0.18 Cognitive perspectives on personality development  (Page 9/30)

Threat is the awareness of imminent comprehensive change in one’s core structures.

Fear is like threat, except that, in this case, it is a new incidental construct, rather than a comprehensive construct, that seems about to take over.

Perception of one’s apparent dislodgment from his core role structure constitutes the experience of guilt.

Anxiety is the recognition that the events with which one is confronted lie outside the range of convenience of one’s construct system.

In each case, the psychological phenomenon is based on either the failure of one’s constructs to provide courses of action or a direct challenge to the system of constructs available to the individual. Given that the individual’s personal construct systems define the larger construct of self, these psychological phenomena represent a challenge to the very self experiencing them. In defense of the individual, aggressiveness is seen as the active elaboration of one’s perceptual field . In other words, aggressive individuals try to control events in ways that force decisions favorable to the individual. Similarly, hostility is viewed as the continued effort to extort validational evidence in favor of a type of social prediction which has already proved itself a failure . In this case, the individual tries to find confirmation of success following failed constructs, and this can only be done at the expense of others (Kelly, 1955a).

As people live their everyday lives, there are two typical cycles of transition, the C-P-C Cycle and the Creativity Cycle . The C-P-C Cycle involves circumspection, preemption, and control. Being circumspect refers to being wary, not taking risks. Thus, as we construe events we try to be precise in the development of our constructs. We then preempt these constructs for membership in an exclusive realm, one that best fits the event we are trying to predict and control. Finally, the first two steps have control as their natural consequence. Still, the individual must make the choice of that course of action, so Kelly suggests that the final C could just as well stand for choice as it does for control. In contrast, the Creativity Cycle begins with loose constructions, and then leads to tightened and validated constructions. What makes the Creativity Cycle meaningful is the individual’s ability to quickly experiment with various constructs and then seize upon the most promising, which is then tightened up and tested. Since much of this process is preverbal, the thought processes of creative individuals may not be apparent to others. According to Kelly, although individuals who begin with tight constructions might be productive, they cannot be creative. Creativity requires beginning with loose constructions (Kelly, 1955a). The value of creativity is not simply to be found as a distinction between the types of cycles experienced by individuals in their daily lives. Creativity is an important component of well-being, and a common topic in books on positive psychology and human strengths and virtues (Aspinwall&Staudinger, 2003; Cloninger, 2004; Compton, 2005; Peterson&Seligman, 2004; Snyder&Lopez, 2005). Indeed, Carl Rogers identified creativity as a significant aspect of the personality of a fully functioning person (Rogers, 1961).