Erikson's Influence On Personality Development

Personality is an essential part of every human being that impacts all of our experiences. As defined by Allport (1961), personality is “a dynamic organisation, inside the person, of psychological systems that create the person’s characteristic patterns of behaviour, thoughts and feelings”. Many researchers have taken interest in personality due to the impact personality has on us internally and externally, where our thoughts, emotions, and behaviours are constantly influenced by our personality which in turn affects our environment. Psychoanalysis has had a great influence on our understanding of how personality develops and the importance of each factor, where concepts from the psychoanalysts are still in use today. The psychoanalysts are

Instead, he believed that personality developmentment is influenced by the parents’ behaviour and family constellation. These two factors influence the child’s perception of his inferiorities, affecting the child’s style of life or his attitude towards life. Adler explained that the mother is the first person the child will have a social interaction with. It is important for the mother to introduce the child to a social life and help develop social interest in the child. The care she provides for the child will influence how the child perceives his inferiorities, influencing how he perceives himself. The father has a more indirect influence on the child. He is a role model for the child on being a worthwhile person, where he needs to contribute welfare to the family and society. Adler stressed that it is important for both parents to treat each other as equals so as to be a good role model for the child while the child develops his style of life. The style of life of the child is his attitude towards his inferiorities, where his attitude is influenced by his parental care. The birth order of the child will also affect the child’s development on his style of life immensely as each child is treated differently by the parents depending on the birth order (Eckstein & Kaufman, 2012). The different treatments will lead to different perceptions of inferiorities developed in the child,

Freud proposed three levels of the mind: the conscious, preconscious, and unconscious. The conscious level includes thoughts that we are actively aware of, the preconscious contains thoughts that can be easily retrieved from the unconscious into the conscious mind, and the unconscious mind consists of feelings, beliefs, and thoughts that we are unaware of. Based on Freud’s structural model of the mind, our behaviours are motivated our unconscious which includes the id and parts of the ego and superego structure of personality. He believes that we are governed by our instincts which originates from our id. Our instincts include life instincts such as instincts for food, water, sex, and aggression, and death instincts. The id’s main function is to satisfy these instincts, acting based on the pleasure principle. It is modulated and supported by the ego, which acts according to the reality principle, where the expression of these instincts is portrayed in a socially acceptable manner to increase the possibility of these instincts being satisfied. Our superego, which consists of our morals and ethical thoughts, can inhibit or encourage certain instinctual behaviours caused by the id which goes against the superego (Holmes, 2011). It causes a conflict with the ego as it inhibits behaviours or thoughts from the id