Considering the impact of diet on physical, mental, and aesthetic well-being, the author sought to create a comprehensive picture of Dietetics - the art of living - through four books. However, as he wrote, it became clear that something important w...
What we are exploring: What is personality and how does it differ from character?
What is new: How does the Latin word "persona" help us understand the essence of "personality"?
What we will learn: How can understanding what personality represents encourage us to consider our authentic individuality and love ourselves?
1. Personality traits by themselves tell us nothing about the dynamics of personality functioning, and psychologists who seek to build complete theories of personality must turn to other methods to solve another important problem in personality psychology: integrating the many processes that influence the interactions of the individual with the physical and social environment - biological functions, development, learning, thinking, emotions, motivation, and social interaction - into a single concept of personality as a whole (Atkinson R.L., et al. 2003) [1].
2. The type of higher nervous activity ("genotype", temperament) should be distinguished from "character", "phenotype", or (the structure of higher nervous activity)* [mental activity, ed., author], which is a fusion of type traits and those traits that are acquired during the individual existence of a human (Teplov B.M. 1985) [2].
3. Character is a concept that is interpreted in a far from unambiguous way. There are difficulties in distinguishing between character and temperament (→temperament│character); even more, controversy arises when trying to separate the concepts of character and personality (Golovin S.Yu. 1998) [72].
4. Different terms for a similar concept. In the traditions of the development of the American and Russian (the successor to the Soviet) schools of psychology, terms related to the integrity of the human psychophysiological system are called differently. The American school postulates this integrity as personality, and the Russian school - as a character. A close comparison of the first and second epigraphs reveals the external similarity of the key phrases between the phrase "the unification of many processes that influence the interaction of an individual with the physical and social environment" and the phrase "the alloy of type traits and those traits that are acquired during the individual existence of a human. The common thing in these phrases is the words "unification" or "alloy" of physical and mental processes. The differences are manifested in what the authors of the quotations attribute these common words to. Atkinson R.L. and co-authors attribute them to social interaction, and Teplov B.M. attributes them to individual development in the process of life. Moreover, the concept of character is defined by different meanings and, as a result, disputes arise when trying to distinguish between the concept of character and the concept of personality (see epigraph 3). Nevertheless, the essence of the terms personality and character is different.
5. Personality vs. Character: What's the Difference? Many people use the terms personality and character interchangeably, without realizing that they refer to different aspects of the human psyche. Personality encompasses how we interact with society to live up to its changing standards. It reflects how others perceive us and how we seek to present ourselves to them. In contrast, character consists of the stable traits formed throughout a lifetime, reflecting our individual habits, behavior, and innate responses to various situations. Character reveals who a human really is, especially in circumstances where social standards and individual principles clash. But what is the fundamental difference between personality and character?
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