Abstract
In this paper I comment on the “Individual personality is best understood as process, not structure: A Confucian-inspired perspective” article by Peter Giordano (Culture & Psychology, 23(4), 502–518 (2017)), which addresses the question of how to comprehend a personality which is continuously changing and varying with changes in social contexts and situations. The issue which Giordano turns up I believe to be of great importance and topicality in the quickly changing globalizing contemporary world. Giordano’s paper highlights an important problem in the development of contemporary personality psychology, but much remains to be clarified concerning his process-centric model. I introduce the theory of Boris Parygin, which can make a contribution to the discussion of personality as a process. Parygin’s theory addresses the same issues that Giordano focuses on: human personality exists and develops in the context of social situation. Parygin’s theoretical model of personality involves two personality schemas: a “static” one and a “dynamic” one. The “structure” and the “process” –centered approaches are joint here to complement each other. Personality life-span development, formation of personality structures, is considered as a process of interaction and dialectical confrontation with the social environment, in the course of which the personality, originally engendered by social factors, builds up its autonomy and realizes its unique individual spiritual potential.
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Notes
Popular phrase in Russian psychological literature “объект и субъект” can be adequately translated into German: “Objekt und Subjekt“. The typical English translation “object and subject” fails to convey the meaning: the passive role of the former and the active role of the latter.
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Acknowledgements
I wish to thank Jaan Valsiner for his invitation to write this paper.
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This article received financial support from the Russian Foundation for the Humanities, project № 17–06-50086.
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Mironenko, I.A. Personality as a Social Process: where Peter Giordano Meets Boris Parygin. Integr. psych. behav. 52, 288–295 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12124-018-9417-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12124-018-9417-y