ABSTRACT
This chapter examines manner in which the individual acquires the core of human personality, which lies in self-consciousness or, briefly, in the self or ego. In order to trace the rise of the self from its organic foundations, it considers more fully the nature of interaction. The chapter explores genesis of the self within the framework of social acts, and discusses some aspects of its relation to status and sense of security. The growth of personality is dependent upon contact with material objects and especially with persons. Human interaction is characterized by the fact that the action of one individual calls forth a reaction of another which modifies or qualifies the subsequent act of the first. Young children play more or less individually; and interactions, are likely to be with adults or with other children who may take their toys, invade their play space, or otherwise interfere with their responses, at this level the interactions are of a rudimentary sort.
