General phenomenological characteristics of personality disorders
Personality disorders are deficits in psychological functioning, where the subject lacks the ability to self-manage impulses and shows an unconscious and uncontrolled state of emotions and behavior, clinically manifested by abnormalities in emotions and volitional behavior. Therefore, personality disorders are less likely to be characterized by “self-aware psychological conflicts” (to put it in an absolute way, because they are compared to neurotic patients), but they are mainly characterized by interpersonal conflicts. The diagnosis of personality disorder requires that the person is at least 18 years old.
Formation of personality and its disorders
Personality disorders are formed mainly in the early years of psychological development, especially between 6 and 18 months or even 36 months after birth, or between half and one and a half or three years after birth, i.e., the “separation-socialization phase” according to Mahler. During this period, the mother-infant relationship directly influences the formation of the infant’s psychological functions.
Let’s review the characteristics of the “symbiosis” period.
The symbiosis period is from 1 to 6 months after the birth of the infant. At this time, the mother and the infant are physically and psychologically integrated, and the good care given by the mother to the infant can make the infant experience a sense of well-being and omnipotence.
Look at the “separation-individuation” stage.
From 6 months of age, as the infant develops psychological functions, he or she becomes aware that he or she and the mother are two different individuals. The infant’s original “sense of omnipotence” is shattered, and his own “sense of weakness and incompetence” emerges, i.e., he is able to realize that it is difficult for him to survive without his mother. This is when the fear of separation, or “separation anxiety,” emerges within the infant and is accompanied by a process of psychological development called “separation-socialization.
During this process, if the child continues to receive good care from the mother, he or she will continue to internalize the good image of the mother and form an object representation of the “good mother”. When the real mother is temporarily away, the child relies on the “good mother” image to support his or her “weakness” and “incompetence” and to dilute the fear caused by the separation. Therefore, a good mother is the inner safety island of a child. A child is like an airplane, and a good mother is like an aircraft carrier. When an airplane takes off from an aircraft carrier, no matter how far it flies, as long as the pilot knows the existence of the aircraft carrier, he or she will feel secure inside.
The characteristics of a good mother.
1. Active attention rather than neglecting the child. Take the initiative to gaze at the child and make various expressions and actions to pamper the child.
2. Accepting everything about the child and being sensitive to all the changes and behaviors of the child, making immediate reactions. When the child smiles, the mother also smiles immediately. When the child cries, the mother also frowns and looks at the child with concern, thinking, “I just fed you, why are you still crying? Oh, it must be pee, it’s hard” and then go to check the diaper or change it.
A good mother loves her child consistently and consistently, not hot and cold and unpredictable. The consistency of a good mother gives the baby a sense of certainty and security. In turn, the child develops self-confidence, self-esteem and basic trust in others.
4. Have empathy for the child. Respect the child’s psychological development needs, if the child wants to wriggle out of the mother’s embrace to play with “toys” or to find children to play, the mother will respect the child’s psychological needs, let go of the child to play, rather than holding on, depriving the child of the opportunity to make independent decisions, independent growth.
Of course, a good mother is not always in the same place, a good mother will occasionally leave her child for a short time. Good mothers sometimes lose their temper with their children, or even ignore them. At this time, the child will have a painful experience inside, which is also caused by the mother, so the child will simply think that in addition to a “good mother” to make him/her happy, there must be a “bad mother” to make him/her feel painful. The child will simply believe that there must be a “bad mother” to make him/her feel miserable, in addition to a “good mother” to make him/her happy. The opposite of a “good mother” is a “good child” and the opposite of a “bad mother” is a “bad child.
How do children cope with “separation anxiety” during the “separation-socialization” process?
First, negative coping (instinctive reaction, helplessness) leads to psychological deficits and pathological personality.
Especially in the case of interruption of maternal love, the child will falsely construct an “absolutely idealized” “good mother” and “good child”, and at the same time absolutely This is highlighted by the psychological state of “fragmentation”. This is highlighted as a “fragmented” psychological state. In addition, the different manifestations of attachment, control, self-confidence, self-esteem, basic trust in others, and self-control of behavior constitute different types of personality disorders.
Specific analysis is described below.
1. Continue to maintain a sense of “weakness” and strengthen the attachment to the mother. If the mother-infant relationship “stagnates” here, until adulthood is still afraid to leave the mother, to continue to stay in the mother’s embrace, to enjoy the happiness and joy brought by the mother, will be manifested as “dependent personality”. At this time, although the subject has a sense of weakness, he lacks resistance to the “weakness” and lacks the inner requirement and self-confidence to resist and become independent, and cannot obtain happiness and sense of value through his own efforts.
2. If, along with “separation anxiety,” the child is afraid of losing the object of attachment, he or she exercises excessive control over the object of attachment (usually the mother) and hates the mother, and at the same time (especially when often rejected by the mother), he or she exercises excessive control over himself or herself. This excessive control due to internal insecurity eventually manifests itself as the “obsessive-compulsive personality”. The main emotion is “fear” or “insecurity” and resistance to this feeling.
3. If the “good mother” and “bad mother” cannot be integrated by subsequent maternal love, the infant will continue to be separated (splitting) and remain in adulthood, and will develop into a “borderline personality The “borderline personality” will develop. At this time, not only are the “good mother” and “bad mother” separated, but the child’s inner self (self) “good child” and “bad child” are also separated. The child’s inner self (self) “good child” and “bad child” are also separated. He is not even aware of his own fragmentation. In borderline personality, the main feature of the defense mechanism is fragmentation, and the most prominent emotion in his heart is “weakness” and resistance to “weakness”.
4. If the “bad mother” dominates, the child will have difficulty establishing basic trust in others and will be convinced that “others are basically bad”, and the child will experience “interpersonal insecurity” when interacting with others. The child will have “interpersonal insecurity” when interacting with others, and will always be on guard against others, believing that he or she will always be backstabbed by others, so the personality type with “interpersonal insecurity” as the core is the “paranoid personality”.
5.If the child is treated with indifference or even hostility by the mother, the child will fight for the attention of others, or even identify with the hostility of others, and the child will actively treat others with hostility or even violence, and will behave as an “antisocial personality”.
6. If the child does not receive sufficient care from the good mother, he feels that he is unlovable and continues to fantasize about returning to the happiness of the “symbiotic period” and continues to long for the acceptance and care of the mother, the child will have doubts about whether he is a “good child”. If the infant is willing to be a “good and loving child” but does not have confidence in it, the infant will behave like a “good and loving child”. At this point, the infant is “eager for endless praise from others” and keeps proving how cute he or she is through the praise of others. This is called “narcissistic personality”.
7. If the child does not experience “happiness” and “omnipotence” during the symbiotic stage, the child’s heart is a cold inner world, and he has no desire to attach to others or interact with others. So it will show “indifference, loneliness, eccentricity” and other characteristics, which is “split-like personality”.
8. If the infant does not receive enough attention and acceptance from his mother in early childhood, and his requests are always denied or rejected by his mother, he will doubt his own ability and value, doubt whether he will be welcomed by others, and start to please others and get others’ attention and acceptance in a roundabout way. In social situations, although there is a desire to perform better and to be noticed and accepted by others, there is too much tension and anxiety in social situations due to too much lack of self-confidence and self-esteem inside, causing him to eventually adopt avoidance behaviors towards social situations. Such behavior persists in adults and is called “anxiety (avoidance) personality”.
Second, actively cope with the development of normal human psychological functions
During the separation-socialization stage, if the infant continues to receive good care from the mother, the infant can rely on the “good mother’s safety island” in his mind and leave the mother for longer and longer periods of time and at greater and greater distances, develop his own autonomy and independence, and build up a “self-capacity and sense of value”-focused personality. The child is interested in the unknown world and takes the initiative to explore it away from his mother and enjoys the happiness and joy that comes from his independence and efforts.
With the continued care of a good mother, the infant’s inner fantasy of a “good mother” and “good child” will gradually approach the level of reality and become closer to it, without excessive and unrealistic demands on both the mother and himself. At the same time, he will gradually realize that “good mom” and “bad mom” are the same person, and that mom and I are two different people, and that I have to respect and accept this not-so-perfect, realistic mom, and at the same time, I can also combine my “good self” with my “bad self”. At the same time, I can integrate my “good self” with my “bad self” and finally accept this imperfect self. This completes the separation of the infant from the mother and the integration of the “good mother” and the “bad mother”, the “good child” and the “bad child The integration of “good mother” and “bad mother,” “good child” and “bad child,” and the expression of a “realistic and positive” personality that is “self-respecting” and at the same time capable of “respecting others to the same degree. The “Realistic and Positive” personality traits
Special Note
Although it is emphasized that “the formation of personality disorders is mainly related to the mother-infant relationship up to the age of 3 years”, it is important to note that
1. The “negative coping” and “positive coping” approaches described above are not distinct. In fact, the two approaches are often overlapping and used in parallel by children. Therefore, negative coping styles exist within each person, and are more likely to manifest themselves later in life when they are struck by stressful events.
2. The mother-infant relationship is not the only, sufficient factor contributing to personality disorders. Although we emphasize the importance of the mother, at the same time, the same poor mother-infant relationship may lead to different directions of psychological development and manifestation of different personality traits in the infant. This is determined by the infant’s intrinsic dynamism.
3. Although the early stages of the infant’s psychological development are the prerequisites and foundations of later psychological development. A good foundation is beneficial to the subsequent development of psychological functions, but a good foundation alone does not guarantee that the subsequent development will also be good. Like building a building, a bad foundation makes it difficult to build a solid building, but a good foundation does not guarantee or lead to a good building of each floor later.
4. Emphasizing the importance of the early stages of infant mental development does not mean that these mental functions are completed before the age of three, nor does it mean that they cannot be changed in the future. Many psychological functions continue to develop and improve even after the age of three. And during this process of development and refinement, personality can undergo certain changes while remaining relatively stable. For example, even if a person is mentally healthy, his or her personality can change after a major event; even if there is a psychological dysplasia in early childhood and there is a deficit in psychological functioning, it is possible to make up for it later in growth. This is the basis for the existence of psychotherapy for personality disorders.
5, personality disorders are classified according to some of the most prominent characteristics of personality, but this does not mean that “a certain personality disorder is only a certain psychological characteristics, but no other personality characteristics.” Or, the typology of personality disorders is relative and artificial, and there can be crossover between the types (the “coexistence” of different personality types or the “co-morbidity” of different personality disorder types).
One of the most basic tasks of psychoanalytic treatment and intervention for personality disorders is to “be a good mother to the patient”, i.e., “the therapist is the internalized object of the visitor”, so that the visitor is in a simulated “good mother” therapeutic situation created by the therapist. Good mother” therapeutic situation created by the therapist, so that the visitor can grow up again. Of course, this process is a very slow one, which is one of the main reasons why psychoanalytic therapy (including personality improvement for neurotic patients) requires a long session. At the same time, in the process of psychoanalytic treatment of personality disorders, while working as a “good mother” object for the patient to re-internalize, attention should be paid to strictly setting the boundary between the therapist and the visitor, and to mobilizing the patient’s own self-management ability and the visitor’s self-management initiative. If the visitor’s personality disorder is so severe that he has no self-reflection and self-management ability at all, he can only be treated with psychoanalytic psychological support therapy, or simply with behaviorally guided psychotherapy. Therefore, psychoanalytic treatment can only help those patients with relatively mild personality disorders.
Classical psychoanalytic theories, especially the later “object relations theory”, have discussed the formation of personality disorders in a large number of theories. You can read these literature in detail. Here, I have applied my psychoanalytic theories to analyze and describe the characteristics of various personality types, and this is a kind of exploration.