Throughout this course we discuss various theories of personality, including the general perspectives
from the Trait, Biological/Genetic/Evolutionary, Psychoanalytic, Neo-Freudian, Humanistic, Cognitive,
Learning/Motivation, Behavioral/Cultural traditions and more. Each perspective focuses on different elements
of personality, including description, motivations, and how personality develops. As we have discussed each of
these perspectives, hopefully you have tried to relate the perspectives to your own life and personality, coming
to understand yourself more fully. For this paper, I want you to share with me what you have learned about
yourself. The purpose of the assignment is to examine the workings of your own personality through the lenses
of the various perspectives we have discussed.
The contents of your paper will be treated as confidential information by myself and your TA. I expect
you to dig down into yourself and tell us what makes you tick. In examining your personality, integrate ideas
from the theories we have discussed and go into detail in explaining how these theories pertain to you. As you
are writing the paper and discussing your personality, you should be able to identify how a certain theory would
be able to explain your motivation or the development of your personality, and you will need to discuss that
theory in that context. How you structure your paper is completely up to you, however, in general, you need to
discuss the 3 major areas: description, motivation, and development in regard to the perspectives of your
choosing. That being said, the majority of the paper should be devoted to motivation and development.
Although it’s possible that one perspective or theory could be used to describe all facets of your own
personality, my guess is that you will utilize several theories and/or perspectives to really explain the inner
workings of your personality. Similarly, you do NOT have to utilize all the perspectives discussed in this class.
The paper should be between 5-7 pages, double spaced with a 1-inch margin and 12 pt. Times New Roman font.
You only need a short title at the top and your full name in the header, nothing else but that and your writing. I
won’t accept anything under 5 pages and please don’t give me anything longer than 8 pages. You should NOT
need to cite any sources for this paper because you should NOT use outside sources beyond this course.
This paper will be graded based on clarity of the information presented (20%), creativity (10%),
integration of theory (60%), spelling, grammar, and sentence structure (10%). Notice that the majority of
the points are related to the integration of theory. I want you to discuss your personality through
personality theories, describing how the theories we have discussed could be used to account for the
various facets of your personality (i.e. description, motivation and development). I DO NOT want a paper
telling me about the theories or the history of the theorists, I want you to use the theories to discuss
YOUR personality. Similarly, I DO NOT want a paper that focuses mostly on a description of your
personality with very little integration of theory. You may setup your paper any way you wish to make it
flow and be fully cohesive, but at the very minimum, please include each of the following in it:
I. Description: Describe your personality. Use information from the inventories you have completed in
this course as well as other characteristics that are important to you. Discuss relevant scores from at
least two scales (aka. measures, questionnaires, inventories) completed in this class while describing
your personality. Focus on information that is of high importance to your self concept.
II. Motivation: What really drives you? What are the underlying motivations that propel you to act the
way that you do? If you discuss external factors, then explain how the external factors relate to your
internal motives. How do your motives and personality interact together? Don’t forget to integrate
theory to explain these motivations.
III. Development: How did your personality develop into what exists today? If you can recall childhood
or life experiences that you think influenced the development of your personality, then use theory to
explain their impact. How has your personality continued to develop? Be specific in examples that you
give to demonstrate your understanding of the theories.
IV. Change: Would you like to be different, or are you happy with your personality? Do you think
personality change is possible? If so, how easy or difficult is it and what are the best methods for
change? Relate the possibility of change to the theory or theories to which your beliefs mostly adhere.
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