Archetypal Aspects of a Person's Life Scenario

Skleynis Viktor Aleksandrovich PhD in Psychology Docent, the department of Social Sciences and Humanities, North-Eastern State University 685024, Russia, Magadanskaya oblast', g. Magadan, ul. Portovaya, 13 kartiala@list.ru Other publications by this author

The concept of a person's life scenario goes back to the works of E. Bern, who considered the behavior and psychological evolution of a person as a reflection of the basic models of social relations learned in childhood in the family and programming further life. Under the life scenario, he understood an unconscious life plan formed in early childhood as a result of interactions with parents, supported by further life events and manifested in those important decisions that a person makes ^[1]. The life scenario of a person determines the way of perception and interpretation of the surrounding world, feelings, thoughts and ways of reacting to the surrounding world, and is formed by the age of 5-6 years. It is this set of basic perception schemes that is subsequently reproduced from memory and used in interpreting information and determining the way of action, thereby determining the human life trajectory and destiny.

The key factor in the formation of the scenario, according to Bern, is the behavior and reactions of parents. Structurally, three phases are clearly distinguished in the life plan: the beginning, the middle and the end, forming a dramatic composition within which a person perceives his life and moves towards his future. A person unconsciously chooses those decisions and actions that bring him closer to the final, which is the main element of the scenario. The script not only determines the key life decisions, but also forms the subjective reality in which a person lives. 

The three basic types of scenarios described by E. Bern include the polar "Winner" and "Loser" scenarios, as well as the intermediate "Non-Winner" scenario ^[14]. The winner's scenario assumes that a person fulfills his obligations to the world and to himself, sets and achieves goals, knowing what to do even if he loses. A person "programmed" by the loser's scenario is not confident in his abilities and does not know what to do in case of failure. The intermediate scenario of non-winners forces a person to work hard to stay in place, not claiming victory, but also not becoming complete losers. They fit well into the team, demonstrate high loyalty and integration into the social group.

In addition to the basic life orientation in terms of achievement, scenarios structure the temporary organization of human life. With regard to the temporal aspect, E. Bern identifies six types of scenarios ^[14]:

– "Never" (due to the restrictions imposed by parents, a person in such a scenario never dares to do what he wants most);

– "Always" (the desire to always repeat actions aimed at satisfying some desire, which ultimately lead to failure);

– "Not yet" (the endless postponement of the fulfillment of the desired for the future, when "suitable conditions" appear for this);

– "After" (waiting for trouble or "reckoning" after the pleasures and joys of the current moment);

– "Over and over again" (a scenario illustrated by the example of Sisyphus, in which a person constantly tries to achieve something, but never achieves what he wants, remaining one step away from the goal);

– "Open scenario" (a specific scenario that does not have a purpose and instructions in itself, and occurs when a person executes all the instructions and scenarios laid down by parents and does not know what to do next, as in the case of a mother who raised a child and cannot live for herself).

E. Bern's works laid the foundation not only for further research into how the model of relationships and interactions in early childhood programs further human life, but also for the development of applied techniques for psychological counseling, diagnostics and behavior correction. According to the ideas of E. Bern and his colleagues, understanding the scenarios that a person unconsciously follows allows one to reflect on the driving forces of one's own behavior and the causes of certain life turns, and find ways to change the negative course of life, overcoming the deterministic force of scenarios. The ability to reflect on their scenarios and act contrary to them forms what E. Bern called an anti-scenario, which underlies the self-determination of the individual.

The development of the theory of life scenarios and scenario analysis took place in various directions, both scientific and psychological, and more applied, psychotherapeutic. Thus, K. Steiner ^[19], considering scenarios as factors that violate a genuine, autonomous human life, identifies three basic types of life scenarios:

1. Depression ("Without love") is a scenario based on a constant feeling of lack of love and disbelief that someone can love you; more typical for women.

2. Insanity ("Without mind") is a scenario based on the inability to cope with problems and control one's own life, the perception of oneself as stupid, incapable and powerless; in its extreme form, it turns into the fear of going crazy.

3. "Drug addiction" ("Without joy") is a scenario expressed in a widely understood dependence on any external means acting on the body (from coffee and aspirin to drugs themselves) and meaning fear and unwillingness to perceive and understand the signals of your body, trying instead to artificially correct its condition.

A significantly new stage in scenario theory was R. Erskine's hypothesis that scenarios are life plans that are determined by decisions made at any stage of development and limit the flexibility and spontaneity of reactions ^[17]. In this case, life scenarios become not so much a reflection of the system of transactions in which a person is involved in early childhood, as a mechanism of psychological protection, becoming an unconscious strategy of life. Nevertheless, at their core, the scenarios are also pathological in nature, being a limiting factor, restrictive for the individual.

The thesis of the inevitable pathology of scenarios is criticized in a number of theories ^[18]. Thus, A. Adler believes that the process of forming a life scenario as a way of uncritical comprehension of one's experience is not pathological in itself, becoming dysfunctional only when a person ossifies in their cognitive content, leaving no room for a new perception and interpretation of reality. A number of theorists, in particular, F. English, go even further and claim that scenarios represent a "valuable asset", an evolutionary advantage of humans that other animals do not possess. Although scenarios can be dysfunctional, they play an important role in structuring our life, time, behavior, provide the integrity of the personality and a prospective vision, without which it is impossible to build your life and move towards distant goals.

A number of subsequent works present new versions and approaches to the study of life scenarios, their structure and typology, the mechanisms of their functioning, the relationship with various environmental factors, in particular, cultural ^[16]. An important role in the development of the theory was played by conducting cross-cultural studies and identifying the cultural background of scenarios. The result was an idea of cultural life scenarios, that is, culturally shared ideas about key life events and decisions, their interpretation and temporary organization. This allowed us to take the study of the determinants of life scenarios beyond the narrow social circle and place them in a broader context. Other approaches connect life scenarios with the peculiarities of the cognitive architecture of the human mind and the functioning of autobiographical memory, typologies of personality traits, as well as the intergenerational dynamics of the content of scenarios.

The theory of life scenarios forms an important part of modern psychology, clinical research and psychotherapeutic practice, is characterized by active discussions and has applications in various scientific and practical fields: personality psychology, developmental psychology, social psychology, psychiatry and psychoanalysis, organizational and cross-cultural psychology. One of the directions of the analysis of the life scenario of the personality is its consideration as a form of manifestation of the archetype. Thus, V.M. Smirnov ^[12], considering the manifestations of archetypal images in cinematic works, points to the relationship of the scenario and archetypal components. Thus, the orientation and dynamics of the hero's life transformations are determined, in the author's opinion, by his archetypically given type, while the initial context that determines the actions and life choices of the heroes of the work is determined by the basic categories of space and time.  A.A. Nikiforova and V.V. Selivanov ^[4] consider archetypal scenarios the result of the realization of the archetype, which is a component of the deep layer of the psychosemantic space of personality. Similarly, the phenomenon of the archetype is understood by J. Bain ^[13], who considers the archetype as the basis for building a life path.

In our works ^[11], the life scenario of a personality and archetypal structures are considered from the standpoint of the psychology of subjective semantics as forms of meanings. At the same time, the life scenario of a person is a component of the deep structures of the image of the world, manifested at the level of semantic structures in the form of specifics of evaluating objects associated with the implementation of the scenario. The forms of manifestation of the life scenario in semantic structures include the specifics of the subject's assessment of the characteristics of his own personality, structuring time, as well as his lifestyle ^{[9, 10]}.

In turn, the concept of the archetype in psychology includes a wide range of diverse phenomena. In a narrow sense, the concept of an archetype includes a basic tendency localized at the level of deep psychic structures and manifesting itself at the underlying levels through expression in a symbolic form. In a broad sense, this concept includes a set of manifestations of basic tendencies in the structures of individual consciousness and cultural phenomena ^[9].

Thus, both archetypal structures and the life scenario of a personality from the point of view of the psychology of subjective semantics can be considered as deep semantic structures projected onto the level of surface structures in the process of meaning formation ^[3].

To compare the type of life scenario on the one hand and the leading archetype, we conducted an empirical study. The definition of the type of life scenario of a personality was carried out using a questionnaire that includes a number of questions related to various manifestations of the life scenario of a personality. When filling out the questionnaire, the subjects were asked to note their typical ways of structuring time and life roles, describe their life motto and early memories, as well as point out a number of typical recurring life situations, pleasant and unpleasant. The subject was also asked to write and name a fairy tale about himself, describing its main character, his own role in the fairy tale and the final scene. The sample of the study is represented by subjects in the number of 150 people aged 18 to 61 years; 67 of them are women and 83 men. Based on the results of this technique, we formed 3 groups of subjects differing in the type of life scenario: the winner (58 people), the invincible (60 people) and the defeated (32 people).

To study the deep structures of the image of the world, the "12 archetypes plus" technique proposed by T.V. Kapustina was used ^[3]. This technique is a set of metaphorical associative maps corresponding to the personality archetypes identified in the archetypal space model by M. Mark and K. Pearson. ^[18], which includes 12 archetypes structured according to two motivational axes: "Stability – Change" and "Belonging – Independence". The relationship between archetypes and motivational axes is shown in table 1.

Table 1. The relationship between archetypes and motifs in the model of M. Mark and K. Pearson

The determination of the relationship between the type of life scenario of the individual on the one hand and the axes of the archetypal space on the other was carried out as follows. In each of the groups of subjects, identified in accordance with the type of life scenario of the individual, we identified 4 subgroups, based on the affiliation of the leading archetype to one of the motivational axes. The comparison of the above parameters was carried out using the Pearson coefficient of mutual conjugacy ?2.

Table 2. Comparison of the types of a person's life scenario and the axes of the archetypal space

The result obtained ?2=13.846 is statistically significant at the significance level p?0.05. Thus, we can talk about the presence of the conjugacy of the archetypal space and the type of life scenario of the individual.

Interpreting the results obtained, it should be noted that the differences between the groups of subjects according to the type of life scenario of the individual may largely be due to the type of life scenario. Thus, the leading archetype related to the motivational pole "stability" is most often found in subjects with the type of life scenario "winner", while among subjects with the type of life scenario "defeated", the leading archetype related to the pole of "change" is found with the highest frequency. The reason for this correlation may be the features of life strategies associated with each of the above poles of the motivational axes. Thus, the strategy of the pole of "stability" is more focused on planning one's own actions, while the strategy of the pole of "change" is associated with risky behavior associated with a greater probability of a negative outcome.  As for the motivational axis "belonging-independence", archetypes related to the pole of independence are more common among subjects with the types of life scenario "winner" and "defeated", while the archetypes of the axis "belonging" correlate with the type of life scenario "invincible". This pattern may also be due to the high degree of involvement of the latter in a social group.