The Psychology of Personality Development

Personality development refers to the process of developing, enhancing, and changing one's personality over time. Such development occurs naturally over the course of life, but it can also be modified through intentional efforts.

When we meet new people, it is often their personality that grabs our attention. According to the American Psychological Association, personality refers to the enduring behaviors, traits, emotional patterns, and abilities that make up a person's response to the events of their life.

“Personality is a blend of behavioral and thought patterns that are relatively stable over time, characterizing an individual's traits and attitudes," says Ludovica Colella, a CBT therapist and author of "The Feel Good Journal."

Understanding how personality develops can provide insight into who someone is and their background while also increasing our understanding of what's behind our personality traits and characteristics.

What Is Personality Development?

Personality development refers to the process by which the organized thought and behavior patterns that make up a person's unique personality emerge over time. Many factors influence personality, including genetics and environment, how we were parented, and societal variables.

While personality is relatively stable, Colella notes that it isn't entirely fixed. "People can undergo changes in their attitudes, behaviors, and thought patterns in response to new experiences or personal growth,” she explains.

Perhaps most importantly, the ongoing interaction of all these influences continues to shape personality. Personality involves both inborn traits and the development of cognitive and behavioral patterns that influence how we think and act.

Personality development has been a major topic of interest for some of the most prominent thinkers in psychology. Since the inception of psychology as a separate science, researchers have proposed a variety of ideas to explain how and why personality develops.

Theories of Personality Development

Our personalities make us unique, but how does personality develop? What factors play the most important role in the formation of personality? Can personality change?

To answer these questions, many prominent thinkers have developed theories to describe the various steps and stages that occur during the development of personality. The following theories focus on several aspects of personality formation—including those that involve cognitive, social, and moral development.

Freud’s Stages of Psychosexual Development

In his well-known stage theory of psychosexual development, Sigmund Freud suggested that personality develops in stages that are related to specific erogenous zones. These stages are:

• Stage 1: Oral stage (birth to 1 year)
• Stage 2: Anal stage (1 to 3 years)
• Stage 3: Phallic stage (3 to 6 years)
• Stage 4: Latent period (age 6 to puberty)
• Stage 5: Genital stage (puberty to death)

Freud also believed that failure to complete these stages would lead to personality problems in adulthood.

Freud's Structural Model of Personality

Freud not only theorized about how personality developed over the course of childhood, but he also developed a framework for how overall personality is structured.

According to Freud, the basic driving force of personality and behavior is known as the libido. This libidinal energy fuels the three components that make up personality: the id, the ego, and the superego.

• The id is the aspect of personality present at birth. It is the most primal part of the personality and drives people to fulfill their most basic needs and urges.
• The ego is the aspect of personality charged with controlling the urges of the id and forcing it to behave in realistic ways.
• The superego is the final aspect of personality to develop and contains all of the ideals, morals, and values imbued by our parents and culture.

According to Freud, these three elements of personality work together to create complex human behaviors. The superego attempts to make the ego behave according to these ideals. The ego must then moderate between the primal needs of the id, the idealistic standards of the superego, and reality.

Freud's concept of the id, ego, and superego has gained prominence in popular culture, despite a lack of support and considerable skepticism from many researchers.

Erikson’s Stages of Psychosocial Development

Erik Erikson’s eight-stage theory of human development is another well-known theory in psychology. While it builds on Freud’s stages of psychosexual development, Erikson chose to focus on how social relationships impact personality development.

The theory also extends beyond childhood to look at development across the entire lifespan.

Erikson's eight stages are:

• Stage 1: Trust versus mistrust (birth to 1 year)
• Stage 2: Autonomy versus shame and doubt (1 to 2 years)
• Stage 3: Initiative versus guilt (3 to 5 years)
• Stage 4: Industry versus inferiority (6 to 11 years)
• Stage 5: Identity versus role confusion (12 to 18 years)
• Stage 6: Intimacy versus isolation (19 to 40 years)
• Stage 7: Generativity versus stagnation (41 to 64 years)
• Stage 8: Integrity versus despair (65 years to death)
  

However, Erikson believed that those who do not resolve the crisis at a particular stage may struggle with those skills for the remainder of their lives.

Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development

Jean Piaget’s theory of cognitive development remains one of the most frequently cited in psychology.

According to Piaget, children progress through a series of four stages that are marked by distinctive changes in how they think. And how children think about themselves, others, and the world around them plays an essential role in personality development. 

Piaget's four stages are:

• Stage 1: Sensorimotor stage (birth to 2 years)
• Stage 2: Preoperational stage (2 to 7 years)
• Stage 3: Concrete operational stage (7 to 11 years)
• Stage 4: Formal operational stage (12 years and up)

Kohlberg’s Stages of Moral Development

Lawrence Kohlberg developed a theory of personality development that focused on the growth of moral thought. Building on a two-stage process proposed by Piaget, Kohlberg expanded the theory to include six different stages:

• Stage 1: Obedience and punishment
• Stage 2: Individualism and exchange
• Stage 3: Developing good interpersonal relationships
• Stage 4: Maintaining social order
• Stage 5: Social contract and individual rights
• Stage 6: Universal principles

These stages are separated by levels. Level one is the pre-conventional level, it includes stages one and two, and takes place from birth to 9 years. Level two is the conventional level, it includes stages three and four, and takes place from age 10 to adolescence. Level three is the post-conventional level, it includes stages five and six, and takes place in adulthood.

Kohlberg's theory of moral development has been criticized for several different reasons. One primary criticism is that it does not accommodate different genders and cultures equally. Yet, the theory remains important in our understanding of how personality develops.

5 Basic Personality Traits

The goal of personality development theories is to explain how we each develop our own unique characteristics and traits. While the list of options could be almost endless, most of these personality traits fall into five basic categories:

• Openness: Level of creativeness and responsiveness to change
• Conscientiousness: Level of organization and attention to detail
• Extraversion: Level of socialness and emotional expressiveness
• Agreeableness: Level of interest in others and cooperativeness
• Neuroticism: Level of emotional stability and moodiness

The "Big 5" is one of the most recognized models of personality and also the most widely used, though some suggest that it isn't comprehensive enough to cover the huge variety of personality traits that one can grow and develop.

Personality Development Tips

Theorists such as Freud believed that personality was largely set in stone fairly early in life. However, we now recognize that personality can change over time.

On a global level, people spend a lot of money on personal development, with this market bringing in more than $38 billion annually (and expected to grow). If you're interested in making positive changes to your personality, these tips can help:

Identify Your Current Traits

Colella notes that self-awareness and reflection are an essential part of personal growth. She suggests that you can start by learning more about your traits, strengths, and weaknesses.

You won't know where to place your efforts if you don't identify the personality traits you need to work on. A personality test can provide an assessment of your current traits. Pick one or two traits to work on that you feel would help you grow as a person and focus on them. You can try our fast and free personality test as a good starting point:

Identify Your Values

Colella also suggests that it is important to identify your core values. You can do this by thinking about the values that are the most important to you. After you do this, you can prioritize your goals and better reflect on how your behaviors and actions align with your goals and values.

Set a Daily Personal Development Goal

Commit to doing at least one thing every day to help develop your personality. This doesn't have to be a big action either. Even baby steps will move you in the right direction.

Keep a Positive Mindset

It is also important to work on forging a growth mindset, Colella explains. This allows you to recognize that personality is not set it stone and can instead evolve over time. "Embrace challenges, learn from failures, and see setbacks as opportunities for growth," Colella says.

Changing yourself can be difficult, especially if you're working on a part of your personality you've had for a long time. Staying positive along the way helps you pay more attention to the pros versus the cons. It also makes the journey more enjoyable for you and everyone around you.

Be Confident

When you have something about yourself that you'd like to change, it can be easy to let your perceived imperfection reduce your confidence. Yet, you can be confident and continue to develop your personality in meaningful ways at the same time, giving you the best of both worlds while pursuing personality development.

Stepping outside your comfort zone can be challenging, Colella notes, but slowly expanding your horizons can lead to gradual growth. "Expanding your comfort zone involves taking small, manageable steps, gradually pushing your limits at a pace that feels comfortable for you," she explains.