Personality; a biosocial approach to origins and structure

In writing this book the aim of the author is to write about personality in such a way as to help in clarifying the little that we know and to show its possible relations to the vast and confused domain that we do not yet understand. The best way to attempt the exploration, perhaps, is to write in terms of the foci of present research, expanding fanwise, through hypotheses. This book, then, if at all successful in its aim, will be a companion for the investigator who likes to see problems defined in terms of directions in which they might lead; an explorer's kit, containing, to be sure, some standard tools, and also some maps. Throughout the volume the approach to personality is made chiefly in terms of origins and modes of development on the one hand, interrelations or structural problems on the other. It is hoped that some of the present chapters will, by raising questions, whet the reader's appetite for clinical and therapeutic literature. This is not a book on diagnosis or therapy of personality problems, or upon any type of clinical approach. It is simply an attempt at evaluation of data on how personality grows. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2005 APA, all rights reserved).