechanisms of human behavior in great detail.

Considering the problem of behavior, Freud identifies two needs that define a person's mental activity: libidinal and aggressive. But since the satisfaction of these needs encounters obstacles from the outside world, they are supplanted, forming an area of ​​the unconscious. But still, sometimes they break through, bypassing the "censorship" of consciousness, and appear in the form of symbols. Revealing the nature of the interaction of these needs and the possibility of meeting them, Freud identifies three main components in the structure of the personality: id (“It”), ego (“I”) and super-ego (“Super-I”). The id is the very scene where the instincts are forced out into the unconscious. The ego, on the one hand, follows unconscious instincts, and on the other hand, it obeys norms and requirements of reality. Suner-ego is a set of moral principles of society; it plays the role of "censor". Thus, it is in conflict, for the requirements of the id and the super-ego are incompatible. Therefore, the ego constantly resorts to protective mechanisms - repression, sublimation. The repression itself is done unconsciously. At the same time, motives, experiences, feelings that “move” into the unconscious, continue to act in the form of symbols, in the form of activities that are acceptable to the “censor”.

According to Freud, for the implementation of various functions and forms of activity there is a whole system of special mechanisms (sublimation, projection, transfer, repression, regression, etc.). In this case, the body is considered by Freud as a complex energy system, governed by the law of conservation of energy. Therefore, if the libido is stopped in one of its manifestations, it must inevitably produce some other essences. The superego ensures the social acceptability of these effects. However, if he fails, the conflict between the id and the super-ego becomes aggravated, the normal functioning of the system is disturbed; blocked libido is expressed in a variety of painful symptoms.

In this design of personality, created by Freud, there is an assumption about the complexity, the multiplicity of structures of human behavior, and all these components are mainly subject to biological laws. In Freud's theory, real human actions act as a symbol of need, “hunted down” by consciousness. Therefore, characterizing the theory of psychoanalysis, the well-known domestic psychologist F. V. Bassin noted that the essence of Freudian doctrine is to recognize the fatal antagonism between repressed experience and consciousness. which leads to antagonism between man and the social environment.

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Names

Jung Karp Gustav (1875-1961) - Swiss psychologists psychiatrist. In 1906-1913 worked with 3. Freud, later moved away from classical psychoanalysis and created his own analytical psychology. Developed one of the methods of associative experiment, introduced the concept of "complex". As a result of many years of clinical research, he came to the conclusion that not only the individual, but also the collective unconscious plays an essential role in the human psyche, the content of which is represented by the archetypes inherited from the ancestors. He developed a complex (little-known at present) personality structure, including “I”, “shadow” (a set of ideas about oneself repressed by man), “self” (self-knowledge of the meaning of life), “anima” (source of caress and inclinations), “animus "(Source of reproachable judgments). He proposed a typology of characters on the basis of two signs: by orientation of the set (extraversion — introversion) and by the dominant function (thinking, feeling, feeling, or intuition).

K. Jung was one of the first students of Freud to dissociate himself from his teacher. The main reason for the differences between them was the idea of ​​Freud’s pansexuality. But the struggle with Freud Jung carried out not from a materialistic, but from an idealistic position. Jung called his system “analytical psychology”.

According to Jung, the human psyche includes three levels: consciousness, personal unconscious and collective unconscious. The decisive role in the structure of a person’s personality is played by the collective unconscious, which is formed from the traces of memory left by all the past of mankind. The collective unconscious is universal. It influences the personality of a person and predetermines his behavior from the moment of birth. In turn, the collective unconscious also consists of different levels. It is determined by national, racial and universal heritage. The deepest level consists of traces of the prehuman past, i.e., from the experience of the animal ancestors of man. Thus, by Jung's definition, the collective unconscious is the mind of our ancient ancestors, the way they thought and felt, the way they perceived life and the world, gods and human beings.

The collective unconscious manifests itself in certain people in the form of archetypes, which are found not only in dreams, but also in real creativity. Archetypes are inherent in individuals, but they reflect the collective unconscious. These are some general forms of mental representations that include a significant element of emotionality and even perceptual images. For example, the archetype of a mother is a universal idea of ​​a mother with the sensual and imaginative content of her own mother. The child receives this archetype already in finished form by inheritance and on its basis creates a concrete image of its real mother.

In addition to the collective unconscious, there exists, according to Jung, a personal unconscious, but it is not separated from consciousness. The personal unconscious consists of experiences that were once conscious, and then forgotten or repressed from consciousness. Under certain conditions, they become conscious.

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Names

Adler Alfred (1870-1937) - Austrian psychologist, one of the leading figures in the psychoanalytic field. In 1895 defended his doctoral thesis in medicine in Vienna. From 1902 to 1911. was a member of the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society, since 1911. He began to create his own scientific school, known as "individual psychology." In his teachings, Adler defended the principle of the internal unity of the mental life of the individual. He believed that between the conscious and the unconscious there is no hard border. By his work, he had a significant impact on humanistic psychology, research in the field of child and clinical psychology and defectology.

The structural units of the personal unconscious are constellations of feelings, thoughts, and memories. Jung called these constellations complexes (for example, the desire of a person to have great power in Jung is called a complex of power).

Jung also introduced the concept of "I". Behind this concept lies the human desire for integrity and unity. Thanks to him, a balance between conscious and unconscious is achieved. "I" can manifest itself in different ways. Depending on its manifestation, people can be divided into certain types.

В основу классификации личностных типов Юнг положил направленность человека на себя или на объект. Соответственно всех людей можно разделить на экстравертов и интровертов. Кроме этих основных типов Юнг говорит и о существовании дополнительных типов, — интуитивного, мыслительного, эмоционального. Причем тип личности определяется соотношением различных функций, большинство из которых врожденные. Поэтому типы личности, по Юнгу, — это врожденные типы, которые не связаны с условиями общественной жизни.

Another, no less famous student of Freud, who retired from his teacher, was A. Adler - the founder of the so-called individual psychology. He sharply spoke out against Freud's biologizing theory. Adler emphasized that the main thing in man is not his natural instincts, but the social feeling, which he called the "feeling of community." This feeling is innate, but it must be socially developed. He opposed the opinion of Freud that a man from birth is aggressive, that his development is determined by biological needs.

In addition, Adler spoke out against the dismemberment of the personality into three instances of which Freud spoke. In his opinion, the structure of the personality is one, and the determinant in the development of the personality is the human desire for superiority. However, this desire can not always be carried out. Thus, due to a defect in the development of the bodily organs, a person begins to experience a feeling of inferiority, it may also arise in childhood due to not favorable social conditions. A person seeks to find ways to overcome feelings of inferiority and resorts to various types of compensation.

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Адлер разбирает разные формы компенсации (адекватные, неадекватные) и говорит о возможных ее уровнях. Например, он говорит о возможности выработать гиперкомпенсацию. Это особая форма реакции па свою неполноценность. Умение выработать сверхкомпенсацию приводит к тому, что физически слабые и безвольные люди начинают совершать мужественные действия. Более того, в гиперкомпенсации Адлер усматривает механизм творчества, активности. В качестве примера он любил ссылаться на личность Наполеона и считал, что особые способности Наполеона как полководца объяснялись отчасти тем, что у того было обостренное чувство неполноценности из-за малого роста.

Адлер выделил три основные формы проявления компенсации:

1. Успешная компенсация чувства неполноценности в результате совпадения стремления к превосходству с социальным интересом.

2. Сверхкомпепсация, которая означает одностороннее приспособление к жизни в результате чрезмерного развития какой-то одной черты или способности.

3. Уход в болезнь. В этом случае человек не может освободиться от чувства неполноценности; не может прийти к компенсации «нормальными» способами и «вырабатывает» симптомы болезни, чтобы оправдать свою неудачу. Возникает невроз.

Таким образом, Адлер предпринял попытку социализировать теоретические воззрения Фрейда, хотя, как мы видим, чувство неполноценности по своей природе является врожденным, поэтому ему не удалось полностью избежать биологиза-ции.

Перечисленные авторы не считали себя прямыми последователями Фрейда. Основными представителями неофрейдизма являются непосредственные ученики 3. Фрейда — К. Хорни и Г. С. Салливан.

Карен Хорни была вначале преданной ученицей Фрейда. В 1939 г ., будучи уже в США, она издала книгу «Невротическая личность нашего времени», в которой горячо благодарит своего учителя. Однако вскоре она стала резко критиковать Фрейда за его попытку свести механизмы поведения человека к двум тенденциям — либидозной и агрессивной, а также за пансексуализм.

Основу сущности человека Хорни усматривает во врожденном чувстве беспокойства. Младенец рождается с этим чувством, и уже с первых дней своей жизни он начинает чувствовать себя беспокойно. Это чувство окрашивает всю его дальнейшую жизнь, фиксируется и становится внутренним свойством психической деятельности. Чем вызвано это чувство? По мнению Хорни, человек постоянно переживает чувство враждебности мира, и желание избавиться от него порождает беспокойство. Все, что делает человек, — это трансформация чувства беспокойства. Оно является основной мотивацией его поступков. Хорни называет его чувством коренной тревоги, которая детерминирует поступки человека. Коренная тревога заставляет человека стремиться к безопасности.

Хорни утверждает, что человеком управляют две тенденции: стремление к безопасности и стремление к удовлетворению своих желаний. Оба эти стремления часто противоречат друг другу, и тогда возникает невротический конфликт, который человек сам стремится подавить, вырабатывая определенные способы («стратегии») поведения. Хорни выделила четыре типа поведения. Первый выражается в «невротическом стремлении к любви» как средству обеспечения безопасности

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Имена

Хорни Карен Клеменгина (1985 –1952); — американский психолог, представитель неофрейдизма. До 1932 г . занималась клинической работой в Германии, затем эмигрировала в США. Полагала, что развитие неврозов, сущность которых заключается в переживании коренной тревоги, обусловлено противоречиями межчеловеческого общения, прежде всего взаимоотношений между родителями и детьми. Если жизненные ситуации (запугивание, отсутствие любви, гиперопека) заставляют ребенка часто переживать коренную тревогу, то могут возникать стойкие черты характера, такие как неуверенность в себе, боязливое отношение к окружающим. По ее мнению, каждый человек может и хочет совершенствовать свой личностный потенциал, но когда это естественное стремление блокируется внешним социальным влиянием, возникает невротический конфликт.

в жизни; второй проявляется в «невротическом стремлении к власти», которое объясняется не какими-то объективными причинами, а страхом и враждебностью к людям; третий тин стратегии поведения выражается в стремлении изолироваться от людей; четвертый тип проявляется в признании своей беспомощности («невротическая покорность»).

Хорни делала попытки увеличить количество стратегий, но в конце концов остановилась на трех типах: 1) стремление к людям; 2) стремление отдалиться от людей, стремление к независимости; 3) стремление действовать против людей (агрессия).

Соответственно этим трем типам отношений выделяются три типа невротической личности: 1) устойчивый, 2) устраненный, 3) агрессивный. Эти типы поведения свойственны здоровым людям.

Разница между здоровым человеком и страдающим неврозом сводится лишь к тому, что противоречие между конфликтующими тенденциями у здорового значительно меньше, чем у невротика. По мысли Хорни, у здорового человека под влиянием временных внешних обстоятельств возникают «ситуационные неврозы». «Неврозы характера» же являются подлинной болезнью, так как в их основе лежит стойкий «изначальный конфликт».

Хотя Хорни резко критиковала биологизаторскую сущность учения Фрейда, в основном своем положении об «изначальной тревожности» и «коренной тревоге» она, по существу, повторяет Фрейда. В теории Хорни остаются основные положения фрейдизма: антагонизм природного и социального (принцип стремления к безопасности несовместим с удовлетворением человеческих желаний), фатальность врожденного механизма «коренной тревоги».

Другим видным представителем неофрейдизма является Г. С. Салливан (1892-1949). Он начал свою научную деятельность в качестве врача-психотера-невта, однако в дальнейшем выступал как психолог. Салливан провозгласил, что объектом психологического исследования должен стать не отдельный субъект, а личность как продукт совместной деятельности субъектов. Личность, по мнению Салливана, является относительно устойчивой моделью повторяющихся межличностных ситуаций, характеризующих человеческую жизнь.

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Names

Роджерс Карл Рэнсом( 1902-1987) — американский психолог, один из основателей гуманистической психологии. Автор книги «Центрированная на клиенте терапия» (1954). В качестве ядра личности рассматривал «Я-кон-цепцию», представленную динамикой соотношения «Я-реального» и «Я-идеального». По его представлениям, в личности сосуществуют две инстанции, которые должны работать согласованно, — реальное «Я», представляющее собой систему представлений и оценок самого себя, зависящую от индивидуального опыта и актуальных оценок окружающих, и идеальное «Я», представляющее собой то, каким человек хочет быть. Разработал недирективную психотерапию, центрированную на клиенте, в основе которой лежит правило не давать советов клиенту и избегать оценок его поведения, но актуализировать его творческие способности, требующиеся для самостоятельного решения его проблем.

Ребенок рождается с потребностью общения с людьми, с потребностью в нежности и с потребностью избегания тревоги. При рождении мир встречает ребенка не очень «нежно» — ребенку холодно, он переживает дискомфорт в момент рождения. В качестве реакции на этот дискомфорт у ребенка появляется беспокойство.

Таким образом, основными механизмами развития личности Салливан считает: 1) потребность в нежности, ласке и 2) стремление избежать тревоги.

Салливан считает, что потребность в безопасности, стремлении избежать тревоги является социальной, но эта социальность включена с рождения в органические потребности. Удовлетворение таких сугубо органических потребностей, как потребность в пище, тепле, требует заинтересованного и нежного соучастия, содействия другого человека, если речь идет о ребенке. Социальное выступает у Салливана как система межличностных отношений, но сами межличностные отношения не формируются, а существуют с момента рождения. Формирование личности, по Салливану, происходит фатально, неизбежно.

Оба механизма сосуществуют с момента рождения ребенка, и вместе они являются механизмом развития личности. Но человек живет во внешнем мире, который постоянно доставляет ему неудовольствие и поводы для тревоги. И вот в борьбе с этим внешним миром, а вернее сказать, в борьбе с беспокойством, формируется его личность, которую Салливан называет «Я-системой». Салливан утверждает, что «Я-система», т. е. личность, формируется, во-первых, в борьбе с неизбежным беспокойством на бессознательном уровне и, во-вторых, в нахождении различных средств для избежания этого беспокойства. «Я-система» заставляет ребенка, подростка, а в дальнейшем и взрослого человека прибегать к помощи вначале матери, а затем и других людей, например своих коллег по работе. Таким образом, в качестве механизма, формирующего личность, у Салливана выступают межличностные отношения.

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Следует отметить, что помимо указанных концепций в рамках психоаналитического подхода существуют и другие, например концепции Э. Эриксона, Э. Фромма и др.

In addition to the psychoanalytic direction, there are no less interesting scientific trends with which we need to get acquainted. One of these areas is humanistic psychology. The essence of these theories, existing in this direction, is that a person is considered as a kind of psychological education that arises in the process of human life in society, as a product of the development of human experience, the assimilation of social forms of behavior. For psychologists of the humanistic direction, personality is a kind of psychological education, which relates not only to the surrounding reality, but also to itself.

This current began to develop in the 30s. XX century. and received its greatest development in the 50-60-ies. It had a great influence on the development of social psychology. Psychologists have become increasingly interested in the person as an "empirical self" and the internal structure of the person.

Humanistic psychology was initially contrasted with neo-Freudian concepts. Representatives of this trend strongly objected to the proposition that human behavior is due either to a desire for pleasure, or a tendency to aggression, or to protection from society. They rejected the position that natural impulses are necessarily hostile to society. On the contrary, they suggested considering inborn altruistic motives as a source of behavior.

One of the leading representatives of this trend is C. Rogers.

He called his method of therapy nondirective, that is, focused on the patient. According to this method, the doctor should not put pressure on the patient. The contact between doctor and patient should be based on respect for each other; however, both of them are full participants in the conversation, or contact. The function of the therapist is to create a situation where the doctor acts as the second “I” of the client and understands his inner world. Deep respect for the individual position of the individual is the only rule of therapy. The client in such a situation feels that all his inner experiences, feelings are perceived with interest and approval, it helps to discover new aspects of his experience, sometimes for the first time to realize the significance of one or another of his experiences.

The method of therapy developed by Rogers corresponds to his ideas about the formation of personality and the mechanisms of its development. Later, Rogers’s idea of ​​non-directive therapy developed into a psychological theory of non-directive behavior. According to this theory, the communication of healthy people among themselves should also be non-directive.

Central to the theory of the personality of Rogers is the category of self-esteem. As a result of the interaction of the child with adults and other children, he creates an idea of ​​himself.

However, the formation of self-esteem does not pass without conflict. Often the assessment of others does not correspond to self-interest ;; ke. A person is faced with a dilemma, whether to accept the assessment of those around him or to remain with his, in other words, devalue himself or others. There is a complex process of "weighing", which

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Names

Maslow Abraham Harold (1908-1970) - American psychologist, one of the founders of humanistic psychology. He created a hierarchical model of motivation based on the postulate of its innateness and universality. He gave a description of personal characteristics of self-achosed people, independence, creativity, philosophical worldview, democracy in communication, productivity, etc. Later he modified his motivation model based on the idea of ​​the qualitative difference between the two classes of needs: development needs and needs.

Rogers calls the "organic assessment process", since the source of the estimates initially lies, as it were, inside the child's body, i.e. here we again come across the concept of innate qualities.

Thus, in Rogers, as in neo-Freudism, personality development is determined by the innate tendency. The social environment plays the role of only the external, alien to human nature pressure factor.

Another well-known representative of humanistic psychology is G. Allnort, who developed a psychological theory of personality, called the theory of devils. According to this theory, people differ from each other in terms of the set and degree of development of their individual, independent features, and a description of a personality can be obtained on the basis of a testological or other, less rigorous examination of it, based, for example, on a synthesis of the life observations of different people behind a given personality. . In fact, Allport proposed a methodology for the study of personality, which became widespread in the framework of experimental psychology of personality. Therefore, we will take a closer look at its approach in the next section of this chapter.

A prominent representative of the humanistic direction in psychology is A. Maslow. According to his opinion, the main need of a person is self-actualization, striving for self-improvement and self-expression. To the main question of his theory - What is self-actualization? - Maslow replies: "Self-actualizing people, without exception, are involved in some business ... They are committed to this business, it is something very valuable for them - this is a kind of vocation." All people of this type tend to realize higher values, which, as a rule, cannot be reduced to something even higher. These values ​​(among them - good, truth, decency, beauty, justice, perfection, etc.) appear to them as vital needs. Existence for a self-actualizing person appears as a process of permanent choice, as an incessant solution of the Hamlet problem “to be or not to be”. At each moment of life, a person has a choice: moving forward, overcoming obstacles that inevitably arise on the way to a high goal, or retreat, giving up the fight and giving up positions.

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A self-actualizing person always chooses a move forward, overcoming obstacles. Self-actualization is a process of continuous development and practical realization of its capabilities. This is "work in order to do well what a person wants to do." This is "the rejection of illusions, getting rid of false ideas about yourself."

According to Maslow, self-actualization is a congenital phenomenon, it is included in human nature. Man is born with the needs of good, morality, goodwill. They make up the core of man. And a person should be able to fulfill these needs. Therefore, self-actualization is one of the innate needs. In addition to this need, Maslow identifies a few more basic ones in the personality structure: the need for procreation; need for food; need for security; the need for protection; the need for truth, goodness, and others.

Speaking about the various theories of personality, we can not say a few words about the French psychological school and about its most prominent representative P. Jean.

Janet expressed the opinion that various mental processes are phenomena that prepare actions. Feelings, thinking are the processes that regulate actions. The basis of the development of personality they laid the doctrine of behavior. But Jeanne does not use the notion of behavior in a behavioral sense. It is considered as including the observed activity of the individual, not only from the outside, but also the internal mental content, which becomes an integral part of the behavior, its regulating link.

Jean's position that the process of regulation is included in the structure of mental processes is extremely important. Essentially, a thought has already been anticipated here, which has found its further development in the works of Russian psychologists L. S. Vygotsky, S. L. Rubinstein, A. N. Leontyev, L. I. Bozhovich and others, namely the transformation of an individual into a person is determined by that there is the possibility of regulation and self-regulation.

Jeanne says that the human psyche develops in collaboration with other people. First, a person cooperates with others and only then, on the basis of this, can regulate his own behavior.

Interesting is the structure of the behavioral act proposed by Jean. In accordance with it, in the behavioral act there are three stages: internal preparation for action, execution of an action, and completion of an action. As we see, this description of the behavioral act already includes an idea of ​​the purpose of the action.

Subsequently, Janet distinguishes different levels of human behavior (seven levels). He refers reflex acts to the first level. This is the lowest level of behavior.

He relates delayed perceptual actions to the second level. At this level, the behavior has a two-phase structure, and it highlights the preparation and completion of the action.

The third level of behavior includes elementary social acts, such as acts of imitation.

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To the fourth level, Janet relates elementary intellectual acts.

At the fifth level, the manipulation of real objects leads, according to Janet, to the formation of so-called intellectual objects.

The sixth level of behavior is the level of mental activity, thinking, which Zhape considered to be a derivative of practical action. Thus, highlighting this level, Janet expressed an opinion on the internalization of action and raised the question of the genetic connection between thinking and action. These ideas were continued in Russian psychology and were developed in the works of L. S. Vygotsky, A. N. Legoniev, P. Ya. Halperin, S. L. Rubinstein, and others.

As the highest - the seventh - level of behavior, Janet calls the creative, labor activity of a person. Janet insists that it is labor that forms the arbitrariness of attention, volitional effort.

The provision on self-regulation, which has become the cornerstone of personality analysis and other representatives of the French sociological school, echoes Jean's position on the existence of psychological stress and psychological strength. Psychological power means a certain property of a person, manifested in the speed and duration of individual actions. Psychological stress means the ability to concentrate and distribute power. Thus, both of these characteristics are interrelated and represent the energy, dynamic side of the regulated behavior. It is the state of psychological stress, which in terms of modern psychology could be designated as conscious mental activity, enables a person to regulate their behavior. Janet himself defines this state as the activation of higher needs.

Thus, the theoretical views of Janet seem quite modern. The ideas expressed by this scientist were subsequently developed in the works of Russian psychologists.

In domestic psychology, the most famous studies in the field of personality are associated with the theoretical work of representatives of the school of L. S. Vygotsky. Significant contribution to the solution of the problem of personality was made by A. N. Leontiev and L. I. Bozhovich.

Based on the concepts of leading activity and the social situation of development introduced by L. S. Vygotsky, L. I. Bozhovich showed how a certain world view is formed in the complex dynamics of interaction between the activities and interpersonal communication of a child during different periods of his life, called the inner position. This position is one of the main characteristics of the individual, a prerequisite for its development, which is understood as a set of leading motives of activity.

A. N. Leontiev presented his concept of structure and personality development. In this concept, the central place is given to the concept of activity. Like Bozovic, the main internal characteristic of a person in the concept of Leontiev is the motivational sphere of the person. Another important concept in his theory is personal meaning. It expresses the relationship of the goals of human activity, i.e., of what it is currently directly directed towards, to its motives, i.e., to what motivates it. The wider, more diverse activities in which the person is included, the more developed and streamlined they are, the richer the person is.

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Names

Jean Pierre Marie Fély (1859-1947) - French psychologist and psychiatrist. He was engaged in the study of neurosis, psychasthenia, psychasthenic nature, mental automatism. In the 1920s. on the basis of the category of action, he created a general psychological concept, in which, unlike the behaviorists, he considered the mental as a result of the internalization of external, practical actions of a socially significant nature. Ideas Jeanne significantly influenced the French psychology of the XX century. (J. Piaget, A. Vallon) and on the cultural-historical concept of L. S. Vygotsky.

It should be noted that personality research is actively being conducted now. The main feature of modern research is that theoretical views are formed on the basis of experimental studies. Let us consider in more detail some methodological approaches to the experimental study of personality.

21.2. Methodology for experimental personality research

At present, it is customary to distinguish three main ways of collecting information about an individual, and the data obtained by these methods are often called L, Q, and T — data.

The data obtained by recording the real behavior of a person in everyday life is commonly called L-data ( life record data). If we briefly characterize this method of collecting information, then it should be noted that it is based on external observation and registration of specific actions or personal achievements. Very often, L -data is used as an external criterion against which the validity of the results of another method is measured. It should be noted that this method has several disadvantages. In the first place, excessive subjectivity must be attributed to its main shortcomings.

Another most common method of collecting information about an individual is the method of using questionnaires and other methods based on self-reporting. The results of such research in experimental psychology of personality are called Q-data ( questionnaire data). Due to the simplicity of instrumental designs and ease of obtaining information, this

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The method is central to personality research. It should be noted that this method is also not without flaws. Since it is based on self-reports, the results of the survey may be distorted. These distortions can be caused by: low intellectual and cultural level of the subjects; the nature of the motivation of the subjects, due to which the results can be biased towards social desirability or underlining their defects; using incorrect standards. In addition, the distortions may be due to an erroneous theoretical point of view underlying the test design.

There is another way to collect personal data. Its difference lies in the fact that it is based on the registration of objective data. Data obtained using similar methods are called T-data ( objective data). This method also has several disadvantages. For example, a fairly high complexity, the complexity of the formalization of results, etc.

Thus, all these methods of data collection are not without drawbacks. However, the most common method of using questionnaires. This is caused not only by its simplicity, but also by the ability to create various personality constructs, since the basis of the questionnaires are the authors' ideas about a particular personality characteristic. Another reason for the popularity of questionnaires is the possibility of using new methods for developing mathematical techniques.

There are two main areas of personality research using questionnaires: an approach based on the identification of personality traits and a typological approach. The first implies the existence of a finite set of basic qualities, and personal differences are determined by the degree of their severity. In the typological approach, they proceed from the postulate that a personality type is a holistic education, irreducible to a combination of individual personality factors. Moreover, both approaches are intended for the formation of a conceptual apparatus that systematizes information about individual differences.

Let's look at the essence of these approaches? So, the features are grouped into closely related signs (psychological characteristics) and act as some integral characteristics summarizing the information contained in this group of signs. The number of features determines the dimension of the personal space. Типы объединяют группы похожих испытуемых и составляют иной набор объяснительных понятий, где в качестве имени понятия выступает название соответствующего типа, а содержание раскрывается описанием типичного (или усредненного) представителя.

Таким образом, подход на основе черт требует группировки личностных признаков, а подход на основе типов — группировки испытуемых. Для решения каждой из этих двух задач существуют специальные математические методы и модели. Наиболее часто для группировки признаков используются методы факторного анализа, а для группировки испытуемых — методы автоматической классификации. Эти методы являются двумя способами формирования обобщений на экспериментальном массиве данных. Они позволяют «сжать» информацию за счет выявления неоднородностей в структуре связей между признаками или испытуемыми. В результате массив экспериментальных данных разбивается на некоторые подмассивы, которые являются обобщениями совокупности данных.

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