PRESIDENT OBAMA

Case Study for President Obama

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Abstract

This paper analyzes the personality of President Barack Obama. The parameters used in this study to analyze personality of Obama are Erikson, Kohlberg, Maslow and McClelland theories.

Case Study for President Obama

Introduction

Barack Obama was born in Honolulu in 1961 and belongs to mixed heritage. His father from Kenya, and was a first student from an African country who entered the University of Hawaii. Obama's mother was initially from Kansas, where her few ancestor had been involved in activities of anti-slavery during 1800s.

Obama parents got divorced when he was ten. His mother remarried an Indonesian man who used to work at oil industry. At the age of six, he moved to Indonesia and came back to Hawaii to live with his maternal grandparents. Later on, Obama's mother and sister also came back to Hawaii. Called “Barry” by his friends and family, Obama was sent to the Punahou School, which was a prestigious academy of Honolulu, where Obama was the only black student handful. In his teens, he recalled feeling divergence regarding his mixed heritage (Walters, 2007).

During his childhood, he was more focused on playing basketball instead of studies; therefore, he was used to play basketball for hours. At that time, he got exposure to drugs explicitly cocaine and marijuana, as a number of juvenile African American felt that they have to fight back against society in order to provide his blackness; however, this behavior eventually resulted in self-destructive behavior.

Discussion

The key element of psychosocial stage theory of Erikson refers to the ego identity development. It is basically refers to the conscious self sense as a result of social interaction. Obama ego identity is constantly changing due to new information and experience he acquire in each phase of life. Erikson classified his theory into eight psychosocial stages.

The first stage is of trust vs. mistrust. In this stage, the development of a child is solely based on the quality and dependability of the child's caregivers. In case of Barack Obama, this life phase is full of trust because of his parent give him a quality care. As a result, he become able develops trust, which makes him belief that the world is predictable and consistent. The second psychological stage is autonomy vs. shame and doubt refers to a greater sense of personal control. At this stage, due to mixed-heritage Obama developed a sense of self-doubt and inadequacy. Third stage refers to initiative vs. guilt, which argue about pre-schooling the years where a child start to assert their control and power over the world through social interaction and play. Despite the circumstances, Obama faced during infancy, he depicted the ability to lead others since early childhood. At the fourth stage of industry vs. inferiority, he starts to develop a pride sense through social interaction in their abilities and accomplishment. However, his parents' divorce makes him little disturb; on the other hand, he was continuously encouraged by his teachers and parents. Fifth stage is no ...