ABSTRACT
Historically, the study of human personality has focused on the same objectives and issues to which this book is directed, using many of the same assumptions. Personality theory “is in sad shape” and the “vast proportion” of personality research “is inconsequential, trivial, and pointless” even though well done. Personality development involves “processes of internalization” through which infants and children develop an “inner life” and construct their own “world of reality,” which they rapidly learn to distinguish from their experiences with their bodies and their environments. Unlike a machine that can be constructed by assembling previously constructed parts, a person can only develop through differentiation, elaboration, and transformation of existing components through self-construction processes. The next developmental step involves constructing more broadly applicable behavior episode schemata (BES) by organizing several of the initial, narrow BES into broader patterns. Personal goals and values can be adopted from social observation as well as being self-constructed, and may produce conflicting values.
