Psychology of Personality



Table of Contents

Introduction3

Personality Theories3

Sigmund Freud3

Early Development and Subconscious4

Psychoanalysis6

Hitler's Personality7

Erich Fromm11

Hitler and Authoritarian Personality12

Conclusion16

Psychology of Personality

Introduction

Adolph Hitler, narcissistic personality, draws a lot of attention even before the first war. His existential crisis of 1918 took the form of an Initial Psychotic. His anti-Semitic delirium got placed in the centre of defense's hypochondriacs. He discovered the power of his word and became a prophet of German revival. He managed to carry on the service of his narcissism. All these aspects raise questions on his controversial personality. In this work, one seeks to clarify a few moments of this process of mass genocide based on Hitler's personality; his personality is viewed in terms of the major theories of two major figures namely, Sigmund Freud and Eric Fromm.

Personality Theories

Sigmund Freud

Sigmund Freud  was an Austrian physician, psychoanalyst and critic of religion, regarded and the founder of psychoanalysis who gained worldwide recognition . Freud is one of the most influential thinkers of the 20th Century, his theories and methods are discussed controversially until today. With the development of psychoanalysis, Freud's perception of mental suffering of people changed. Once known as Crazy for centuries he studied the scientific psychology of his time with the exact description of cognitive phenomena. He carefully recorded every word and every nuance contained within human behavior, to find hidden meanings (Greenwald, 1980, 15).

Sigmund Freud shocked his surroundings with the statement: "Man is not master of himself" The existence of the unconscious, however, is not far from Freud's discovery (Feist,1985,29). Freud turned this knowledge towards the theoretical interest and for the first time formulated the fundamental role of the unconscious in human development. He had already introduced the concept of the unconscious and subconscious.

Early Development and Subconscious

Based on Freud's work, Hitler's personality can be understood in terms of the concept of psychoanalysis and subconscious. Subconscious is the spiritual and emotional awareness of a human being that is not accessible. For Freud, the unconscious is not a static box system more like the contemporary psychologists have presented, but a dynamic conglomerate, which involves non avowed conflicts and biographical data. Freud's unconscious is repressed in the hidden truths of the carrier, but there is a room to watch the surface of the consciousness of each person (Greenwald, 1980, 63).

The extent to which the subconscious mind always spoils the conscious proves to show a completely harmless behavior Hitler's authoritarian and narcissist personality can be regarded as a result of his subconscious development that has not been satisfactory during his early life. Moreover, Freud's psychic apparatus of man consists essentially of three levels that are in a constant interplay with forces of traction and control. The ego is the oldest psychic instance that runs the inherited systems and obeys the pleasure principle. In the encounter with the social environment, society and the environment second level is known as the id (Feist,1985,29).

The first one represents the conscious and rational decision-making level, and on the other hand, the “about me” attitude represents the socio-cultural level. This is the information from education and ...