5 - Personality and Depth Psychology

Abstract

This chapter elaborates the personality and depth psychology of an individual from cultural perspectives. Psychiatrists consider personality to be the total manifestation of an individual's behavior and mental functions. Very much influenced by psychoanalytic theory, personality is often analyzed from the standpoint of intrapsychic perspectives. Psychologists, however, view personality as an observable behavior pattern of a person that can potentially be measured objectively. In addition to personality, several parameters, such as perception, cognition, memory, emotion, and motivation, are recognized by psychologists as basic to the processes of individual psychology. Attitudes, values, communication, and group behavior are considered parameters of social psychology. Depth psychology refers to the area of psychology that usually operates at the subconscious or unconscious levels. It is considered a fundamental part of personality and the activity of primary psychology in depth, which may rise to the surface in conscious awareness under special circumstances. Defense mechanism is a psychoanalytic term referring to the psychic apparatus utilized by the ego to cope with anxiety. It is regarded as a mental process that operates at an unconscious level. Recently, there has been an increasing awareness that the operation of defense mechanisms is subject to cultural influence. It is not only the frequent choice of certain defense mechanisms that is influenced by cultural factors, but also the categorization and definition of defense mechanisms into subgroups according to the poles of pathology. Also, the degrees of immature, neurotic, or mature depend on the values of the people in the different cultures, and the categories for subgrouping may also vary.