The 5 Personality Types According To Erich Fromm

The 5 personality types according to Erich Fromm are based on the principle of productivity. According to the famous psychoanalyst, only one of these types of people can invest in their own freedom. Only one can achieve his emotional and personal independence.

There are a lot of personality theories. We have personality theories from Jung, Carl Rogers, Cattell, Eysenk or ” The Big Five ” by Costa and McCrae. We can notice a certain conflict within all these theories. Does this mean that behavioral science has not yet been able to agree on how to define the characteristics of the human personality?

Each trend, school of thought and author emphasizes its own definition of personality from its own theoretical models. The typology developed by Erich Fromm began with an interesting approach based on the humanistic philosophy which, whether we believe it or not, makes it genuinely useful even in daily life.

If there is one thing that this social psychologist and author of “The Art of Loving” or “The Fear of Freedom” believed in, it was man’s responsibility to achieve true autonomy, and to invest in his own independence while respecting others. According to Erich Fromm, this is synonymous with productivity.

Erich Fromm’s personality theory of the 5 personality types is based on two primary needs: the need for freedom, which we already knew, and the need for belonging. And when we read his work, there is something that usually attracts our attention. It is the fact that Fromm, a neo-Freudian psychoanalyst, has given a negative image of man. He considers him to be too passive and only motivated by his consumption needs.

In large parts of his work, he therefore urges us to promote our own personal development. He says that we should put aside our dependence on external factors, material things and the need for success and recognition and only invest in qualities such as love, respect, creativity and humility.

The human personality is deeply rooted and difficult to change, and Fromm still insists that it would have been enough if we were just a little more aware of our tendencies and attitudes. Enough to be able to have the commitment to change ourselves. Let us now look at what the 5 personality types are according to Erich Fromm.

The receptive personality

The receptive type is characterized by a constant need for recognition from others. The characteristic of this personality profile that stands out the most is that the support they receive is usually not given back. There is no input into the other person’s life and they do not try to provide any kind of help.

They also tend to be characterized by poor social skills, difficulty making decisions and a clear underestimation of their own human potential.

The exploiter

Among the 5 personality types, Erich Fromm believes that this is the most common. It refers to the types of profiles that establish connections and relationships with others out of purely selfish interests. They do this for themselves and, as Fromm put it, “for commercial interests.”

The exploitative type is willing to lie and manipulate to get what he wants, and they succeed in this by focusing on people with a low self-esteem to exploit them.

The collector

The unifying personality refers to persons whose sole purpose is to accumulate material possessions. Their only desire, which they consider a need, is to accumulate more and more things.

The more things they have, the more secure they feel. They feel stronger and consider themselves to have a greater personal satisfaction. It should be noted, however, that this unhealthy dependence on material things is never fully met. They are always missing something. Their happiness is never complete, and when new things come on the market, their first impulse is that they must have them.

The type of marketing

Among all personality types, Erich Fromm believes that this is the one that succeeds best in the workplace, for obvious reasons. These are people who establish relationships with others for financial gain. They are contacts based on clear financial or commercial goals.

But what may at first seem quite normal and expected is in fact what most damages the fundamental principle of human freedom. Why? These commercial contacts try to establish differences in social status where some achieve prestige and power, while others become submissive.

The productive type

Until now, we have gone through the personality types that according to Erich From represent everything that is not productive. The profiles that neither invest in their own personal freedom and autonomy nor less in others. However, all is not lost and we will not leave you with a pessimistic view of man. Fortunately, there is a fifth personality type where our hopes lie and our personal goals are found.

• The productive type is a person who channels all his efforts and all his interest in being someone who is engaged with others. What does this mean? In principle, they are individuals who can build lovable, enriching and meaningful relationships with the people around them.

• They also have a very healthy approach when it comes to dealing with negative emotions and pressure or attempts at control from others.

Erich Fromm encourages us to once again reflect on an idea that we have seen so much in the field of personal development. This idea claims that only those who invest in their own psychological value, self-esteem and independence can promote the same thing in others. Only he will be able to lay the foundations for a more humane society full of hope.

As we can see, this perspective on the 5 personality types, according to Erich Fromm, has a clear social component that can be used as a source of authentic motivation. Its purpose is to create the changes that will stimulate our personal development. Let us try to put this into practice.