Determinants of Personality

Personality is the outcome of a continuous personal quality development process. The role of personality becomes clear in a particular situation. Personality is recognised in a situation. It is the result of personal quality interaction in a particular condition. The major determinants of personality of an individual are given below:

Biological Factors

Heredity: Heredity refers to those factors that were determined at conception. Physical stature, facial attractiveness, sex, temperament, muscle composition and reflexes, energy level, and biological rhythms are characteristics that are generally considered to be either completely or substantially influenced by who your parents were; that is, by their biological, physiological, and inherent psychological makeup. The contribution of heredity to personality development is vividly clear for developing external appearance, behaviour, social stimuli, self inner awareness, organising traits, etc.

Brain: Brain has a great impact on personality. The psychologists are unable to prove empirically the contribution of human brain in influencing personality. Father and children generally adopt the same type of brain stimulation. The differences are caused by environment. Electrical stimulation of brain (ESB) and split brain psychology (SBP)are the outcome of genetic transmision. The are helpful in moulding employee's behaviour. ESB is used for motivating employees towards better performances. Managers are trained to use SBP for mobilising employees for proper behaviour.

Physical Features: Perhaps the most outstanding factor that contributes to personality is the physical stature of an individual. An individual's external appearance is proved to be having a tremendous effect on personality. For example, the fact that a person is short or tall, fat or thin, handsome or ugly, black or whitish will undoubtedly influence the person's effect on others and in turn will affect the self-concept. A person's physical characteristics may be related to his approach to the social environment, to the expectancies of others, and to their reactions, to him. These in turn may have impact on personality development.