Personality and the conduct of everyday life

Abstract

The main purpose of this paper is to present a theory of persons that is rooted in the way persons conduct their everyday lives. The approach and the key concepts in the theory are presented in the second, central part of the paper. This theoretical approach to personhood is unusual. Current research on personality recognizes that personality must be studied in the interplay between person-situation-behavior. In the first part of the paper I present some of the core issues in those studies. The theoretical approach aims at resolving these issues. These issues are one of the two major sources of inspiration for the theoretical approach. The other important source of inspiration are studies of psychological interventions. In the third part of the paper I present a study that illuminates how the theory may provoke and enrich our understanding of interventions.

Keywords:

• conduct of everyday lives
• personhood
• personality
• person-situation-behavior
• psychological interventions