13.1. Phenomenological model of personological concepts
Phenomenology is the science dealing with specific essences and entities, which form the basis of all sciences and thereby can be termed as principles. Such essences are revealed by intuition. In contrast to empirical intuition focused on the world of experience, the phenomenological intuition is rational. However, it is not sufficient merely to state the existence of a peculiar subject field of phenomenology. The researcher should look deeper and reveal specificity of the phenomenon. Thus, the realm of sense is the field of peculiar existence that can be attained with the apparatus of phenomenology.
Phenomenology is also an interesting field of the medico-sociological studies within the Western research tradition. Analysis and comprehension of its substance can exert a pronounced effect on the future development of sociology of health and disease making it more informative and more comparable with the views of individual human beings.
The phenomenological avenue in the study of human personality originates from the individual perception of the outer world and the behavior of people in this world, the personal one included. The cornerstone of the phenomenological approach to personality is the postulate on the predominant role of personal perception, which declares that it is not the environmental objective reality, but its individual perception and interpretation at a particular moment that are the major constructs in explaining the personal problems and individual peculiarities. An inference from this postulate is the conviction that human beings can determine their life and fatum by themselves independently on and even in defiance of the external reasons, so they are responsible for their self-determination. According to the views of the supporters of this phenomenological theory, the human beings are kind, and they strive for perfection by their very nature thereby marching en mass towards maturity on the way of self-actualization.