1. An Introduction to Personal Construct Psychology
Helen Jones
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2. Introduction
A brief overview of the key features of George Kelly’s work – The Psychology of Personal Constructs (Norton, 1955
A theory that helps people to make sense of their personal perspectives and values and to understand other people’s points of view
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3. Constructive Alternativism
Basic Postulate: “A person’s processes are psychologically channelised by the ways in which (s)he anticipates events”.
The person as scientist
All behaviour is an experiment
Validation or invalidation are equally useful
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4. Four Points of View
Listen to yourself – so that you can suspend your views
Listen to others, in their own terms
Listen to, and check out, the implications of the words you hear
Take responsibility for predicted outcomes
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Use self characterisation and listening exercise
Introduce laddering
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5. Self Reflexivity
A theory of personality which is not applicable to the person practising it is not likely to apply to relate well to others either!
It is PERSONAL
Character sketch
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6. The credulous approach
The credulous approach implies a belief in what the other person says is true for them and viable for them.
The approach implies work on the part of the listener to suspend his or her own personal perspectives in order to understand the theories of the other person
Self awareness
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7. Some assumptions behind Kelly’s theory of personality
There is an integral universe
No one person has direct access to it
Each individual has a unique personal construct system which makes total sense to that individual
We share some common understandings
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8. Assumptions - continued
We tend to see the world through sets of filters – seeing some things as alike and thereby different from others
We differ in the ways we make discriminations
All our ways of seeing things are linked internally in a hierarchical fashion
Use three objects and test laddering
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9. More assumptions….
We communicate with others only when we begin to understand their value systems as well as our own
Our core beliefs are few and highly resistant to change
Organisations have their core structures as do individuals – understanding this helps
Laddering and resistance to change
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10. Creativity and Decision Making
Kelly describes creativity as the constant weaving between LOOSENING (vague thoughts and ideas) and TIGHTENING (making things happen)
A human tragedy is to live only one, or other, of these aspects of the cycle
Examples in pairs
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11. Decision Making Kelly describes this as the CPC Cycle
We CIRCUMSPECT (C) (collect data/information)
We PREEMPT (P) (make decisions) anticipating that the outcome will allow us
CHOICE/CONTROL(C) over our immediate and longer term futures
Examples in pairs
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12. PCP and emotion – transitional constructs
Kelly suggests that we are “nothing but” a bundle of constructs rolling along in time and space
So emotion is not separate from thinking – it is more the awareness of the need to reconstrue – a heightened awareness of one’s own construct system
* Kelly chooses to use the term “transition” – a change of gear
Examples in pairs
Share in group
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13. Kelly’s Emotional vocabulary
Guilt – is a dislodgement of the self from one’s core constructs
Threat – is an awareness of an imminent change in one’s core constructs
Anxiety – is an awareness that one does not immediately have the constructs available to deal with a particular situation
My examples and work in pairs
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14. More emotional vocabulary
Aggression ( more akin to assertiveness these days) is an active elaboration of a person’s perceptual field – doing things in a consciously different way
Hostility (more like cooking the books) is an attempt to extort evidence in favour of a social prediction which has not worked
More examples
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15. Further references
“The Psychology of Personal Constructs” – George Kelly, latest edition 18/12/00Wiley, 1991
A Psychology for Living – Peggy Dalton and Gavin Dunnett, Wiley, 1992
Inquiring Man – Don Bannister and Fay Fransella, Penguin, 1971
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