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12.1: Introduction

  • Page ID
    200459
    • Rose M. Spielman, William J. Jenkins, Marilyn D. Lovett, et al.
    • OpenStax

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    Chapter Outline

    11.1 What Is Personality?

    11.2 Freud and the Psychodynamic Perspective

    11.3 Neo-Freudians: Adler, Erikson, Jung, and Horney

    11.4 Learning Approaches

    11.5 Humanistic Approaches

    11.6 Biological Approaches

    11.7 Trait Theorists

    11.8 Cultural Understandings of Personality

    11.9 Personality Assessment

    11.1.png
    Figure 11.1 What makes two individuals have different personalities? (credit: modification of work by Nicolas Alejandro)
    Three months before William Jefferson Blythe III was born, his father died in a car accident. He was raised by his mother, Virginia Dell, and grandparents, in Hope, Arkansas. When he turned \(4\), his mother married Roger Clinton, Jr., an alcoholic who was physically abusive to William’s mother. Six years later, Virginia gave birth to another son, Roger. William, who later took the last name Clinton from his stepfather, became the \(42^{nd}\) president of the United States. While Bill Clinton was making his political ascendance, his half-brother, Roger Clinton, was arrested numerous times for drug charges, including possession, conspiracy to distribute cocaine, and driving under the influence, serving time in jail. Two brothers, raised by the same people, took radically different paths in their lives. Why did they make the choices they did? What internal forces shaped their decisions? Personality psychology can help us answer these questions and more.

    This page titled 12.1: Introduction is shared under a CC BY 4.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by Rose M. Spielman, William J. Jenkins, Marilyn D. Lovett, et al. (OpenStax) via source content that was edited to the style and standards of the LibreTexts platform.