Hidden personality is the part of the personality that is determined by unconscious processes.
Sigmund Freud
The basic assumption of Freud's psychoanalytic view of the person is an energy system in which all mental processes are considered to be energy flows, which can flow freely or can get sidetracked or dammed up. Freud argues that the goal of all behaviour is the reduction of tension through the release of energy, which produces pleasure. People function in accordance with hedonistic principles, seeking unbridled gratification of all desires. The endless pursuit of pleasure is, however, in conflict with society and civilization, as the uncontrolled satisfaction of pleasure is not accepted. In Freud's view, humans are primarily driven by sexual and aggressive instincts. Sexual and aggressive energy prevented from expression in a more direct way are converted to cultural activities such as art and science. Energy used for cultural purposes is, however, no longer available to sexual purposes and Freud concludes that the price of civilization is misery, the forfeit of happiness and a sense of guilt.
Freud's theory of personality is based on the idea that much of human behaviour is determined by forces outside awareness. The relation between the person and society is controlled by primitive urges buried deep within ourselves, forming the basis of the hidden self. Freud argues that much of our psychic energy is devoted either to finding acceptable expressions of unconscious ideas or to keeping them unconscious. Freud constructed his concept of the unconscious from analysis of slips of the tongue, dreams, neuroses, psychoses, works of art and rituals. The conscious mind is like the tip of an iceberg, with its greatest part – the unconscious – submerged. Psychoanalytic theory is fundamentally a motivational theory of human behaviour and Freud claimed that "psychoanalysis aims at and achieves nothing more than the discovery of the unconscious in mental life".
Carl Rogers
Humanist psychologist Carl Rogers opposed psychoanalytic personality theory as he was dissatisfied with the 'dehumanising nature' of this school of thought. Rogers' view of 'hidden' personality relates to the person one could be given the right circumstances within society. For an individual to be truly happy and for self-actualisation to be realised, the public and hidden selves must be as similar as possible. Rogers believed that when all aspects of a person's life, surroundings and thoughts are in harmony, thus the ideal state of congruence is reached. In simpler terms, the Personal Unconscious are the thoughts, ideas, emotions, and other mental phenomena acquired and repressed during one's lifetime.
The Collective Unconscious
Many philosophers have advanced the theory that the human mind is a "blank slate," capable of being molded by our upbringing, which includes social experiences. In working with patients, Carl Jung observed the development of repeated themes in different people's artwork, dreams and fantasies. Yet he noticed that many of these themes had no relation to and could not have originated from any connection to the person's own individual life experiences.
Jung concluded that, in addition to our Personal Unconscious, we each possess a deeper aspect of the unconscious. It was in identifying this second unconscious region that Jung's model differentiated itself from Freud's. Naming it the Collective Unconscious, Jung theorized that this region contained psychological elements not developed during the course of our own lives, but passed on through our common evolutionary history to all members of our species. There are shared, fundamental elements that make up the Collective Unconscious and generate a limiting framework around which our psychic material organizes. He referred to those as Archetypes. Archetypes are the fundamental elements of the collective unconscious. Jung, states that every human being is born with a psyche that expects to engage, influence, and to undergo certain life milestones. For instance, our psyches have evolved to expect us to be born, to expect us to have parents, to expect us to encounter particular types of other people and creatures with which we share the earth, to expect us to have children, and to expect us to eventually die. These fundamental psychological expectations have become embodied, Jung claimed, in a common set of basic tendencies in the unconscious that predispose us to generate particular ideas, concepts and imagery related to them. These tendencies are the Archetypes.
Foundations of Personality
Freud and Roger's theory of personality are based on some very different assumptions. Their concept of human nature and the role of rationality in human motivation are diametrically opposed. Although both theories include a hidden personality, both concepts are very different in that for Freud it is our natural state, while for Rogers it is the self-created by the demands of society.
Human Nature
Freud theorised that people have an unconscious mind that would, if permitted, manifest itself in incest, murder and other activities which are considered crimes in contemporary society. Freud believes that neuroticism is a result of tensions caused by suppression of our unconscious drives, which are fundamentally aggressive towards others.
Reason in Human Behaviour
Revolutions in the history of science have one common feature: they deconstruct our convictions about our own self-importance. Copernicus moved our home from centre of the universe to its periphery, Darwin relegated us to descent from an animal world and Freud discovered the unconscious and deconstructed the myth of a fully rational mind. Human behaviour is, according to Rogers: "exquisitely rational, moving with subtle and ordered complexity toward the goals the organism is endeavouring to achieve". The natural course of the actualising tendency is, however, often blocked by psychosocial conditions. When this happens, people become estranged from their true nature and may behave irrationally through anti-social and destructive behaviour.
Hidden Personalities
The Freudian concept of the unconscious mind was never experimentally verified by him and remained a theoretical construct. Critical questions about what is available to immediate observation and what occurs unconsciously could never be fully answered by Freud as he did not possess any of the current day technological possibilities.