Personality refers to the way an individual behaves, including his pattern of though, feeling, action, perception, belief, skills and all his methods of adapting to the environment.
Human beings are born with certain characteristics, called reflexes or at times instincts. Without being taught, a new baby knows how to suckle her mother's breast, cry, pass urine or faeces, bleak the eyes etc.
But although a baby can do all these, but cannot read meaning to them, or express his fellings. Furthermore the baby does not know anything about himself such as sex, colour or shape.
But as we grow older, we start to learn to appreciate things by observing and immitating people in our immediate environment. Through this learning our personality is shaped. For example, we often behave according to the pattern of behaviour of the society in which we live.
Personality has three components and these components are learned during socialization: they include
Cognitive components i.e. how we perceive , think and remember. This is a function of our mental capacity or intelligence.
The behavioural components relates to our abilities, skills and talents.
The emotional component which consist of our feelings
These three components are developed through our interaction with various socialization agents. These include our parents, siblings, neighbours, members of our extended family, peer groups, class mates, work mates, the mass media e.t.c.
