2130 Personality Psychology

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2130 Personality Psychology Know Thyself

• Week 1
• Professor Ian McGregor

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Why Greeks, Freud?

• Western Bias in Personality Psychology
• Powers and Perils of Independent Selfhood
• Normative Personality Processes
• Development and self-actualization
• Ways of managing conflicts and obstacles
• Wisdom and virtue are difficult
• Individual Differences
• Nature/Nurture of traits

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East Interdependent Self-Construal and
Collectivistic Culture
Mother
Father
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Self
Sibling
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Co-worker
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x
Friend
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West Independent Self-Construal and
Individualistic Culture that Shaped Personality
Psychology
Father
Mother
x
x
x
x
x
Sibling
Self
X
X
x
X
X
X
X
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x
Co-worker
Friend
x
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Cretes Minoan Civilization(About 3000-1450 BCE)
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Mycenaean Civilization Achilles and the Siege
of Troy(1600-1100BCE Iliad by Homer during
Archaic Greece, 800-500 BCE)
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Homers Odyssey Long Strange Trip(Homer in
Archaic Greece 800-500 BCE)
John William Waterhouse Ulysses and the Sirens,
1892
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Labyrinth and Minotaur
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Theseus Heroism
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Icarus Melted WingsNothing in ExcessJacob
Peter Gowy The Fall of Icarus 1650
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Aesop620-560 BCE
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Help with Self-Knowledge Circe and the Delphic
Oracle
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Highest Happiness from Contemplating Perfect
Ideals and Abstract, Absolute Truth
http//www.youtube.com/watch?v69F7GhASOdM
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Greek Idealism

• Pythagoras
• Ideals and perfection of math abstractions
• Ideals for living (his commune)
• Socrates/Plato
• Allegory of the Cave
• Platos ideals and phenomena
• Aristotle essence and matter
• Rational animalhighest happiness from
  contemplating essential truth

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Virtue as Harmony Nothing to excess

• Cool Odysseus vs. passionate Achilles
• Icarus
• Fly the middle course
• Pythagoras
• Harmonyproper proportion
• Socrates golden mean
• "choose the mean and avoid the extremes on either
  side, as far as possible"
• Aristotle
• Virtue falls between two vices

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Virtue from Self-Knowledge is Difficult

• Circe and Delphic Oracle at Apollos temple
• Know Thyself
• Aesop
• self-deception and rationalization
• Pythagoras
• Silence for 2 years
• Socrates
• Recognize ignorance unexamined life not worth
  living
• Plato
• Allegory of cave, Charioteer
• Aristotle
• Like taming a wild horse
• Balancing ideal, pragmatic, mysterious and
  unconscious elements

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Summary Greek Influence on Western Theories of
Personality Process

• Independent, empowered, idealistic selves
• Psychological sophistication and pragmatism
  (trade)
• Virtue and happiness from self-knowledge and
  inner harmony among competing impulses
• Especially in the face of obstacles and inner
  conflicts
• Self-knowledge and harmony (virtue) are difficult
  and sometimes require consultation with
  unconscious and intuitive reality
• Greeks also contributed to theory about
  Individual Differences
• Beyond Platos gold, silver, iron, and bronze
  souls

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Galens Synthesis

• 495-435 BCE Empedocles (Greek Philosopher)4
  Elements
• 450-380 BCE Hippocrates (Greek Physician)4
  Humours and Health
• 130-200 CE Galen (Greek Physician)
• Fire, Yellow Bile Choleric (disagreeable)
• Air, Blood Sanguine (extraverted)
• Water, Phlegm Phlegmatic (conscientious)
• Earth, Black Bile Melancholic (neurotic)