The theory of positive disintegration (TPD) is an idea of personality development developed by Polish psychologist Kazimierz Dąbrowski. Unlike mainstream psychology, the theory views psychological tension and anxiety as necessary for personal growth. These "disintegrative" processes are "positive", whereas people who fail to go through positive disintegration may stop at "primary integration", possessing individuality but nevertheless lacking an autonomous personality and remaining impressionable. Entering into disintegration and subsequent higher processes of development occurs through developmental potential, including over-excitability and hypersensitivity.
Unlike other theories of development such as Erikson's stages of psychosocial development, it is not assumed that even a majority of people progress through all levels. TPD is not a theory of stages, and levels do not correlate with age, nor do tension and anxiety correlate to maturity.
Dąbrowski's theory
The development of the theory of positive disintegration began in Dąbrowski's earliest Polish works, as reflected in his 1929 doctoral thesis. His first work in English also contained seeds of the theory. His next major English work was his 1964 book Positive Disintegration. He proposed that the key to mental growth was having strong "developmental potential": a constellation of psychological factors often leading to the disintegration of existing psychological structures. These disintegrations allow the individual to voluntarily reorganize their priorities and values, leading to psychological growth.
Dąbrowski's theory of personality development emphasizes several major features, including that having a unique personality is not a universal trait: it must be created and shaped by the individual to reflect their own unique character. Personality develops as a result of developmental potential (DP), including overexcitability and the autonomous (third) factor; not everyone displays sufficient DP to move through the process of mental growth via positive disintegration.
Dąbrowski used a multilevel approach to describe the continuum of developmental levels seen in the population. In his theory, developmental potential creates crises characterized by strong anxieties and depressions (which he called psychoneurosis) that precipitate disintegrations. For personality to develop, initial integrations based on instinct and socialization must disintegrate through a process Dąbrowski called positive disintegration. He said that the development of a hierarchy of individual values and emotional reactions was a critical component in developing one's personality and autonomy; thus, in contrast to most psychological theories, emotions play a major role.
Emotional reactions guide the individual in creating their individual "personality ideal", an autonomous standard that acts as the goal of individual development. Individuals must examine their essence and develop their own unique personality ideal. Only then can they make existential choices that emphasize the aspects of self that are higher and "more myself", and inhibit those aspects that are lower or "less myself", based upon their ideal personality; thus shaping their personality and creating an authentic self based upon the fundamental essence of the individual. Critical components of individual development include: self-education, subject-object, personality ideal, self-perfection, and autopsychotherapy.
Factors in personality development
Dąbrowski observed that most people live their lives in a state of "primary or primitive integration" largely guided by biological impulses ("first factor"), by uncritical endorsement and adherence to social conventions ("second factor"), or by both at once. He called this initial integration Level I. Dąbrowski observed that at this level, there is no true individual expression of the autonomous human self; the individual has no autonomous personality, and rather, they exhibit Nietzsche's idea of the herd personality. Individual expression at Level I is influenced and constrained by the first and second factors.