Sick personality

1. Sick personality is one in which there is break down in the personality structure resulting into poor personality. Like physical illness, the person does not behave as he does normally. The difference in behaviour is due to deviation from normal that is when the person’s behaviour is not in confirmation to expected norms.

2. Ex: If a person is anxious only for favourable judgement, he tries to appear normal which does not work in the state of stress.

3. Throwing tantrums, inconvenient behaviour or behaviour not expected as per the age fall in category of abnormal behaviour. When a child has overabundance of such traits at one time, it can be termed as personality sickness.

4. The person best suited to determine whether a personality pattern is sick or healthy is the personologist. There can not be a single standard of judging a healthy personality pattern. When the behaviour is not in conformity with the expected social norms, sickness in personality is evident.

5. There are more psychological illness than physical illness. Personality sickness is more due to behaviour disorder amongst children or young people compared to adults / old people. In the early years, the person is more susceptible to adolescence changes, stresses & strains. The feeling of insecurity occurs in the minds during adolescence. Body changes do take place.

6. Causes of Personality Sickness: There are two changes: physical & Psychological. Self rejection includes self disapproval, self distrust, feeling of being unworthy, not being deserving reward or success.

7. Common Causes : Unrealistic expectations, Unfavourable social attitude, Unrealistic expectations, personal limitations, emotional stress, lack of motivation, repeated failures, poor childhood training, lack of perspective, Identification with maladjusted people.

8. Major categories of Personality Sickness: There are five categories of socially unacceptable behaviour – hyperactive reactions - restlessness, implusiveness, Withdrawing reactions – detachment, inability to form close interpersonal relationship, Overanxious reactions – chronic anxiety, Runaway reactions – Inclination to steal, Unsocial zed aggressive reactions - destructiveness, hostile teasing of children.

9. Common Danger Signals :a. Immaturity- A person is judged immature if his

performance in some areas of behaviour falls below the standard set by his peers. Immature people are aware of their immaturity & so they feel inadequate. They are unable to conform to the standards expected at their age. Ex: Irresponsibility, homesickness are examples. Ex: Early marriages.

b. Regression: Regression is an attempt to return to the earlier stage of development. Ex: when a new baby enters the family, the elder one feels uncomfortable & tries to imitate the younger one & seeks attention. It is an attempt to go back or slide back to the old state. Feeling of good old days affects the person.

c. Cruelty: All young children are cruel at their age. They take pleasure in hitting or hurting others. Children resort to cruelty to compensate for their inadequacy in doing certain things due to their size, height etc.Forms: Bullying – inflicting physical pain on an animal or person. Bullying is replaced by teasing. Whereas bullying is more physical oriented, teasing is psychological. Discrimination is another form of cruelty towards person. Self rejection is the outcome.

Defence Mechanism: Rationalization: The person gives account of his conduct in such a way as to protect his ego &

refrains from telling anything of his intention. Many times the person explains lack of success in a manner to justify his failure or unfulfilled desire only for the purpose of maintaining ego. Projection: It is the poor workman who blames his tools. The person tries to explain or excuse behaviour that falls short of his & other’s expectations by thrusting the blame onto something or somebody. In projection, the person shifts the blame on specific person which he uses as scapegoat. Projection is more satisfying than Rationalization as in this the person shifts blames on others for his doing.Displacement: In displacement, the person directs his resentment due to inadequacy or inferiority, against a person, object or situation which is unrelated to the cause of resentment. The object of displacement is usually against a smaller or helpless person or animal or object. Displacement is poor sportsmanship that leads to disapproval or rejection by members of social group. Ex; gang attack on innocent victim, cracking joke on family member knowing well that others will approve. Fantasy: When fear, frustration & anxiety prevent active adjustment or actual realization of wishes, the person gets into day daydreaming mode for the maintenance of ego. Young people create imaginary companions with whom they play or talk when they are actually in the state of loneliness. Day dreaming falls into two types of categories – hero creation & martyr creation. Borrowed fantasies are also embraced to reduce self devaluation. These fantasies are resorted to as defence mechanism. Compensation: This is an act of channelling energies into an activity in which one can achieve success & eliminate some self rejection attitude &

also diverting attention of others from the activity in which he failed to the activity in which he succeeded.Repression: This is convenient forgetting. The person forgets those things which remind him of his inadequacies. This way he eliminates some of the psychological distress that has led to self rejection.Devaluation: One of the common causes of self rejection is unfavourable social judgements; one way to defend the ego is to devalue their source. This can be done by minimizing the judgements or by proving to others that those who made the judgement were actually not competent. This act of devaluing the opinion or judgement of others amounts to poor sportsmanship.Sour Grapes Mechanism: Some people devalue anything which they don’t get or fail to get by pointing out faults & defects in that thing. This pattern of defence mechanism is based on the same story of fox that was not able to jump high enough to get the grapes.