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Humanistic and Existential Personality Theories Paper

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Humanistic and Existential Personality Theories Paper

PSY 405

February 15, 2014

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University of Phoenix

Humanistic and Existential Personality Theory

Although philosophers and psychologists interpret existentialism in a variety of ways, some common elements are found among most existential thinkers. First, existence takes precedence over essence. Existence means to emerge or to become; essence implies a static immutable substance. Existence suggests process; essence refers to a product. Existence is associated with growth and change; essence signifies stagnation and finality. (Fiest, Feist & Roberts (2013) Humanistic and Existential Personality Theories offered perspectives that have proven to be valuable. Humanistic and Existential theories focus on the different aspects of an individual in their journey toward self-actualization. From Carl Rogers’s development of the actualizing tendency and the formative tendency to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, there is a diverse range of perspective. In this paper, we will analyze how humanistic and existential theories affect individual personalities and explain how these personality theories influence interpersonal relationships.
Effect on Individual Personalities
Our personalities consist of many complex characteristics and have been classified into a wide array of theories. One main concept of these theories is known as the Learning theory. Learning theory is defined as the process by which humans learn or how they accommodate a relatively permanent behavioral change or its potential (Feist, Feist & Roberts, 2013). With this said, it is essentially the conceptual framework of our minds and encompass how information is absorbed, processed and retained. Some of the most influential work in regards to humanistic and existential personality theories belong to Abraham H. Maslow, Carl

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