Feist−Feist: Theories of
Personality, Seventh
EditionV. Learning Theories 18. Kelly: Psychology of
Personal Constructs© The McGraw−Hill^559
Companies, 2009that 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 com-
parison 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 subsequent
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 pro-
vide 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 vali-
date 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
[that person] anticipates events”(Kelly, 1955, p. 46). In other words, people’s
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