George Kellys theory of personal constructs.
A theory used in Personality Psychology that in many respects was ahead of its time.
George Kelly's theory of personal constructs was ahead of its time in describing human personality in a manner similar to the constructivist models that have become popular in recent decades.
In this sense Kelly's work cannot be framed strictly within the cognitivist orientation, dominant at the time.
Kelly's theory of personal constructs
The psychologist and educator George Alexander Kelly (1905-1967) presented his model of personality in his two fundamental works: "Theory of personal constructs", published in 1955, and "Personality theory", 1966.
Similar to factorial or trait personality models (e.g. Raymond B. Cattell's or Costa and McCrae's Big Five), Kelly proposes the use of qualifying adjectives to explain personality. In this case, however, what is important is the way in which each individual constructs and gives meaning to the words in question. in question.
Kelly conceives of the human being as a scientist who constructs and modifies with experience his body of knowledge and hypotheses, or his philosophy of life, in order to anticipate the results of his behavior and other events. This takes place through the formation of personal constructs, descriptive categories that we use to conceptualize events.
Personal constructs are dichotomous and bipolar.This means that we understand personality and human experience in general from adjectives with opposite poles. Some examples of personal constructs would be the happy-sad, smart-dumb, and tall-short dichotomies. Constructs are not always bipolar, as we will see later.
This author considered that his perspective can be considered as "constructive alternativism". By this he meant that, in studying human personality and thinking, he wanted to focus on the relevance of an interpretation of reality for a particular person rather than on its degree of truthfulness in comparison with objective facts.
The eleven corollaries of this theory
The fundamental postulate of Kelly's theory states that all of an individual's psychological processes of an individual depend on the way he or she anticipates events.. Eleven corollaries are derived from this core idea, which are very useful to understand how personal constructs work and how personality develops according to this author.
1. Construct
Human beings use abstract thinking to construct mental models of reality and with them to predict events. Thus, from events of the past we anticipate those of the future..
Individuality
Psychological differences between people depend on the degree of similarity between their construct systems, that is, between their respective ways of constructing reality mentally, since it is these that determine behavior and mental contents.
3. Organization
Personal construct systems are organized hierarchically according to their scope of application. This avoids contradictions when predicting through different constructs, since there will always be one that has a greater weight.
4. Dichotomy
As we have said, according to Kelly, people conceptualize reality on the basis of opposite pairs of terms, such as "hot-cold" or "hot-cold" or "hot-cold".such as "hot-cold" or "nervous-quiet". When only one of the poles is known, we say that we are dealing with a submerged construct.
5. Choice
Extensive construct systems make it possible to predict many events but the risk of error is high; on the other hand, those that are more restrictive minimize the probability of failure but anticipate fewer events. People with a more risky character tend towards extension, and those with a more cautious character towards extension.and the cautious ones towards definition.
6. Scope
The corollary of scope or application refers to the fact that each construct is effective in predicting a certain range of phenomena. The concept "center of convenience" is used to talk about the aspects for which the construct is particularly useful.
7. Experience
Although life experience can modify a person's construct system, this does not happen spontaneously but takes place through the psychological construction we make of the events in question. The susceptibility to change of a given construct or construct system is a very relevant factor in personality. is a very relevant factor in personality.
8. Modulation
This postulate speaks of permeability, that is, of the capacity of a construct to introduce new elements into its scope of application and of the possibility of modifying the constructs hierarchically superior to it.
9. Fragmentation
Fragmentation is the capacity of a system of constructs to include subsystems of which contradictory predictions are extracted without leading to a disorganization of the whole.. This corollary is closely related to that of organization, since fragmentation depends on the hierarchization of the constructs.
10. Communality
A relevant aspect of Kelly's theory is the emphasis on the fact that the construct systems of two people who share the same culture will have a commonality. two people who share the same culture will be more likely to resemble each other than if they do not. than if they do not. Therefore, the same will be true for behavior, values and other psychological processes and mental contents.
11. Sociability
The eleventh and final corollary of the theory of personal constructs states that we are more likely to understand and like an individual if we are able to reproduce his or her construct system. This postulate can be clearly related to the concept of empathy, and is influenced by the communality corollary.
(Updated at Apr 12 / 2024)