Personality can be defined in different ways, depending on whether we focus on the individual or on people in general.

1. Prepared By: Ms.Faizal Antanat Shamila
Institution: Eastern University, Sri Lanka

2. Personality
Personality can be defined in different
ways, depending on whether we focus
on the individual or on people in
general.
A stable pattern of behaving, feeling
and thinking that distinguishes one
person from another and is stable
across time.
People are rarely absolutely consistent
from one situation to the next,
behaviour does vary across situation.
.

3. Determinants of Personality
Personality is the wide term, which is the result or net
effect of different circumstances and factors. There are
many factors which affect personality or which determine
the personality. Few among them are as follows:
 Heredity
 Brain
 Family Background
 Social group (where we interact)
 Situation
 Cultural Factor
 Physical Features

4. Heredity:
• Heredity is the transmission of qualities from generation to generation. It
refers to physical stature, facial attractiveness, sex, temperament, muscle
composition and reflexes, energy level, and biological rhythms are
characteristics that are considered to be inherent.
• This can happen due to chromosomes of the germ cell. Heredity
predisposes to certain physical, mental, emotional states. It has been
established through research on animals that physical and psychological
factor may be transmitted through heredity. It has been concluded from
various researches that heredity plays an important part in determining an
individual’s personality.
• Recent research studies shows that young children lend strong support to
the power of heredity and finding shows that some personality traits may
be built into the same genetic code that affects factors like height and hair
colour

5. Brain:
It is the second biological factor that affects the
personality of a person. Brain is the second biological
approach to determine personality. It plays an
important role in determining personality. The role of
brain in personality formation is very important. If a
person’s brain is sharp, he can understand the
situation better and take prompt decision. This
improves his personality.

6. Personality helps to the person to be a success in the world at the
same time failure also create the good personality.

7. Family Background (Members):
• Family factors are also major factors which influence to determine individual
personality. Family consists of husband and wife and their children's. Parents and
other family members have strong influence on the personality development of the
child. Parents have more influence on the personality development of a child as
compared to other members of the family. Family will be guided, supervised, take
care of all family members, cooperation, coordination and cooperation in work and
also explained the role and responsibilities towards the family, society and real
life. Family either directly or indirectly influence to person for development of
individual personality.
• Family influences the behaviour of a person especially in early stages. The nature of
such influence will depend upon the following factors:-
• Family Size
• Birth Order
• Race
• Religion
• Geographic location
• Parent’s educational level
• Socio- economic level of family

8. Social Groups:
Besides a person’s home environment and
family members, there are other influences
arising from the social placement of the family
as the person is exposed to agencies outside
the home (i.e. social groups) these social
groups includes school mates, friends,
colleagues at work place or any other group.

9. Situation:
Situational factors may also play an important role in
determination of human personality. Situational factors
are very important to change the individual behaviour in
a different circumstance at different situations, it also
influence to personality of
individual person.
Many a times, the behavior of a person is determined
not by how that man is but by what the situation is in
which he is places. An employee who is hard working
and always gets ahead may prove lazy and trouble maker
if he is put under unfavorable situation. This aspect is
very important because it can be kept in control by the
management.

10. The Interaction of Personality and Situational
Factors are outlined:
Strong situational pressures
Personality may not predict behaviour
Example: enforcement of rules
Weak Situational pressures
Personality may predict behaviour
Example: Customer sales representative
A strong situation can overwhelm the effects of
individual personalities by providing strong cues
for appropriate behaviour.

11. • Culture is the factor which determines the decision making
power of an individual. It refers to traditional practice,
customs, procedure, norms and rules and regulation
followed by the society. It significantly influence to individual
behaviour compare to biological factors.
• Cultural factors determine attitudes towards independence,
aggression, competition,
cooperation, positive thinking, team spirit, and a host of the
human being and
discharge his/her duties towards valuable responsibilities to
society.
• Each culture expects that the person should behave in a way,
which is accepted by the group. Personal belonging to
different cultural groups has different attitudes. Every culture
has their own sub-culture also.
• However, a direct relationship cannot be established between
personality and given culture.

12. Physical Features:
The physical features of the individual also have a great impact on
personality of an individual. It is third biological approach to
determine personality.
It is vital ingredient of the personality, it focus an individual person's
external appearance which also determined the personality.
Physical features include height, weight and such other physical
aspect of an individual. Physical features like tall or short, fat or
skinny, black or white. These physical
features will be influenced the personal effect on others and also
affect self concept
of individual.
Recent research studies shows that definitely this features influence
to individual personality in an organization.

13. Tips to improve your Personality
• Greet everyone with a smile
• Be a better listener
• Be confident about who are you
• Don’t be afraid to be your self
• Becoming more interesting people
• Be Positive
• Be encouraging supporting to others
• Treat people with respect
• Don’t talk bad things about others
• Do Prayer

14. Big Five Dimensions of Personality
Today, many researchers believe that they are
five core personality traits. It is important to
note that each of the five personality factors
represents a range between two extremes. For
example, extraversion represents a continuum
between extreme extraversion and
extreme introversion. In the real world, most
people lie somewhere in between the two polar
ends of each dimension.

15. Emotional stability
Conscientiousness
Openness to
experience
Agreeableness
Extroversion.
Careful, dependable, self-
disciplined
Relaxed, secure, calm
Sensitive, flexible, creative,
curious
Courteous, good-nature,
empathic, caring
Outgoing, talkative, sociable,
assertive

16. 1. Extraversion
Extraversion is characterized by sociability, talkativeness,
assertiveness and high amounts of emotional expressiveness.
People who are high in extraversion are outgoing and tend to
gain energy in social situations. People who are low in
extraversion (or introverted) tend to be more reserved and have
to expend energy in social settings.
People who rate high on extraversion tend to:
• Enjoy being the center of attention
• Like to start conversations
• Enjoy meeting new people
• Have a wide social circle of friends
• Find it easy to make new friends
• Feel energized when they are around other people
• Say things before they think about them

17. People who rate low on extraversion tend to:
• Prefer to be alone
• Find it difficult to start conversations
• Dislike making small talk
• Carefully think things through before they
speak
• Dislike being the center of attention

18. 2. Agreeableness
This personality dimension includes attributes such as
trust, altruism, kindness, affection, and other prosocial
behaviours. People who are high in agreeableness tend to
be more cooperative while those low in this trait tend to
be more competitive and even manipulative.
People who are high in the trait of agreeableness tend to:
• Have a great deal of interest in other people
• Care about others
• Feel empathy and concern for other people
• Enjoy helping and contributing to the happiness of
other people

19. Those who are low in this trait tend to:
• Take little interest in others
• Don't care about how other people feel
• Have little interest in other people's
problems
• Insult and belittle others

20. 3. Conscientiousness
Standard features of this dimension include high
levels of thoughtfulness, with good impulse control
and goal-directed behaviours.
Highly conscientiousness tends to be organized and
mindful of details.
Those who are high on the conscientiousness
continuum also tend to:
• Spend time preparing
• Finish important tasks right away
• Pay attention to details
• Enjoy having a set schedule

21. People who are low in this trait tend to:
• Dislike structure and schedules
• Make messes and not take care of things
• Fail to return things or put them back where
they belong
• Procrastinate important tasks
• Fail to complete the things they are supposed
to do

22. 4. Neuroticism
Neuroticism is a trait characterized by sadness,
moodiness, and emotional instability. Individuals
who are high in this trait tend to experience
mood swings, irritability and sadness. Those low
in this trait tend to be more stable and
emotionally resilient.
Individuals who are high in neuroticism tend to:
• Experience a lot of stress
• Worry about many different things
• Get upset easily
• Experience dramatic shifts in mood

23. Those who are low in this trait are typically:
• Emotionally stable
• Deal well with stress
• Rarely feel sad or depressed
• Don't worry much
• Very relaxed

24. 5.Openness
This trait features characteristics such as imagination and
insight, and those high in this trait also tend to have a
broad range of interests. People who are high in this trait
tend to be more adventurous and creative. People low in
this trait are often much more traditional and may
struggle with abstract thinking.
People who are high on the openness continuum are
typically:
• Very creative
• Open to trying new things
• Focused on tackling new challenges
• Happy to think about abstract concepts

25. Those who are low on this trait:
• Dislike change
• Do not enjoy new things
• Resist new ideas
• Not very imaginative
• Dislikes abstract or theoretical concepts

26. Psychoanalytic theory – Freudian
Theory
• The founder of psychoanalytic theory
was Sigmund Freud.
• Before we can understand Freud's theory
of personality, we must first understand
his view of how the mind is organized.

27. According to Freud, the mind can be
divided into three main parts:
1. The conscious mind includes everything that we are aware
of. This is the aspect of our mental processing that we can
think and talk about rationally.
2. preconscious mind is a one of our mind. A part of this
includes our memory, which is not always part of
consciousness but can be retrieved easily at any time and
brought into our awareness. Freud called this ordinary
memory the preconscious. According to Freud, there is a
transition zone called the preconscious between the
conscious and unconscious minds. General a person is not
fully aware of information in the preconscious, but with
some effort and concentration, one may be able to become
aware of it.

28. • For example, what did you do last Thursday? You may
not remember immediately, but if you are able to work
backward day by day, and are given a few clues to help
you out, you might be able to recall a lot of the
information. This data is stored in the preconscious.
Sometimes a revelation about some information you
have taken for granted might hit you out of the blue.
You realize that you have known that information for a
long time, but you have never taken the care to
acknowledge it and examine it.
• For example, your nephew says he doesn’t like playing
in the backyard, but suddenly you realize it is because
he is terrified of big dogs and the neighbours own a
large dog. All kinds of data is stored in the preconscious
mind, and can be moved into the conscious mind with a
little effort.

29. 3. The unconscious mind is a tank of feelings, thoughts and
memories that outside of our conscious awareness.
Most of the contents of the unconscious are unacceptable or
unpleasant, such as feelings of pain, anxiety, or conflict.
According to Freud, the unconscious continues to influence our
behavior and experience, even though we are unaware of these
underlying influences.

30. Frued Iceberg.
Freud believed that the unconscious mind was much larger in
scope than the conscious mind. He used the image of an
iceberg to compare the conscious mind with the unconscious
mind. Only the tip of an iceberg shows about the surface of the
water – this is the conscious mind. The bulk of the iceberg, a
huge expanse of ice, – is out of sight beneath the surface of the
water – this is the unconscious mind.

31. STRUCTURAL MODEL (ID, EGO,
SUPEREGO)
According to Freud, we are born with our ID. The id is
an important part of our personality because as
newborns, it allows us to get our basic needs met. Freud
believed that the Id is based on our pleasure
principle. In other words, the Id wants whatever feels
good at the time, with no consideration for the reality of
the situation. When a child is hungry, the Id wants food,
and therefore the child cries. When the child needs to be
changed the Id cries. When the child is uncomfortable,
in pain, too hot, too cold, or just wants attention, the id
speaks up until his or her needs are met.

32. The ID doesn't care about reality, about the needs of
anyone else, only its own satisfaction. If you think
about it, babies are not real considerate of their parents'
wishes. They have no care for time, whether their
parents are sleeping, relaxing, eating dinner, or
bathing. When the ID wants something, nothing else is
important.
Within the next three years, as the child interacts more
and more with the world, the second part of the
personality begins to develop. Freud called this part
the EGO. The EGO is based on the reality
principle. The EGO understands that other people have
needs and desires and that sometimes being impulsive or
selfish can hurt us in the long run. It’s the EGO'S job to
meet the needs of the ID, while taking into consideration
the reality of the situation.

33. By the age of five, or the end of the phallic stage of
development, the SUPEREGO develops. The SUPEREGO is
the moral part of us and develops due to the moral and ethical
restraints placed on us by our caregivers. Many equate the
SUPEREGO with the conscience as it dictates our belief of
right and wrong.
In a healthy person, according to Freud, the EGO is the
strongest so that it can satisfy the needs of the ID, not upset the
SUPEREGO, and still take into consideration the reality of
every situation. Not an easy job by any means, but if the ID
gets too strong, impulses and self gratification take over the
person's life. If the SUPEREGO becomes to strong, the
person would be driven by rigid morals, would be judgmental
and unbending in his or her interactions with the world.

34. EGO DEFENSE MECHANISMS
We stated earlier that the EGO'S job was to satisfy the
id's impulses, not offend the moralistic character of the
SUPEREGO, while still taking into consideration the
reality of the situation. We also stated that this was not
an easy job. Think of the ID as the 'devil on your
shoulder' and the superego as the 'angel of your
shoulder.' We don't want either one to get too strong so
we talk to both of them, hear their perspective and then
make a decision. This decision is the EGO talking, the
one looking for that healthy balance. Before we can talk
more about this, we need to understand what drives the
id, ego, and superego. According to Freud, we only
have two drives; Sex and Aggression.

35. Sex, also called Eros or the Life force, represents our drive to
live, prosper, and produce offspring. Aggression, also called
Thanatos or our Death force, represents our need to stay alive
and stave off threats to our existence, our power, and our
prosperity.
Now the ego has a difficult time satisfying both the id and the
superego, but it doesn't have to do so without help. The ego
has some tools it can use in its job as the mediator; tools that
help defend the ego. These are called Ego Defense
Mechanisms or Defenses. When the ego has a difficult time
making both the id and the superego happy, it will employ one
or more of these defenses:

36. DEFENSE DESCRIPTION EXAMPLE
Denial arguing against an anxiety
provoking stimuli by
stating it doesn't exist
denying that your physician's diagnosis of
cancer is correct and seeking a second
opinion
Displacement taking out impulses on a
less threatening target
slamming a door instead of hitting as
person, yelling at your spouse after an
argument with your boss
Intellectualization avoiding unacceptable
emotions by focusing on
the intellectual aspects
focusing on the details of a funeral as
opposed to the sadness and grief
Projection placing unacceptable
impulses in yourself onto
someone else
when losing an argument, you state
"You're just Stupid;" homophobia

37. Rationalization supplying a logical or
rational reason as
opposed to the real
reason
stating that you were fired because you
didn't treat up the boss, when the real
reason was your poor performance

38. Reaction Formation taking the opposite belief
because the true belief
causes anxiety
having a bias against a particular race or
culture and then embracing that race or
culture to the extreme
Regression returning to a previous
stage of development
sitting in a corner and crying after
hearing bad news; throwing a temper
tantrum when you don't get your way
Repression pulling into the
unconscious
forgetting sexual abuse from your
childhood due to the trauma and anxiety
Sublimation acting out unacceptable
impulses in a socially
acceptable way
sublimating your aggressive impulses
toward a career as a boxer; becoming a
surgeon because of your desire to cut;
lifting weights to release 'pent up' energy
Suppression pushing into the
unconscious
trying to forget something that causes
you anxiety

39. Personality Formation
Half’s career stage model
The model suggests that an individual goes through four stages
during his career - exploration, establishment, maintenance
and decline.
In the exploration stage, the individual seeks an identity for
himself, attempts to understand himself and his personality,
and tries out various roles in his career. At this stage, the
employee is relatively unstable in his career and less
productive as he keeps switching between various jobs in
search of the right one.
In the Second stage, the establishment stage, the employee
tries to settle down in his job and interacts with co-workers to
develop a good relationship with them. The productivity of a
person increases during this stage.

40. • In the third stage, the maintenance stage, the productivity of
an employee reaches its peak and he feels the need to
contribute something to the next generation. He may even act
as mentor to his subordinates. At this stage, the productivity of
some people may increase further, while for some the
productivity may remain stagnant.
• The last stage in the career of an individual is the decline
stage. In this stage, the productivity of a person starts
declining. In this stage, the individual evaluates his life and
career and tries to convince himself that he made the right
decisions in his life. The decline stage may undergo drastic
changes in the years to come due to changes in the mandatory
retirement laws, advances in medical treatment and society's
expectations from the older generation ("gray power").

41. 2. Management Theory of Chris Argyris
Chris Argyris explored the concept of organizational learning
and its impact on a company's growth, effectiveness and
adaptability.
Personality changes
According to Argyris, seven changes should take place in the
personality of individuals if they are to develop into mature
people over the years.
• As for the immaturity/maturity continuum, the Chris Argyris
theory states that successful employee empowerment
requires management to provide opportunities for personal
growth in the same 7 areas in which children must mature as
they approach adulthood.

42. Along the immaturity/maturity continuum, employees must
move from:
• Passivity to activity;
• Dependence to independence;
• Few behaviours to many behaviours;
• Shallow interests to deep interests;
• Short-term perspective to long-term perspective;
• Subordination to equality or superiority; and
• Non self-awareness to self-awareness/self-control.

43. Emotion
Emotions are intense feelings that are
directed at someone or something. The
mainstream definition of emotion refers to a
feeling state involving thoughts, physiological
changes, and an outward expression or
behavior.

44. Physiological component of emotions
Many physiological changes take place in
an emotional state, in the form of changes in:
– Heart rate
– Pulse rate
– Respiration
– Blood pressure
– Digestion and appetite
– Muscular activity
– Body temperature
– Perspiration
– Endocrine and neurotransmitter secretions
– Blood sugar
– Salivary gland activity
– Pupil dilation

45. Positive and Negative mood
• Positive affect is a mood dimension consisting of positive emotions
such as excitement, self-assurance, and cheerfulness at the high
end, and boredom, sluggishness, and tiredness at the low end.
Negative affect is a mood dimension consisting of nervousness,
stress, and anxiety at the high end, and relaxation, tranquility, and
poise at the low end.
• Positive affect and negative affect play out at work (and beyond
work, of course) in that they color our perceptions, and these
perceptions can become their own reality. Importantly, negative
emotions are more likely to translate into negative moods. People
think about events that created strong negative emotions five times
as long as they do about events that created strong positive ones.
So, we should expect people to recall negative experiences more
readily than positive ones.

46. Sources of Emotions
• Personality
• Time of Day and Week
• The Weather
• Stress
• Social interactions
• Sleep
• Exercise
• Age
• Gender

47. Emotional Intelligence
Emotional intelligence (EI) is one’s ability to detect and to
manage emotional cues and information. People who know
their own emotions and are good at reading others’
emotions may be more effective in their jobs. That, in
essence, is the theme underlying recent EI research.
EI is composed of five dimensions:
• Self-awareness—being aware of what you’re feeling
• Self-management—the ability to manage your own
emotions and impulses
• Self-motivation—the ability to persist in the face of
setbacks and failures
• Empathy—the ability to sense how others are feeling
• Social skills—the ability to handle the emotions of others

48. EQ Competencies that Correlate to Workplace Success
The following outlines a set of five emotional intelligence
competencies that have proven to contribute more to
workplace achievement than technical skills, cognitive ability,
and standard personality traits combined.
Intuition & Empathy: Our awareness of others' feelings,
needs, and concerns. This competency is important in the
workplace for the following reasons.
Understanding others: an intuitive sense of others' feelings and
perspectives, and showing an active interest in their concerns
and interests
Customer service orientation: the ability to anticipate,
recognize, and meet customers' needs
People development: ability to sense what others need in order
to grow, develop, and master their strengths
Leveraging diversity: cultivating opportunities through diverse
people

49. • Political Acumen & Social Skills: Our adeptness at inducing desirable
responses in others. This competency is important in the workplace for the
following reasons.
• Influencing: using effective tactics and techniques for persuasion and
desired results
• Communication: sending clear and convincing messages that are
understood by others
• Leadership: inspiring and guiding groups of people
• Change catalyst: initiating and/or managing change in the workplace
• Conflict resolution: negotiating and resolving disagreements with people
• Building bonds: nurturing instrumental relationships for business success
• Collaboration and cooperation: working with co-workers and business
partners toward shared goals
• Team capabilities: creating group synergy in pursuing collective goals
•

50. • Self Awareness: Knowing one's internal states,
preferences, resources, and intuitions. This
competency is important in the workplace for the
following reasons.
• Emotional awareness: recognizing one's
emotions and their effects and impact on those
around us
• Accurate self-assessment: knowing one's
strengths and limits
• Self-confidence: sureness about one's self-worth
and capabilities
•

51. • Self Regulation: Managing one's internal states,
impulses, and resources. This competency is
important in the workplace for the following
reasons.
• Self-control: managing disruptive emotions and
impulses
• Trustworthiness: maintaining standards of
honesty and integrity
• Conscientiousness: taking responsibility and
being accountable for personal performance
• Adaptability: flexibility in handling change
• Innovation: being comfortable with an openness
to novel ideas, approaches, and new information

52. • Self Expectations & Motivation:
• Emotional tendencies that guide or facilitate
reaching goals. This competency is important in
the workplace for the following reasons.
• Achievement drive: striving to improve or meet a
standard of excellence we impose on ourselves
• Commitment: aligning with the goals of the group
or organization
• Initiative: readiness to act on opportunities
without having to be told
• Optimism: persistence in pursuing goals despite
obstacles and setbacks
•

53. Thank You