ABSTRACT
What is meant by the word “personality”? According to Child (1968, p. 83), personality consists of “the more or less stable, internal factors that make one person’s behaviour consistent from one time to another, and different from the behaviour other people would manifest in comparable situations”. There are four key words in that definition:
• Stable: Personality remains relatively constant or unchanging over time. • Internal: Personality lies within us, but the ways in which we behave are
determined in part by our personality. • Consistent: If personality remains constant over time, and if personality
determines behaviour, then we would expect people to behave in fairly consistent ways.
