Why You Are Who You Are: Investigations into Human Personality

Overview

Award-winning Professor Mark R. Leary explores the many ways our behavior affects our life through the intriguing science of our personalities.

To understand the roots of personality is to understand the motivations and influences that shape behavior, which in turn reflect how you deal with the opportunities and challenges of everyday life. That’s the focus of these exciting 24 lectures, in which you examine the differences in people’s personalities, where these differences come from, and how they shape our lives.

Drawing on information gleaned from psychology, neuroscience, and genetics, Professor Leary opens the door to understanding how personality works and why. Throughout his illuminating lectures, five important personality traits come into focus: extraversion, neuroticism, agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness.

Combining psychology with neuroscience and behavioral genetics, this exploration will open your eyes to the myriad ways our traits, motives, emotions, beliefs, and values are shaped by our genes, environment, experiences, and evolutionary history. This unique course gives you essential knowledge and insights for one of life’s most important skills.

Course Outline

01: What Is Personality?

Examine the concept of personality and the factors that influence it, including a case study on delinquent behavior in teenage boys.

Duration: 33 min

02: Key Traits: Extraversion and Neuroticism

Explore the two key traits that provide a broad picture of personality: extraversion and neuroticism.

Duration: 33 min

03: Are You Agreeable? Conscientious? Open?

Learn about the remaining three building blocks of personality: agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness, along with a sixth emerging trait.

Duration: 32 min

04: Basic Motives Underlying Behavior

Discover the three core motives that instigate and energize people’s behavior and how they influence decision-making.

Duration: 31 min

05: Intrapersonal Motives

Examine motives that don’t involve external rewards, including psychological consistency, self-esteem, and authenticity.

Duration: 32 min

06: Positive and Negative Emotionality

Understand how the emotions you experience shape your personality and the factors that lead to varying emotional experiences.

Duration: 32 min

07: Differences in Emotional Experience

Explore how individuals differ in their tendencies to experience specific emotions and how this affects their responses to events.

Duration: 32 min

08: Values and Moral Character

Investigate the moral aspects of personality, including values, moral foundations, virtues, and character strengths.

Duration: 33 min

09: Traits That Shape How You Think

Focus on cognitive characteristics related to thinking styles, including curiosity, decision-making speed, and critical evaluation.

Duration: 32 min

10: Beliefs about the World and Other People

Discover how beliefs about human nature and fairness function as personality traits and influence behavior.

Duration: 32 min

11: Beliefs about Yourself

Examine four types of self-related beliefs and their impact on feelings and behaviors: identity, self-efficacy, self-esteem, and self-compassion.

Duration: 32 min

12: Personality and Social Relationships

Learn about attachment styles and tactics used to persuade and influence others, including the role of empathy.

Duration: 33 min

13: Consistency and Stability of Personality

Explore the complexities of personality stability and change over time, and the factors that contribute to both.

Duration: 33 min

14: Evolution and Human Nature

Understand how evolutionary processes have shaped certain personality characteristics and their implications for behavior.

Duration: 32 min

15: Personality and the Brain

Investigate the neural mechanisms behind personality differences and how they relate to brain structure and function.

Duration: 33 min

16: Genetic Influences on Personality

Learn about the role of genetics in personality development and how inherited traits influence behavior.

Duration: 33 min

17: Learning to Be Who You Are

Examine the learning processes that shape personality, including classical conditioning and personal experience.

Duration: 33 min

18: How Culture Influences Personality

Explore how cultural differences affect personality development and the implications for behavior.

Duration: 33 min

19: Nonconscious Aspects of Personality

Delve into the unconscious processes that influence personality and behavior, including repression and self-regulation.

Duration: 33 min

20: Personality and Self-Control

Understand the characteristics and skills that affect self-regulation and how they relate to personality.

Duration: 32 min

21: When Personalities Become Toxic

Investigate the dramatic-emotional-erratic cluster of personality disorders and their implications for emotional regulation.

Duration: 31 min

22: Avoidance, Paranoia, and Other Disorders

Explore anxiety-related personality disorders and their characteristics, including avoidance and paranoid tendencies.

Duration: 32 min

23: The Enigma of Being Yourself

Consider the challenges of authenticity and how it may not be as important as we typically think.

Duration: 29 min

24: The Well-Adjusted Personality

Conclude by examining the relationship between personality and healthy psychological adjustment, identifying key ingredients for success.

Duration: 37 min