Page 169 - DMGT402_MANAGEMENT_PRACTICES_AND_ORGANIZATIONAL_BEHAVIOUR

Management Practices and Organisational Behaviour

Notes 8.8.2 Major Determinants of Personality

What determines personality? Of all the complexities and unanswered questions in the study of
human behaviour, this question may be the most difficult. People are enormously complex;
their abilities and interests and attitudes are diverse. An early argument in personality research
was whether an individual's personality was the result of heredity or environment. Was the
personality predetermined at birth, or was it the result of the individual's interaction with his or
her environment? Personality appears to be a result of both influences. Additionally, today we
recognize another factor – the situation. The problem lies in the fact that cognitive and
psychological processes, plus many other variables, all contribute to personality. The problem
lies in the fact that the cognitive and psychological processes, plus many other variables, all
contribute to personality. The determinants of personality can perhaps best be grouped in five
broad categories: biological, cultural, family, social and situational.
1. Biological Factors: The study of the biological contributions to personality may be studied
under three heads:
(a) Heredity: Heredity refers to those factors that were determined at conception. Physical
stature, facial attractiveness, sex, temperament, muscle composition and reflexes,
energy level, and biological rhythms are characteristics that are considered to be
inherent from one's parents. The heredity approach argues that the ultimate
explanation of an individual's personality is the molecular structure of the genes,
located in the chromosomes.

Research on animals has showed that both physical and psychological characteristics
can be transmitted through heredity. But research on human beings is inadequate to
support this viewpoint. However, psychologists and geneticists have accepted the
fact that heredity plays an important role in one's personality.
(b) Brain: The second biological approach is to concentrate on the role that the brain
plays in personality. Though researchers have made some promising inroads,
psychologists are unable to prove empirically the contribution of the human brain
in influencing personality. The most recent and exciting possibilities come from the
work done with electrical stimulation of the brain (ESB) and split-brain psychology.
Preliminary results from the electrical stimulation of the brain (ESB) research indicate
that a better understanding of human personality and behaviour might come from
a closer study of the brain. Work with ESB on human subjects is just beginning.
There seem to be definite areas in the human brain that are associated with pain and
pleasure. This being true, it may be possible physically to manipulate personality
through ESB.

(c) Biofeedback: Until recently, physiologists and psychologists felt that certain biological
functions such as brainwave patterns, gastric and hormonal secretions, and
fluctuations in blood pressure and skin temperature were beyond conscious control.
Now some scientists believe that these involuntary functions can be consciously
controlled through biofeedback techniques. In BFT, the individual learns the internal
rhythms of a particular body process through electronic signals that are feedback
from equipment that is wired to the body. From this biofeedback, the person can
learn to control the body process in question. More research is needed on biofeedback
before any definitive conclusions can be drawn, but its potential impact could be
extremely interesting for the future.
(d) Physical features: A vital ingredient of the personality, an individual's external
appearance, is biologically determined. The fact that a person is tall or short, fat or
skinny, black or white will influence the person's effect on others and this in turn,

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