are you aware? copyright © 2007 allyn & bacon mayers personality: a systems approach part 2:...
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Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Are You Aware?
Theme and Variation on
Topic 7. The Conscious Self
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Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
The Lecture and the Book…
• Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
1. What is the Conscious Self?
2. What Does it Mean for the Self to Be Conscious?
3. Does the Self Possess Free Will?
4. Are there Alternatives to the Conscious Self?
5. How is the Conscious Self Expressed?
• Lecture 7: Are You Aware?
– The Self as Knower
– Freud’s Ego
– Consciousness• Definition
• Evolution
– Conscious Flow
– Determinism and Free Will
– (If time) Unconscious selves
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Example 1: The Self-as-Knower (W. James)
• Self-as-Known: Model of Self
• Self-as-Knower: Awareness– Imagine losing…
• your memories before this morning
• sensations of your legs,
• sensations of your body
– How much can you lose, and still be a knower?
• Can we place agency within the Self-as-Knower?
Models
of the Self
“Self as Known”
Conscious
Awareness
“Self as Knower”
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Freud’s Ego
• The seat of consciousness, for Freud
• Part of three structures also including the– Id – primitive desires
– Superego – social dictates
Ego
SuperegoId
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Focus on Freud’s Ego
Access to Motility
the ego develops from the body
homunculus (the sensory-motor
portion of the cerebral cortex
that control movement). The
ego gives the green or red light
to acting in the world
The Preconscious and
Rational Thought
the ego contains learned
information and operates
with it in rational termsDefense
Mechanisms
protect consciousness
from painful thoughts
Consciousness
an internal sense organ
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Definition of Consciousness
• Earliest Definition:
We both know – as partners in a bridge game know...
• Later Conception:
Two parts of the mind know…
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Evolution of Consciousness
• Julian Jaynes believed there were no indications of self-reflection before 400 B.C.E.
• Before that, people heard voices inside their heads, and believed those voices came from gods.
Temple erected to the god Apollo
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Evolution of Consciousness
• Modern consciousness evolved when people recognized the internal voices were part of their own minds (as opposed to from gods)
• People began monitoring, controlling and modifying those internal voices
• …as well as distracting themselves from them (see photo to right)
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
The Flow Experience
• …Is a means of structuring consciousness
• …Its characteristics– Complete concentration– Low self-consciousness– Merging of action and awareness– Timelessness– Clear goals
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
The Flow Experience -- Bringing it About
Stressed,Anxious
Unchallenged, Bored
Low Skill Level High
High
Challenge
Low
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
The Conscious Self
Focus on Free Will, Voluntary Action
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Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Is the Self Determined? Or…
…can a ghost in the machine make changes?
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
The Sense of Free Will in DecisionsWill and Five Types of Decisions (James, W. Vol 2, Chapter on Will, pp. 531-534)
• The reasonable type decision. Matters settle themselves. We wake up, and things seem clear… We…sense… being free in seeing what is right.
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
The Sense of Free Will…
2. Ending hesitation due to outside forces. No way seems better than the other. We grow tired of the inconclusiveness…When outside forces say we must decide, we decide…one way or another, almost at chance.
3. Ending hesitation from within. We can no longer stand trying to figure out the best course of action. “Decide now!!!” we say – however reckless, and decide we do.
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
The Sense of Free Will…
4. Changes of heart… We suddenly become serious, our conscience awakens (or in some cases we become light and frivolous). Either way, the true answer seems clear.
5. “…we ourselves by our own willful act inclined the beam…the feeling of effort accompanies these…dreary resignation…[or the realization that by] murdering one alternative…[how much] he is making himself lose…the sense of inward effort.
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Determinism vs. Free Will in Religion• Calvinism
– God is sovereign and chooses things
– Because all people have sin, salvation is according to God’s choice
– God chooses who is saved, and did so before the creation of the world
• Arminianism– God wants all people to be saved– God’s election of people to
salvation is a product of their religious faith
– Salvation will occur if people are sufficiently faithful to the tenets of Christianity
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Determinism vs. Free Will in Science• Deterministic psychology
– Freud: Everything is determined by the major parts of the mind: e.g., conscious, unconscious, preconscious
– Skinner: Everything is determined by the nature of the organism in interaction with outside control…
• Free-will position– Pelletier: Indeterminism in physics
permits mental events to operate independently of the brain and to influence the brains events
– Sir John Eccles: The mind creates fields of “spatio-temporal” influence.
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Determinism vs. Free Will
• Zeno of Citium, the Stoic Philosopher (not to be confused with Zeno of Elias) cited in Chaplin & Krawiec Systems and
Theories of Psychology, 1979, pp. 10-11. • Believed that everything is fated, determined• One day, Zeno discovered a slave who was
stealing from him. The slave said “According to your very teachings, it was determined that I would steal. Therefore, I am not personally responsible.”
• Zeno replied: “It has also been determined that I will beat you.”
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
The Ethical Tradition in Western Civilization
• There exists self-determinism in conduct• This conflicts with certain aspects of
science• Yet, until science proves there is strict
determinism, self-determinism – that is, free will, remains viable.
• From Chaplin & Krawiec (1979), Theories of Psychology pp. 10-11)
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Freedom from the Free Will Debate
• Libet’s finger raising experiment: – Instruction: Say when you will raise
your finger– A negative electrical shift in the brain
arises related to raising a finger– 300 to 400 milliseconds later,
participants said they were going to start
• People don’t know when they exert will!
• From Chaplin & Krawiec (1979), Theories of Psychology pp. 10-11)
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Freedom from the Free Will Debate
• Wegner’s cursor control study– Confederate and
participant co-controlled cursor
– Participant stops on an image “by choice”
– Sometimes the confederate controls it; sometimes not
• People don’t know when they control the cursor!
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
The Conscious Self
Focus on Unconscious Alternatives
This multimedia product and its contents are protected under copyright law. The following are prohibited by law:• any public performance or display, including transmission of any image over a network;• preparation of any derivative work, including the extraction, in whole or in part, of any image;• any rental, lease, or lending of the program.
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Are there Unconscious Agencies…
• Are there some parts of personality that are:– Unconscious– Yet still exert free will?
• An agency is a part of personality that exerts free will.
• Usually, agencies are “superparts” combining many functional areas of personality.
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Freud’s Concept of the Id
• The “it” dreams• Source of all mental
energy• Primary process
– Dreams– Fantasies– Elicits pleasures– Source of energy
• Unconscious
Aims of Desire
the id identifies what
it wants; this information
is communicated to the ego
Dreams and Fantasies
Play out and experiment
with desires
Mental Energy
Sexual desire; Aggressive desire
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
The superego
• Originates around age 3-5
• Instills cultural values
• Developed through identification with parents, and fear of their punishment
• (Older explanation: Oedipal/Electra complexes)
• Sometimes conscious, sometimes not
Ego-Ideal
(Ideal Self)Conscience
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Alters and Dissociative Identity Disorder
• The presence of two or more distinct identities or personality states, each with its own relatively enduring pattern of perceiving, relating to, and thinking about the environment and self
• At least two of these identities or personality states recurrently take control of the person’s behavior
• Inability to recall important personal information that is too extensive to be explained by ordinary forgetfulness.
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Alters and Dissociative Identity Disorder
Relationships Among Personalities • Called alternate personalities or
subpersonalities• Switching – sudden and dramatic
(growling, twitching, blinking)• Various Relationships
– Mutually cognizant (all know one another)
– Mutually amnestic (no awareness of each other)
– One-way amnestic – Etc.
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
A Case Study of Dissociative Identity Disorder
• Presenting problem: – A mother, Julie, and her son, age 9, are the
clients.– The child had been under performing at school
and poor social relations• Early History of Therapy
– Five weeks of family therapy proceed and some progress appears to be occurring
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
• On Week 6, Julie says, “Doctor, there is someone I’d like to introduce to you.”
• The therapist expected her to go to waiting room and introduce someone.
• Instead, the woman closed her eyes, frowned, and opened eyes saying, “I wish Julie would stop smoking, I hate the taste of tobacco.” -- Introduced self as Jerrie; Later in hour, introduced Jenny, as 3rd personality.
A Case Study of Dissociative Identity Disorder
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
• Birth to 3: Original personality : Jenny– Ages 3-7: Physical Welfare neglected; sexually
molested by neighbor • Age 3: Jenny Invents Jerrie, a tough masculine
figure able to cope.– Age 8: parents gave her away as “incorrigible”
• Age 8: Jenny Invents Julie, who is more sensitive and less vulnerable to cruelty; Julie knows Jenny, but not Jerrie.
A Case Study of Dissociative Identity Disorder
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
• Age 18: Jerrie and Julie alternate as external personalities; Jenny is always inside.
• Age 24: Jerrie marries; adopts Adam from husband’s previous marriage
A Case Study of Dissociative Identity Disorder
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
Jenny Julie Jerrie
Frightened, shy, vulnerable. Felt she had created two Frankensteins now out of her control; hoped to integrate Julie and Jerrie as best mother for Adam.
Best mother, but rather stubborn and very strong individually. Heavy smoker. Julie took LSD and then let Jerrie out to victimize her.
Tough, able to cope, homosexual, dressed in masculine fashion. Sophisticated, sure, accomplished in the business world. Doesn’t smoke or do drugs.
A Case Study of Dissociative Identity Disorder
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
• Jerrie told Adam there were two personalities who had contributed to his misery.
• Adam: “Mother is two people who keep going in and out, but both of them love me.” He was relieved rather than disturbed.
• Julie admitted herself to a psychiatric hospital with suicidal depression, but Jerrie talked her way out, and that was the last seen of them.
A Case Study of Dissociative Identity Disorder
Part 2: Parts of Personality Chapter 7: The Conscious Self
Are You Aware?
Copyright © 2007 Allyn & Bacon Mayer’s Personality: A Systems Approach
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