Understanding what your personality is actually all about
PERSONALITY DISORDERS SERIES – PART I
IWe have all used the word ‘Personality,’ so loosely for so long that now the word is barely used by us correctly. Generally we notice that when a person is manipulative, we say “his/her personality is like that only.” But is that all there is to personality?
In Psychology, we define Personality as the characteristic enduring pattern of a person’s inner experiences (thinking and feeling) and behavior which differentiates that person from everybody else. We tend to tell individuals apart as well based on their personalities.
Nature and nurture both contribute almost equally in developing our personality. The nature part is played by one’s hereditary factors and the nurture part is played by the circumstances in which the person has lived, up until then. This includes the exposure and experiences to our life situations.
We have all heard the two parrots story from our parents/grandparents where two baby parrots are picked up by two people from a forest. One parrot grows up with a robber and the other one grows up with a saint. The parrot which is living with a robber starts learning all the language of robbers and the parrot with a saint learns all the Vedas. We can relate one’s personality development with the parrots in this story. So, besides the influence of genes there is always also the influence of the environment in which we grow.
About the stages of personality development, there are many theories. According to Sigmund Freud’s theory, personality development starts from infancy till the age of 18 years in different stages. But Eriksonian theory says, personality development does not stop at the age 18 but instead continues till an individual dies. Whatever may be that the theories say, in every stage of our life we are exposed to many situations and every experience moulds the way that we think, feel and behave.
We don’t have to be a genius to understand that our personality should always help us in leading a mentally peaceful and happy life. But if that very personality is itself becoming an obstruction for us to lead a happy & peaceful life then it no doubt is an indication that there is some problem with our personality, which in the psychological terminology, we call it as ‘Personality Disorder.’
Personality Disorder is a psychiatric condition where a person manifests consistent pattern of rigid, unhealthy way of thinking, feeling and behaving. Because of this disorder that person, can neither express oneself nor deal with others in the appropriate way. Adjusting to their own environment becomes a difficult task to people with personality disorder.
As the said rigidity in thinking would have become stronger over the years, people with personality disorders can never either fathom or accept that they are at fault.
Usually because of lack of knowledge about this psychiatric condition, many suffer constantly believing it to be just general stubbornness and make it tougher for themselves to make amends later on. Needless to say, these personality disorders pose difficulties to not only themselves but also directly or indirectly, to those who are significant in their lives.
Scientists have classified personality disorders into three clusters based upon some features which they manifest. Each cluster includes different personality disorders based upon the symptoms.
Cluster A: This cluster features the disorders which mainly manifest odd and eccentric behavior. They are:
- Paranoid Personality Disorder
- Schizoid Personality Disorder
- Schizotypal Personality Disorder
Cluster B: This cluster features the disorders which mainly manifest emotional, erratic and dramatic behavior. They are:
- Antisocial Personality Disorder
- Borderline Personality Disorder
- Narcissistic Personality Disorder
- Histrionic Personality Disorder
Cluster C: This cluster features the disorders which mainly manifest behavior of anxiety and fear. They are:
- Avoidant Personality Disorder
- Dependent Personality Disorder
- Obsessive Compulsive Personality Disorder
No one other than a mental health professional can diagnose personality disorders as they can differentiate the long term patterns of functioning and symptoms from simple stubbornness. Also, diagnosis can be done only for people above 18 years. People who are aged below 18 years, cannot be diagnosed as their personality would still be in developmental stages.
Causes for personality disorders were proposed by many theorists based on their own primary researches as follows:
- In a Psychodynamic perspective, disturbances in parent-child relationship leading to weakened ego strength which further results in poor adaptive functioning is a cause.
- In Behaviorists’ perspective, personality disorders develop because of fault in skills acquisition, exposure to wrong type of models and improperly rewarded behaviors which are undesirable. Behaviorists believe that every behavior, whether good or bad, can be learnt and unlearnt as well.
- In Cognitive perspective, personality disorders are the product of faulty schemas and information processing. Distortion in cognitive processes is the root cause of development of personality disorders.
- In a Sociocultural perspective, inequalities in society create advantage to certain group of population and disadvantage to other group of population. This inequality results in personality development.
- In Neuroscience perspective, many psychiatric disorders develop because of abnormal levels of neurochemicals.
Identifying a personality disorder is quite difficult and here’s one of my case-studies for you to understand why,
- A young couple had come to me with some relationship issues. On enquiring, the girl told me that the guy is over possessive and he doesn’t allow her to go alone anywhere. On probing, she also explained how he checks her phone and keeps calling her to find about her whereabouts whenever she goes to her office. It took two sessions for me with the boy and enquiring about his childhood and family relations to diagnose that the boy is not just another typical over possessive boyfriend who needs counselling but is someone who is suffering with Paranoid Personality Disorder.
- Another couple had come to me about six years ago for marital counseling. The quarrels between them stemmed mainly from one particular incident everyday. The wife wouldn’t allow her husband to even have a cup of tea until he had taken bath and organized everything in order after coming back home from work. The husband’s complaint was that he first wanted to have a cup of tea as that would give him some energy after driving for so long to come back home. This incident used to happen every working day for almost months until the husband had had enough. That’s when the fights started and they thought they needed marital counselling. After 4 individual sessions with the wife where we discussed her life other than marriage and some personality related discussions, I diagnosed that the wife was not just a stubborn person clinging onto ego of that particular incident but was suffering from Obsessive Compulsive Personality Disorder.
So, the presenting problem may be completely different but the reason can be a Personality Disorder. Hence, proper awareness of Personality Disorders and a practical experience is required to diagnose if there is more to a problem than just what it looks like and if it is a Personality Disorder. So, this is better left to the professionals. These Personality Disorders should not be taken in a lighter vein by us as something as serious as Borderline Personality Disorder, which in later stages becomes incurable, also belongs to this group.
These Personality Disorders are quite some and have to be discussed in detail to do justice to their seriousness. So, I have decided I shall write them separately in the next few blogs as a series. A havoc is created by these Personality Disorders in the lives of people, if not looked at in the appropriate light by professionals and not corrected in time. So, be more alert towards yourself. More often than not that helps. It doesn’t help to brush everything under the carpet saying it is just stubbornness or Ego issues or something similar. Always remember, where there is acceptance, there is room for improvement.
You can reach out to me personally to discuss your issues in detail, via my email ID – drkavithanarayandas@gmail.com.
Stay mentally healthy always 🙂
