Importance Of Personality Theory

When studying Personality Theory as a discipline, as well as other fields in psychology, it is important to understand why it is a discipline. Well known theorists have attempted to view and understand human life though a certain lens in order to explore the many convolutions of an individual’s personality, and wonder and ask questions about human nature and personality. It is through this exploration that the discipline has evolved as a science since Freudian times.
As in all aspects of science, ideas, questions and notions need to be researched and tested to be understood fully or proven. Researchers’ start with formulating a theory where the principles are precisely stated in order to express a clear hypothesis (Feist et al p. 5). A theory …show more content…
5). The hypothesis is a suggested explanation or preliminary idea of how something works, many call it an educated guess or possible explanation for something, which should be able to be tested and needs to be able to be proven false if necessary. This is a cyclical process, where more hypotheses can be added and determined as the theory develops (p. 8). A theory must be able to generate research, be able to be organized or categorized as well have the ability to give a platform or structure to ‘guide actions’, like using the ‘if this then, what?’ notion (Jameson, PPT). For example, in order to find a workable answer a psychologist could ask: if the patient suffers from low self-esteem and melancholy, then …show more content…
There are two types of research; qualitative and quantitative. Quantitative research (which this Personality Theories class is based on), involves hypothesis testing, where predictions are made on the hypothesis (Jameson, PPT presentation). The researcher tests the hypothesis with the data collected in the research. Whereas the purpose of qualitative research is to understand and interpret social interactions and often involves people observation, and can also take the form of conducting interviews and asking people open ended questions (avoiding leading questions) like: ‘what do you feel about that?’. In quantitative research, a researcher uses assessment techniques, otherwise known as instruments (like questionnaires and surveys) to be able to predict a conclusion. There are two empirical imperatives that ensure that these assessments are useful, namely, the instrument must be reliable and valid. Reliability is determined when the instrument yields consistent results and validity is the ‘degree to which the instrument/experiment design measures what it is supposed to measure’ (Jameson,