Chapter two titled Theories of Personality, discusses the theories of personalities effectively and in depth. Introduced was the structure and development of personality. The four major theoretical perspectives were explained, which includes psychodynamic, behavioral, humanistic, and biological perspectives. These four approaches help to explain behavior at all levels. The Structure of Personality and the defense mechanisms of Sigmund Freud, as well as the Conditioned Reflex by Ivan Pavlov and Albert Bandura’s Social Cognitive Theory, have led me to many questions, but also have led to a greater understanding about how everyone differs in personality and why we humans, are the way we are.
Sigmund Freud’s theory of personality is a crucial aspect of psychology and stems from his work with mental patients, by doing this, Freud developed his ideas about the psychoanalytic theory on the basis of which he stated that the personality has three structures; the id, ego and super ego. Freud stated that the id is the unconscious part of personality which has no actual contact with reality. Stated on page 36 of Psychology Applied to Modern Life, the id houses biological urges to eat sleep defecate, and copulate. At first I did not completely understand what this meant to one’s personality, but as the explanation continues, the text states that the id demands immediate gratification. This then made sense in my mind, because we as humans ‘need’ to do these things before we can pursue other wants. The ego is the personality structure which emerges in childhood with all the varied experiences which make children aware of the demands and constraints they face in real life. The id and ego primarily use the ability to reason to make crucial decisions in life due to the impact of reality and experiences and as such lack morality or issues of right or wrong. I thought that the