Stress and Personality

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Stress and Personality
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How does your personality affect your response to
stress?
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Major Points

• Background from the field of Psychology
• Personality Traits/Types
• According to stress response
• Typology systems

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Psychology of PersonalityWhat do they have to
say???

• Freud
• Jung
• Kubler-Ross
• Frankl
• Maslow

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Freud

• Stress comes from the tension between your id
  (impulses) and the superego (society). This is
  controlled by the ego (identity).
• You try to use defense mechanisms to protect your
  ego.

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Jung
Your personality arises through individuation.
Stress may result from conflicts between your
conscious and unconscious.
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Kubler-Ross

• The stages of handling
• unmet expectations are
• similar to the stages of
• dying denial, anger,
• bargaining, depression,
• and finally acceptance.

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Frankl
Stress can arise from the failure to make
meaning out of life and suffering.
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Maslow
Look to my hierarchy of Needs. Stress occurs
when Lower level needs are not Met, which keeps
the person From reaching higher levels.
Self-actualization Self-Esteem Belonging and
Love Safety Physiological needs
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Personality Traits Stress-prone vs.
Stress-Resistant
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Type A Behaviors/Traits

• Rushed lifestyle
• Predictor of heart disease
• Characteristics
• Type A and our society
• Hostility is the key factor

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Other-Focused Traits/Behaviors

• Self-worth comes from others depending on them
• Characteristics
• Motivation

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Helpless-Hopeless Behaviors

• Learned helplessness
• Locus of control

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Hardy Personality

• Commitment
• Control
• Challenge

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Sensation Seekers

• Type R
• Calculated risks

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Self-Esteem and Personality

• Low self-esteem stress-prone
• High self-esteemstress resistant
• Self-Assessments in book (p. 125-127)
• Self-Value

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Personality Typology

• Jung ? Myers-Briggs Typology Inventory (MBTI)
• Preferences

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Extraversion-Intraversion

• Intraversion
• Internal focus
• Time alone

• Extraversion
• External focus
• Energy from people

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Sensing-Intuition

• Sensing
• Rely on senses
• Practical
• Deal with facts

• Intuition
• Dreamers
• Experience
• Deal with ideas

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Thinking-Feeling

• Feeling
• Emotional
• Decisions based on values

• Thinking
• Logical
• Analytical
• Think through decisions

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Judging-Perception

• Perception
• Spontaneous
• Work best at the last minute

• Judging
• Organization and order
• Work ahead of schedule

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Myers-Briggs Type and Stress
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Preferences

• Extroversion
• Introversion
• Intuition
• Sensing
• Thinking
• Feeling
• Judging
• Perceiving

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Personality Test Activity

• Answer the following questions
• What are some of the stressors that each of your
  personality types could be prone to?
• What stressors could arise when two people with
  your personality types work together or are in
  relationships (friendships, romance, parents,
  etc.) with one another?
• What would be the strengths of this relationship?
• What is some common ground between your
  personality types?
• How might each person understand the others
  response to stress?
• What could each person learn from the other?