Personality and Individuality

Individuality as a property of the individual. The essence of individuality is associated with the identity of the individual, with the ability of him to be himself, to act as an independent being within the framework of another whole. Personality is:

that each individual is unique,

but, especially in the fact that each individual is a separate original subject who, being included in the world around him, in one or another social structure, retains its relative independence.

Individual identity is manifested in all signs of individuality. But the true meaning of individual uniqueness is associated not so much with the appearance of the individual, as with the way of being as an independent subject of activity. Individuality can be defined as a special form of human existence in society.

It is advisable to compare the concept of individuality with the concept of personality, since individuality does not exist along with personality, but as one of its properties. The concept of personality fixes the socially significant traits of a person, peculiar to him as an individual.

But if the essence of the personality is the personification of social relations, then the concrete personality can express its social essence in the form of individuality. As an individual, a personality creates his own image, is the “author” of his actions. “If a person is“ the top ”of the whole structure of human properties, then individuality is the“ depth ”of the person and the subject of activity” (6).

A person taken out of connection with individuality, outside of her own way of being, is, of course, an abstraction and does not really exist. If the human individual cannot become a person without assimilating his social essence, then the person cannot acquire his own independent being without becoming an individuality.

Thus, personality is social in its essence, but is individual in its mode of existence. It represents the unity of the social and individual, essence and existence. Personality and individuality are not only interconnected, but also mutually condition each other. The formation of personal qualities of a person is in close connection with his individual self-consciousness. The behavior of a particular person, his attitude to his social roles and functions depend on his individual consciousness, his level of development, and individual characteristics. Thus, individuality is not only connected with the personality, but also forms its essential feature, and therefore must organically enter into the definition of the very concept of personality.

The concept of individuality does not coincide entirely with the concept of personality. If the notion of personality characterizes a person from his social conditionality, his social content, pointing to his social position and orientation, then the notion of individuality reveals the form, the way of his being. The natural characteristics of the individual in themselves do not form an individuality. The human individual becomes an individuality to the extent that he ceases to be only a “unit”, an “instance” of a kind, and acquires the relative independence of his being. Individuality is a special formed quality of a concrete person, taken in the unity of his natural and social properties, his consciousness and activity. So "individuality manifests itself in different ways in the objective world, organic nature and human society, respectively, we can distinguish three of its forms: objective, biological and social."

The essential definition of individuality is that it reflects the identity of a particular individual.

The concept of personality characterizes a person with his social content, the notion of individuality reveals the form, the way of his being. The concept of individuality is inextricably linked with the process of human individualization, with the formation and development of its identity and uniqueness.

In general, individuality of an individual is understood as a set of semantic relations and attitudes of a person in the world, which are appropriated in the course of life in society, provide orientation in the hierarchy of values ​​and mastery of behavior in a situation of struggle between motives; embodied through activity and communication in the products of culture, in other people, in oneself.

Individuality is the uniqueness of a particular person, the totality of his own peculiarities and styles. In psychology, the problem of individuality is posed in connection with the holistic characteristic of an individual person taken in the diversity of his thoughts, feelings, manifestations of will power, abilities and talents, motives, needs, interests, habits, experiences, qualities of perseptive processes, intellectual level, aptitudes and other various features .