Personality by Liam Thatcher

Personality

lthatch282 — 2025-04-07 00:39:21 UTC

Whenever someone asked me what personality is I would just answer with "It's the traits that make us who we are." But I could not nuance it beyond that. Before this course, I didn't understand the concept of personality. I understood that its traits stemmed from environments and experiences. Still, I couldn't answer the more profound questions like "Why are our personalities so different even if we came from similar environments?" I also didn't know how personalities were categorized and frankly my personality. It seemed like there was so much explaining for something seemly so simple with it actually proving to be far more complicated than I originally thought.

How did you discover this topic in the course?

lthatch282 — 2025-04-07 01:20:39 UTC

I originally found this topic via the modules and weekly reading but what really struck my interest and attention was the personality test we took for our discussion. While taking the personality test I not only learned what personality I was but also what questions go into deciphering one's personality. Once I understood what my personality was which was an INFJ I became super interested in why my personality was the way that it was. This caused me to look at the different theories that we had stated in our module.

What were your initial thoughts about it before learning more?

lthatch282 — 2025-04-07 01:28:27 UTC

For the most part I had a basic idea of the concept of personality but I couldn't really explain it. Part of this is because emotions and personality aren't completely understood phenomena, which you can see from the multitude of theories on our modules. I had a lot of confusion about what traits where and how they connect to personality. I didn't know if all of our personality was based in a single trait or if a multitude of different while equally dominent traits accumulated into a personality. I also felt that ones personality gets to a certain stage where it cannot be changed completely. Even though one could go through a certain event that might make them act different their personality is what it is.

How have your views or understanding changed after studying this concept?

lthatch282 — 2025-04-07 01:52:45 UTC

My understanding developed as I didn't know much about personality and traits to begin with. I thought personality was fairly cut and dry before this but through looking at the modules I learned that it's more of the spectrum than anything. Although we have certain labels for the types of personalities everyone is different. I think about it as parts of DNA, each trait comes together to create a unique personality just as each special part of DNA comes together to make a being. There are a lot of theories on the subject which had me very overwhelmed to begin with but I found understanding by connecting all of them. I liked Frued's description of levels of consciousness, where a lot of what we do is without us thinking and occurs naturally. He argued that a lot of what we want to do comes from our natural urges, I felt this paired well with the theories of Hans and Sybil Eysenck who argued that a lot of our personality traits stem from biological factors. I also liked their five-factor model which allows us to categorize personalities, although it's a fairly basic form of categorization it separates some generalized traits for a better understanding. I now understand that personality is an all-encompassing experience, in life, we experience and learn things that morph our personality. We also are born with a natural set of traits that help us understand and make sense of the experiences we have which form our personality.

Article of Choice

lthatch282 — 2025-04-07 02:29:23 UTC

The article I selected furthered my understanding of personality by answering a question I stated earlier which was how twins' personalities can be so different even though they are genetically similar. It first talks about the nature versus nurture aspect of a personality and how lived experiences affect personality. This showed me that personality is not only purely genetic but stems from all lived experiences. One little difference in the early stage of one twin's life can have a drastic impact on their personality and the traits that come with it. The article interviewed identical twins Barbra and Christine and they both give testimony to their differences in traits. According to Barbara, "Christine is more conscientious about what she does. I am more confident. That became increasingly obvious as the years went by" (McKie, 2013). Christine herself adds, "I am more self-conscious and I suffer from serious depression. There is no sign of that in Barbara. We may be identical twins but we are very different in many ways” (McKie, 2013) Each twin share similar genic codes but lived separate lives with their own experiences causing them to have different personalities. This article also speaks on another concept we discussed in class epigenetics. The effects of our environment on our genes can cause us to become more stressed with certain events or more laid back, just as an example. All of these have impacts on our personalities showing the true complexity of developing your own unique personality.

McKie, R. (2013, June 1). Why do identical twins end up having such different lives? The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/jun/01/identical-twins-genes-different

My Career

lthatch282 — 2025-04-07 02:42:34 UTC

Although I am not 100% percent certain what I want to do, I have been heavily considering becoming a teacher. Understanding personalities and traits is key for this job as you know because you interact with so many and at the end of the day it's the teacher's responsibility to work with each individual personality and help them succeed. I understand the traits that come with a personality then I may be able to empathize and work with a student via understanding their personality type and what form of learning works best for them. This level of understanding of a person would also allow me to form a deeper relationship with the student and through my own personal experience this can make the learning a lot more effective but also fun as well. It's also equally important as a teacher to understand my own personality when it comes to teaching. This way I can know what my strengths and weaknesses are and create the best curriculum for my students and also for me to teach it them. All and all understanding what causes people's personalities and how to work them creates another level of understanding, understanding that assists in learning but also creates a hyper-inclusive and open learning environment.