Everyone living in this world is different, every one of us has our own unique personality and characters. That’s how we differentiate ourselves from others. Some persons are smart, some are not, some persons are optimistic, and some persons are pessimistic. Hundred years ago, psychologists and scientists started to do research and study human personality, how humans behave the way that differs from others.
From hundred years until contemporary psychology, there are diverse perspectives of psychology to developed personality theory respectively, for example, Psychoanalysis theory, Behaviorism theory, Humanistic theory, and etc.
Here, I would like to analyze the personality of one of the famous people in the world, Adolf Hitler. Adolf Hitler is one of the notable people that have a very unique personality. Adolf Hitler is a politician and the leader of the Nazi Party, also chancellor of Germany, people always comment that he is a person who cruels, inhuman, and insatiable greed for power. He promoted Pan-Germanism, anti-Semitism, and anti-communism with charismatic oratory and Nazi propaganda. He becomes a dictator from 1934 to 1945, during World War II, and led to eleven million peoples been killed, and six million of them are Jews. He committed suicide with his wife Eva Braun on 30th April 1945.
Adolf Hitler was born on 20th April 1889, a small town of Braunau-am-Inn, Austria. Adolf Hitler’s father, Alois Hitler was an Austrian customs official. Adolf Hitler’s mother Klara Polzl had six children, but only Adolf Hilter and his Sister survive. (Giblin, 2002)
Hitler was a smart and loving child in primary school. The death of his younger brother, Edmund, from measles on 2nd February 1900 deeply affected him. He changed from being confident and outgoing and an excellent student, to a morose, detached, and sullen boy who constantly fought with his father and teachers. (Payne, 1990)
Adolf Hitler’s youth age has been controlled by his extremely strong-well father until his father died in 1903. Adolf Hitler's ambition is to be a famous artist, he loves painting, but never succeed in school, and finally left formal education in 1905, the time he is only 16 years old. Hitler applied to the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna but failed several times. (Encyclopedia of World Biography)
During World War I, Adolf Hitler volunteered to serve in the Bavarian Army as an Austrian. In 1918, he was temporarily blind by a mustard gas attack. After World War I, he returned to Munich, and joined the German Workers' Party, the predecessor of the Nazi Party. In the year oh 1923, Adolf Hitler attempted an unsuccessful armed uprising in Munich and was imprisoned for nine months, during that period, he wrote his autobiography book, “Mein Kampf”. The Nazi party become stronger after he released, and he becomes the Chancellor of German in the year of 1933. Adolf Hitler initialed World War II, millions of peoples been killed by him included Jews, Slaves, Black, physical and mentally ill persons, and a gay man.
Theories apply to Hitler’s personality
From the psychoanalytic perspective, Adolf Hitler’s personality shaped during his childhood period. Freud’s notion about the psychosexual stages is, our personality develops through various stages during childhood. We will develop a healthy personality if all these psychosexual stages are completed successfully. But some people may not complete certain stages properly during childhood, thus fixation may occur. Hitler had a hard time when he was a kid, he loses his brother, which caused him to change from a happy smart kid to a morose, detached, and sullen boy. He loved his mother so much but not his father. According to Freud, a boy experience the Oedipus complex during the phallic stage. Hitler may go through the Oedipus complex when he was a kid. He may have developed a sexual attraction to his mother and jealousy toward his father. Perhaps the underlying cause that he always against his father’s will and he simply revolt any idea from his father, or in another word the unresolved son-father competition. Hitler’s sexual orientation is unknown even though he had several girlfriends and married Eva Braun. Rumors said he is homosexual, some others just argued that he is heterosexual. According to psychoanalytic theory, obsessions and compulsions reflect maladaptive responses to unresolved conflicts from the early stages of psychological development. Hitler was developed insecurity feeling since he was a kid, his unstable feeling and thought caused him easy to fear and feel anxious. His “Racial hygiene” program ideas reflect he has obsessions and compulsions to torture and killing others.
Alfred Adler’s psychoanalytic theory is, people have the feeling of insecurity and inferiority, they need to strive for success in their life. Just like Hitler, the driving force behind his thought, emotion, and behavior is the struggle of striving for superiority. Adolf Hitler’s young age is not easy, his inferiority and insecurity feeling caused him to fall into misery. Regardless of human ethics and morals, Adolf Hitler was an ambitious person. At a young age, he dreamed to be an artist. Hitler work hard to strive for the success in life, he spends time to learn how to draw painting, he takes a long journey from a small town come to Vienna, leaving his mother just to achieve his dream. Even though he not selected from the art academy, but he never gives up his dream, he never stops to draw, rather he still keeps on learning to paint. During World War I, he wished he is a successful soldier, he never gave up even though German had surrendered. Eventually, he became the successful dictator of Nazi Germany.
From the biopsychology perspective, Adolf Hitler’s temperament and personality inherited from his father. Both of them are a rigid, stubborn, grumpy, and hostile person. Their relationship getting worst when both of them persist in their own will.
From the big five personality perspective, Adolf Hitler is a Neuroticism person, he was the person that often experiences emotional instability, and many of them are negative emotions, like sadness, anxiety, irritability, and anger. From his book the “Mein Kampf”, when he described how being despised, betrayed by Jews, we can see he was a neurotic, paranoid person. From his book, he interpreted the ordinary situation as threatening, and the minor frustrations as hopelessly difficult. He can’t make a rational judgment on what is right and wrong, conversely bias, prejudice. Perhaps this the main reason that how he became extremely anti-Semitism.
Karen Horney is one of the Neo-Freudian psychologists. She studied how neurotic personality person and their relationship with others. Horney’s idea is a neurotic personality person is maladaptive and counterproductive in the way they deal with relationships. Hitler was trapped in a self-defeating interpersonal style, he always blames others for his failure in life. He develops this personality probably is the result of his childhood anxiety.
Hitler’s behavior more likely moving against people, he always projects his own feeling by being hostile to others, since small, he hostile to his father, teachers, and friends. When he glowed old, he hostile to Jews, he is selfish and cruel, to hurts and kills others with an irrational reason.
Conclusion
Most of the people know who Adolf Hitler is. Adolf Hitler’s cruel, inhuman behavior is unforgettable. He evokes our sad feeling about World War II, millions of people died because of this dictator, the chancellor of German. Adolf Hitler’s life has never been easy, he was abused by his father since he was a kid, his mother unable to protect him, even though she loves him so much. Hitler’s childhood determines his later life. Perhaps he can be a good Chancellor of German, and World War II will never happen if his childhood is healthy.
Hitler’s life has too many negative issues, but undisclosed in his book, “Meain Kamps”, he glowed up with an abused father, and he hates his father so much. Adolf Hitler is a neurotic personality person, he developed a lot of psychological issues in his life. His insecurity and anxiety feeling developed since was a kid, and underlying the causes of his obsessive thought and compulsive behavior. Although his sexual orientation and abnormal sexual behavior is just rumors and no evidence to prove, we can see his sex life is not healthy.
We have no idea why Hitler hates Jews so much and becomes an extreme anti-semitic, but the underlying cause probable is he was trapped in a self-defeating interpersonal style. He always blames others for his failure in life. The social culture became the factor in his psychological issues as well.
Every one of us is different, that’s so many factors determine how our personality shaped, we inherited our parent’s gens, we may inherit some personality traits from them too. The environment also one of the main factors that how our personality shaped. Most of the healthy personality people glowed from a healthy environment and have a happy childhood.
Reference
1. Robert Payne. (1990) The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler. New York: Dorset Press
2. James Cross Giblin. (2002). The life and death of Adolf Hitler. New York. USA: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
3. Encyclopedia of World Biography.(2012) Adolf Hitler Biography. Retrieved on 22nd June 2012 From: http://www.notablebiographies.com/He-Ho/Hitler-Adolf.html#b
4. Adolf Hitler. (1941). Mein Kampf. New York: Reynal & Hitchcock.
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