hy the incest was occurring, nor do anything to prevent it. By the time she was twelve, Deborah worked up the nerve to tell her mother. Her mother took her to the police station and tried to press charges. Her mother was advised not to file criminal charges, and eventually her father just ignored protective orders and followed the family wherever they moved. When Deborah was fourteen, her father began living with them again. Although the incest did not continue, the emotional suffering did. Deborah again experienced confusion when her mother decided to accept this man back into their household. As an adult, Deborah flip-flops between sanity and depression. At times, she still feels as though she would like to be daddy’s girl; a feeling she lost out on during adolescence. Alternately, she has had dreams of meeting and brutally attacking the man who physically assaulted her at such a tender age. Deborah has been given prescription medicine to assist her with blackouts brought on whenever she recalls the incest. During some of her adult sexual experiences, Deborah has imagined having vaginal intercourse with her father, and has even fantasized about being older and more capable of making him satisfied. She indicates that, at times, she feels like she has been strangely rejected by him. Deborah has felt so abnormal during adulthood, due to her abnormal childhood, that she is utterly uncertain about her decision-making abilities in every aspect of her life. In an attempt to determine which personality approach best describes Deborah Mays, I have selected the behavioral/social approach. Due to the overabundance of incestuous occurrences in Deborah’s life, she experienced mental anguish, instability, and depression. The text Personality (Burger, 2000, p. 10) describes depression as “…developing from experiences with aversive situations over which people have little or no control.” As applicable to...
