The best personality model ?

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This page tries to give an impression of what a personality entails. A personality model is presented that is based on neuroscientific insights, clinical experience and trauma therapy. This makes it probably the most complete and 'best' personality model at the moment.

Personality model I: emotions and thoughts

On the introduction page Personality I already wrote that Personality can be described as a fairly fixed form of a complicated mix of emotions, thoughts and behavior. Fixed because someone's personality doesn't just change within 1 day. That's because the complex mix of emotions, thoughts, and behaviors are held together by established procedures in our brain and body.

Below the 1st part of the personality is explained in a Youtube video. It emphasizes Emotions (body) and Thoughts. Behavior has not yet been included in this first part. That will be covered later on this page.

The Complete Personality Model is largely based on insights from Jeffrey Young's schema theory/therapy, Aaron Beck's cognitive model of Personality, and Jaak Panksepp's research work in what he called Affective neuroscience.

Jaak Panksepp's personality model: affective neuroscience

The Youtube movie about the Personality is mainly based on the impressive work of the late Jaak Panksepp, who wrote a wonderful book about this subject: Affective Neuroscience. See also the book recommendations on the right.

The video lasts about 24 minutes. Please be aware that at the moment it is still in Dutch. Later this year it will be available in English though. For the ones who want a challenge to still decipher it, please go ahead.

Overview of the Personality model (in Dutch)

Please Click HERE for the Youtube-clip about the Personality model

For those who want the entire Personality Model in PDF format you can download it (in Dutch!). It may be used for your own presentations, on the Internet or social media. When using it, please mention that you got it from this website: www.the-psychology-insider.com.

Please Click HERE to download the Personality model in PDF format

Personality model: your EMOTIONS

Jaak Panksepp's neuroaffective personality model is based on mainly animal experimental work. Our human brains have evolved from animal brains, which simply means that we are built on the animal brain. According to Panksepp, we have an (evolutionarily) very old brain, the Reptilian brain, and on top of that is the somewhat younger Mammalian brain. On top of that is the Human brain.

The wonderful thing about Panksepp's model is that he has been able to demonstrate very clearly that there are 7 basic circuits in the animal brain that you can switch on and off electrically. These basic circuits are your 7 basic emotions. Emotions have only one goal: to ensure that you can survive. So they have a signal function, nothing more and nothing less. The evolutionarily oldest emotions were experienced in the so-called Reptilian brain (brain stem, medulla oblongata):

1. SEEKING: the SEARCH system

2. FEAR: the FEAR system

3. RAGE: the ANGER system

4. LUST: the SEXUAL

The (higher) emotions that were developed a little later in evolution are located in the Mammalian brain:

5. CARE: the CARE system

6. GRIEF/PANIC: the SADNESS/PANIC system

7. PLAY: the GAME system

These 7 systems are also called the motivational systems, the Primary Emotional Systems. I simply want to call them the Basic Emotions here. It is important to realize that these emotions are anchored in the body and they are UNconscious. They always encourage action, but you are not immediately aware of them. That only happens when you can give them meaning, when you can recognize them and have Thoughts about them. A basic emotion only becomes a Feeling when Thoughts and/or images are added that you are aware of.

This Self-awareness requires a higher order processing in the brain. Antonio Damasio has written a beautiful book about this: The Self Becomes Aware (2019): Self Comes to Mind (2012).

Below are the 7 basic emotions in order of importance:

1. The SEARCH system

This basic emotion is essential for survival. With the help of your senses you explore your environment, you move in it and look for the right safe environment to survive, to drink and eat and to mate. If this SEARCH system is damaged, you do not move or move very little and you simply die from exhaustion or you fall prey to a predator.

2. The LUST system

Without LUST or SEX an organism does not survive of course. It is important for the survival of the species.

3. The FEAR system

Without fear you do not survive in nature either. Fear is a powerful signal to escape from or prepare for danger. Without fear, you do not do this sufficiently and you run a high risk of fatal danger.

4. The ANGER system

Without aggression or anger, you will not survive in nature either. For example, if you have to find food in the form of another animal, you must be able to kill it with sufficient aggression and violence.

Both the most primitive life forms, reptiles, mammals and also humans are built on these 4 basic emotional systems in the brain.

However, the following 3 Basic Emotions developed later in evolution when the brain became more complex, especially in mammals.

5. The CARE system

In order to survive, the CARE system has been developed in most mammals. As soon as an organism is born, it is usually cared for. However, this is hardly or not the case in reptiles or lower animal species. The basic emotion Care is directly related to empathy. Empathy provides the connection and the stimulus to care.

6. The SADNESS system

Panksepp also calls this the Panic system. He links it to the fundamental concept of Separation anxiety: the fear in all mammals of being left alone by the parent. As far as I am concerned, this fear falls under the FEAR system, because it IS fear too.

However, SADNESS is also a basic emotion, but of a somewhat 'higher' kind. It developed somewhat later in evolution, in mammals. Possibly because these animal species increasingly developed in a group, so with each other. Because the emotion SADNESS can only be useful as a connecting emotion, probably stemming from the basic emotion CARE.

7. The PLAY system

It is very interesting that Panksepp discovered PLAY as a basic emotion. It is actually a separate electrophysiological circuit in the brain, which you can switch on and off. It probably also developed somewhat later in evolution in mammals. Possibly because PLAY is not only strongly connecting, but also very educational. Many young animals learn about their environment, their strengths and their skills through play. Here again, PLAY probably originated from the CARE system.

It is very important to realize that these 7 basic emotions are ALWAYS present in our brains. Presumably they are also always on in our network brain, to a greater or lesser extent. It is also important to realize that EMOTIONS are always BODY MOVEMENTS. All emotions are expressed in our body: muscle tension, movement, breathing and autonomic nervous system actions (heart rate, sweating, temperature).

EMOTION REGULATION and CONNECTION

In order to live or survive well, we must make the right choices in life. Precisely because we are built on our 7 basic emotions, we must regulate them so that we are not uninhibitedly angry, anxious, sad, playful or inquisitive. For example, think of a puppy: as uninhibited as a puppy is, it cannot survive in nature. If its spontaneous, wild (often cheerful) actions are not better inhibited/regulated, then this puppy runs a great risk of ending up in dangerous situations. For this, the parents are needed to teach the puppy to regulate these emotions, so that the puppy makes the right actions and choices.

In addition, it is necessary for a puppy to make the right connection with other animals and/or its own kind. Know when connection is necessary (e.g. seeking help or protection) and also when being alone for a while is also wise (to do things independently).

Personality model: your THOUGHTS

Panksepp's model clearly shows that we and most animal species function primarily based on our basic emotions. We learn to regulate these in such a way that we make the right choices and take the right actions in life.

In higher animal species and humans, the cognitive system has developed in addition to the emotional system. The cognitive system is actually the higher information processing in which thoughts and images come together with the underlying basic emotions. In fact, they are representations or, in other words, maps of our basic emotions that always express themselves in our body. If we give meaning to our basic emotions, in other words: if we link our thoughts to our basic emotions, then they become feelings that we can be aware of. Consciousness has everything to do with the fact that we can place body movements within a certain frame of thought/thought. Within that frame of thought, we can make more connections between our environment and our inner environment (our body).

The cognitive system is more or less complex in higher animal species (and therefore also in humans). In some people it functions less well than in others. Neuropsychologically speaking, we differ considerably from each other when it comes to our memory, perception, attention and our problem-solving (=executive functions) ability. In other words: there are stupid but also smarter people.

This also applies to our consciousness and our emotional world. There are people with a very well-developed emotional world and a higher consciousness. But there are also (many) people with a less developed emotional life and consciousness. That is not good or bad, that is simply the way it is. Many people find it annoying when I say this, because they then think that I am judging people or something. But I am simply stating the facts: there are major differences between animals and people when it comes to how developed the cognitive system is. Remarkably enough, this seems to apply much less to the emotional system. Although the intensity of the basic emotions differs greatly between animals and people, in broad terms all 7 basic emotions seem very similar in all people and higher animal species.

This can be explained very well by the much greater differences between cognitive systems. Especially in higher animal species such as humans, the cognitive system can differ enormously. Therefore, there are also many different combinations possible between cognitions and basic emotions. The more variations in the cognitive system are possible, the more different variants of feelings can exist.

For example, 2 people can have the same basic emotion Anger, but the intensity of it can differ enormously. The experience of this Anger can also differ greatly, depending on how complex the cognitive system is. The more someone has experienced or learned, the more complex the cognitive system often becomes. And therefore also the more complex his or her emotional world.

An example:

There are people who have a relatively simple cognitive system: weak memory, weak concentration, poor problem-solving skills, and therefore often also a low level of education. However, they do have just as much desire for sex or play as highly educated people. However, with their weaker concentration and poorer problem-solving skills, they are less able to regulate their basic emotions. They are therefore often less aware of their feelings (after all: feelings = cognitions + basic emotions). In fact, they are therefore more quickly controlled, overwhelmed by their emotions. They therefore have less control over them, because the regulatory functions (= cognitive systems) are less highly developed. Again: that is not good or bad, it is what it is. Unfortunately, that often ensures that they make more unwise choices, such as eating unhealthily, being more impulsive and therefore more likely to end up in dangerous situations than people who can really think better and more.

I do not mean to say that a highly educated person by definition has much better control over his or her own emotions than a less educated person. But the chance that this is the case is generally somewhat higher. Unless...there are past psychotraumas that have seriously damaged their Self-image. By definition, a damaged Self-image means that regulating emotions is a problem.

In summary

People differ in temperament: how strong their emotional brain is. So how intense their basic emotions can be.

People differ even more in their cognitive abilities (e.g. memory, attention, perception, problem-solving ability).

The many combinations between basic emotions and the incredibly large number of cognitive systems, makes that people can be so very different in behavior and therefore personality. But...at the core we are all built on the above 7 basic emotions.

Our SELF-IMAGE

On top of our basic emotions, our cognitive system is built. This also contains our so-called human brain in which our personality is located. One model of this splits our thoughts into 3 parts: 1. Self-image; 2. If-then rules (norms, values ​​and predictions); 3. Automatic thoughts. That is the so-called cognitive model of A. and J. Beck.

On the page about the Self-image model I mainly explain more about this Self-image, the core of our personality. This Self-image is mainly UNCONSCIOUS, which means that we often do not realize what it looks like exactly. But... the positive thing is... that we can train this, so that we can become more aware of it. That is also important because the Self-image in fact regulates our Emotion regulation and Connection with other people. The weaker our Self-image, the weaker our emotion regulation and our connection with other people. The more often we make worse choices in our lives. A weaker self-image therefore does not actually have much to do with our (analytical) intelligence. In other words: I know very smart people who have a very weak self-image and therefore do very stupid things and get into/are in emotional trouble. I also know very stupid people who, however, have a fairly strong self-image and therefore have relatively few emotional problems.

DISCLAIMER

I will not take any responsibility for how the information on this website will affect you. It always remains your responsibility to handle all information with care and in case of medical or mental problems you should ALWAYS consult a professional in your neighbourhood!

Ik neem geen enkele verantwoordelijkheid voor hoe de informatie op deze site u zal beïnvloeden. Het blijft altijd uw verantwoordelijkheid om al deze informatie zorgvuldig te bekijken. In het geval van lichamelijke en/of mentale problemen dient u ALTIJD een professional in uw directe omgeving te waarschuwen!

Books

Very inspiring. Really recommended! In this book  Affective Neuroscience is extensively explained.