What can you say about yourself? And how can you describe the behaviour of others? Would you normally judge a book by its cover or you would want to read the contents in the book to have an opinion about the book? Trying to say describe yourself maybe difficult sometimes and so it is for trying to define what personality is because you may be something now and at a later time you are another. However, I would like to define personality thus: Personality is a total sum of uniquely appearing internal and external psychological and behavioural characteristics which tend to be consistent across situations and which can serve as a basis for distinguishing Person A from Person B. This definition suggests that personality is stable (consistent) and that it is individualistic (distinguishing individuals from one another). But we may run into a problem because you may say people change or that situations change people. A friend of mine talked about a robbery attack on his family house at a time. When the armed robbers came visiting, he said the father was afraid not because of the armed robbers but because of his impulsive son (my friend). Surprisingly, his elder brother who naturally is very calm was the one that launched the attack against the band of thieves. So, I would like to ask did my friend change because of the situation. The answer should suggest that yes he changed, however, situations should be exception to what personality description means rather than the norm. This means that my friend would act more impulsively in most situations rather than reasonably while his brother would act more calmly rather than unpredictably like the day of the robbery. The other thing about the above definition is the issue of internal and external factors that determine behaviours. This is talking about personality development and which suggests that no one factor is enough to explain personality. It is a matter of both our internal and external experiences as they have been found to form our beliefs, motivations, interests, values and so on. In another word, our personality is formed as both inherited and environmentally acquired.
Personality disorder:
The above plainly discusses personality as a normal construct. What then does it mean when personality becomes a problem or in more technical term a disorder. A personality becomes a disorder when a behaviour deviates significantly from one’s cultural norms, and that behaviour is seen as enduring and pervasive and that behaviour onsets very likely from early on in adolescent or early adulthood stage of development, and that behaviour is significantly causing distress to the person and those around him. The person with personality disorder is acting most of the times in a particular way that causes distress to herself or others in different situations and across different domains of occurrences.
The meaning of personality disorder becomes better understood when we distinguish it from personality. While we can consider personality to be the lens that people may use to describe you consistently, no matter how stable personality appears it can still be subjected to environmental flexibility, personality disorder is inflexibly rooted sets of behavioural, cognitive and feeling states of an individual which causes distress to the person and those around him.
Diamondmoor Psychological Consult and Services wants to devote this space to the discussions around personality disorders. The 5th edition of diagnostic reference of American Psychological Association recognizes 10 types of these personality disorders under three classes and we will be taking one per week.
But before we move on, I want your opinion on this: Do you think someone with personality disorder can change considering the fact that the behavioral patterns are inflexible?
At Diamondmoor Psychological Consult and Services, we are available to help. Reach us today on 08128276962, 234 22914084 and [email protected]
Thank you.