Chapter 19 Kelly: Psychology of Personal Constructs 573their weight continues to drop to a life-threatening level. Some people construe a
world that is substantially different from the world of other people. For example,
psychotic patients in mental hospitals may talk to people whom no one else can
see. Kelly (1963) would insist that these people, along with everyone else, are
looking at their world through “transparent patterns or templates” that they have
created in order to cope with the world’s realities. Although these patterns or
templates do not always fit accurately, they are the means by which people make
sense out of the world. Kelly referred to these patterns as personal constructs:
They are ways of construing the world. They are what enables [people], and
lower animals too, to chart a course of behavior, explicitly formulated or
implicitly acted out, verbally expressed or utterly inarticulate, consistent with
other courses of behavior or inconsistent with them, intellectually reasoned or
vegetatively sensed. (p. 9)A personal construct is one’s way of seeing how things (or people) are alike
and yet different from other things (or people). For example, you may see how
Ashly and Brenda are alike and how they are different from Carol. The comparison
and the contrast must occur within the same context. For example, to say that Ashly
and Brenda are attractive and Carol is religious would not constitute a personal
construct, because attractiveness is one dimension and religiosity is another. A
construct would be formed if you see that Ashly and Brenda are attractive and
Carol is unattractive, or if you view Ashly and Brenda as irreligious and Carol as
religious. Both the comparison and the contrast are essential.
Whether they are clearly perceived or dimly felt, personal constructs shape
an individual’s behavior. As an example, consider Arlene with her broken-down
car. After her old car stopped running, her personal constructs shaped her subse-
quent course of action, but not all her constructs were clearly defined. For instance,
she may have decided to buy a late-model automobile because she interpreted the
car dealer’s friendliness and persuasiveness as meaning that the car was reliable.
Arlene’s personal constructs may be accurate or inaccurate, but in either case, they
are her means of predicting and controlling her environment.
Arlene tried to increase the accuracy of her predictions (that the car would
provide reliable, economical, and comfortable transportation) by increasing her store
of information. She researched her purchase, asked others’ opinions, tested the car,
and had it checked by a mechanic. In much the same manner, all people attempt to
validate their constructs. They look for better-fitting templates and thus try to improve
their personal constructs. However, personal improvement is not inevitable, because
the investment people make in their established constructs blocks the path of forward
development. The world is constantly changing, so what is accurate at one time may
not be accurate at another. The reliable blue bicycle Arlene rode during childhood
should not mislead her to construe that all blue vehicles are reliable.
Basic Postulate
Personal construct theory is expressed in one fundamental postulate, or assumption,
and elaborated by means of 11 supporting corollaries. The basic postulate assumes
that “a person’s processes are psychologically channelized by the ways in which