Gordon Allport ( Psychology of the individual )

Gordon Allport stressed the individual's individuality. Attempts to characterise individuals in terms of
general characteristics, he argued, robbed them of their distinctive individuality. As a result, Allport
was critical of trait and factor theories that reduced human behaviours to shared characteristics.

He maintained, for example, that one person's stubbornness is unlike any other person's
stubbornness, and that no other individual's stubbornness combines with his or her extraversion and
imagination in the same way.

Allport's ability to research a single person in depth was consistent with his focus on each person's
individuality. He coined the term "morphogenic research" to describe the study of the organism, as
opposed to the nomothetic approaches used by most other psychologists. Nomothetic methods
collect data on groups of individuals, while morphogenic methods collect data on a single person.

Allport also called for a multidisciplinary approach to theory growth. He considered some of Freud's,
Maslow's, Rogers', Eysenck's, Skinner's, and other theorists' contributions, but he claimed that none
of them could sufficiently describe the complete growing and special personality. A general,
comprehensive theory, according to Allport, is preferable to a narrow, specific theory, even though it
generates less testable hypotheses.

Biography

He was born in Montezuma, Indiana, on November 11, 1897.

His father was a surgeon, and his mother was the youngest of four brothers and a teacher.

Father was a doctor who converted the family's home into a clinic. Mother, a former schoolteacher,
placed a strong emphasis on faith as well as the values of clean language and good behaviour.

The family moved around a lot before settling down in Cleveland, Ohio.

Allport developed an early interest in philosophical and religious issues, and he was more comfortable
with words than with games as a child.

And he identified himself as a social "isolate" who created his own social circle.

He did not consider himself an inspired scholar, graduating second in his high school class of 100.
Allport enrolled at Harvard in 1915, joining his brother Floyd (psychologist). He was undecided about
his future career when he earned his bachelor's degree in philosophy and economics in 1919. He had
taken psychology and social ethics as undergraduate studies, and both disciplines had left an indelible
mark on him.

He was hired to teach English and sociology at Robert College in Istanbul from 1919 to 1920. Allport
was given a fellowship for graduate study at Harvard while in Turkey. He also got an invitation to stay
with his brother Fayette in Vienna.
Allport had a meeting with Sigmund Freud in Vienna. Allport's later views on personality were heavily
influenced by his meeting with Freud. With audacity, the 22-year-old Allport wrote to Sigmund Freud,
announcing his visit to Vienna and inviting the founder of psychoanalysis to meet with him. For
Allport, the experience proved to be a fortuitous life-changing occurrence.

When Allport returned to the United States, he enrolled in Harvard's PhD programme right away.
Following his graduation, he spent the next two years in Berlin and Hamburg, studying under the
great German psychologists Max Wertheimer, Wolfgang Kohler, William Stern, Heinz Werner, and
others.

In 1924, he returned to Harvard to teach a new course in personality psychology, among other things.
Social ethics and the promotion of goodness and morality were merged with the empirical discipline
of psychology in this course.

Allport moved to Dartmouth College two years after starting his teaching career at Harvard. He
returned to Harvard four years later and stayed there for the remainder of his professional life.

Allport married Ada Lufkin Gould in 1925. Ada Allport, a clinical psychologist with a master's degree
from Harvard, had the clinical experience that her husband lacked. She was an important contributor
to some of Gordon's work, especially his two large case studies on Jenny Gove Masterson and Marion
Taylor, both of which were never published (Barenbaum, 1997).

The Allports had one brother, Robert, who went on to become a paediatrician, sandwiching Allport
between two generations of doctors, which seemed to please him greatly (Allport, 1967). There were
many distinctions and honours bestowed upon Allport. He became president of the American
Psychological Association in 1939. (APA). In 1963, he received the American Psychological
Association's Gold Medal Award; in 1964, he received the APA's Distinguished Scientific Contribution
Award; and in 1966, he was named Harvard's first Richard Clarke Cabot Professor of Social Ethics.

Allport, a heavy smoker, died of lung cancer on October 9, 1967.

Allport's Approach to Personality Theory:

Allport's approach to personality theory is shown by the answers to three interrelated questions:

(1) What is the concept of personality?

(2) How does intentional motivation fit into personality theory?

(3) What are the attributes of someone who is mentally healthy?

Personality is described as "the dynamic organisation of those psychophysical systems within an

individual that decide his specific adjustments to his environment" (Allport, 1937, p. 48).
"Personality is the complex organisation of those psychophysical structures within an individual that
decide his characteristics, actions, and thinking" (Allport, 1961, p. 28).

Personality encompasses both substance and change, as well as product and method, as well as
structure and development.

In conclusion, personality is both physical and psychological; it encompasses both overt and subtle
actions and thoughts; and it not only is, but also does anything.

What Is the Role of Conscious Motivation?

The value of conscious inspiration was stressed by Allport. Adults that are healthy are usually mindful
of what they are doing and why they are doing it. His focus on conscious motivation stems from his
emotional response to Freud's question: "And was that little boy you?" during their meeting in
Vienna. In disclosing the tale of the clean little boy on the tram car, Freud's answer implied that his
22-year-old visitor was unconsciously talking about his own fetish for cleanliness.

Allport (1967) said that his reason was completely conscious: he really wanted to know Freud's
thoughts on dirt phobia in such a young boy. Unlike Freud, who assumed the storey of the little boy
on the tram had an underlying unconscious sense, Allport was more likely to take self-reports at face
value. "This experience showed me that, for all its virtues, depth psychology can go too far, and that
psychologists would do well to acknowledge manifest motivations before probing the unconscious"
(Allport, 1967, p. 8).

Allport (1961) did not, however, dismiss the presence or significance of unconscious processes. He
acknowledged that latent desires and sublimated drives are responsible for certain motivation. Most
compulsive behaviours, he believed, are automatic repetitions that are typically self-defeating and
inspired by unconscious impulses. They frequently begin in childhood and continue to have a childish
flavour into adulthood.

What Are the Characteristics of a Healthy Person?

To comprehend Allport's definition of the mature personality, a few general assumptions are needed.

To begin with, mentally mature people exhibit proactive behaviour, which means they are capable of
not only reacting to external stimuli, but also of actively acting on their environment in new and
imaginative ways and causing their environment to respond to them. Proactive action isn't just about
reducing tensions; it's also about creating new ones. Furthermore, mature personalities are more
likely than disturbed personalities to be guided by conscious processes, allowing them to be more
resilient and independent than unstable individuals who are still ruled by implicit motivations rooted
in childhood experiences.

Even if their later years are tempered by tension and pain, most healthy adults have had a relatively
trauma-free childhood. Individuals that are psychologically stable are not without flaws or unusual
behaviour that distinguishes them.
Also, while healthy people seem to become more stable as they get older, age is not a requirement for
maturity.

What, then, are the more specific requirements for psychological health? Allport (1961) identified six
criteria for the mature personality.

The first is an extension of one's own self-awareness. People in their forties and fifties are always
looking for ways to identify with and engage in activities outside of themselves. They are not self-
centered, but they can become interested in issues and events that are not about them. They cultivate
a selfless interest in work, recreation, and play. They value social activities, family, and spiritual life.
Outside habits eventually become ingrained in one's personality. "Everyone has self-love, but only self
extension is the earmark of maturity," Allport (1961) said of this first criterion (p. 285).

Second, mature personalities are known for their "warm self-relating to others" (Allport, 1961, p.
285). They are capable of loving others in a personal and compassionate way. Of course, warm
relating is contingent on people's willingness to expand their sense of self. Mature people can only
love someone in a non-possessive and unselfish way if they look beyond themselves. Individuals who
are psychologically stable treat others with respect and recognise that their needs, expectations, and
hopes are not necessarily different from their own. They also have a positive sexual attitude and do
not take advantage of others for personal gain.

Emotional stability or self-acceptance is the third criterion. Mature people embrace themselves for
who they are, and they have emotional poise, as Allport (1961) described it. When things don't go as
expected or they're just "having a rough day," these mentally stable people don't get upset. They
don't get worked up over small annoyances, and they understand that complaints and inconveniences
are a part of life.

Fourth, mentally stable people have a rational view of their surroundings. They don't live in a dream
world or try to change reality to fit their needs. They are problem-oriented rather than self-centered,
and they are aware of how others see the world.

Insight and laughter are a fifth criterion: Mature people understand themselves and don't need to
blame others for their own faults and flaws. They often have a nonhostile sense of humour, allowing
them to laugh at themselves rather than relying on sexual or violent themes to make others laugh.
Intuition and humour, according to Allport (1961), are closely related and may be facets of the same
thing, namely self-objectification. Healthy people look at themselves critically. They are capable of
perceiving life's inconsistencies and absurdities and do not need to pretend or put on airs.

A unifying philosophy of life is the final standard of maturity. Healthy people have a good
understanding of what life is all about. Their insight would be hollow and sterile without this
perspective, and their satire would be superficial and pessimistic. The unifying philosophy of life may
or may not be religious, but Allport (1954, 1963) seemed to believe that a mature religious orientation
is a critical component in the lives of most mature individuals on a personal level. Many churchgoers
have an immature religious philosophy as well as narrow racial and ethnic biases, but profoundly
religious people are largely free of these prejudices. A individual with a mature religious attitude and
a unifying philosophy of life is likely to have a well-developed conscience and a deep desire to serve
others.

Structure of Personality:

The basic units or building blocks of a person's personality are referred to as their structure. The most
important structures, according to Allport, are those that enable a person to be defined in terms of
individual characteristics, which he refers to as personal dispositions.

"A generalised neuropsychic structure (peculiar to the individual), with the capacity to make many
stimuli functionally equivalent, and to initiate and direct consistent (equivalent) modes of adaptive
and stylistic behaviour," Allport (1961) described a personal disposition (p. 373).

Allport and Henry Odbert (1936) counted nearly 18,000 (17,953 to be exact) individually descriptive
terms in the 1925 edition of Webster's New International Dictionary to classify human dispositions,
with around a fourth of them describing personality characteristics.

For eg, politeness is a stylistic trait, whereas eating is a motivational trait. How people eat (their style)
is influenced by a variety of factors, including how hungry they are, as well as the intensity of their
stylistic dispositions. When eating alone, a normally polite but hungry person may forego manners,
but if the politeness nature is strong enough and others are present, the hungry person may eat with
etiquette and courtesy despite being hungry.

Of course, the three levels of personal dispositions are arbitrary points on a continuous scale ranging
from the most suitable to the least appropriate.

Cardinal dispositions, which are prevalent in a person, fade into central dispositions, which are less
dominant (letter of recommendation) but still distinguish the individual. Secondary dispositions
combine into central dispositions, which are less indicative of a person's adaptive and stylistic nature (
food preference like pepsi). However, we can't assume that one person's secondary dispositions are
weaker than another's central dispositions.
 Poprium:

It's a collection of characteristics that a person refers to as "that is me" or "this is mine." The proprium
owns all of the "uniquely mine" features. The word proprium was coined by Allport to describe the
habits and characteristics that people consider to be wet, central, and significant in their lives. Since
certain characteristics and attitudes of an individual are not warm and core, but rather reside on the
periphery of personality, the proprium is not the entire personality.

The proprium is made up of a person's ideals as well as the part of the conscience that is personal and
in line with one's adult beliefs. These non-appropriate habits include (1) simple drives and needs that
are usually met and fulfilled without difficulty; (2) tribal rituals such as wearing clothing, saying
"hello" to strangers, and driving on the right side of the road; and (3) automatic behaviours such as
smoking or brushing one's teeth that are not critical to one's sense of self.

Motivation:

Most people, according to Allport, are motivated by current motivations rather than historical events,
and are mindful of what they are doing and why they are doing it. He also said that theories of
motivation would take into account the distinctions between peripheral motivations and primary
goals. Proper strivings aim to sustain stress and disequilibrium, while peripheral motives seek to
minimise a need. Adult behaviour is reactive as well as constructive, and a good motivation theory
must be able to understand both.

A Motivational Theory A useful theory of personality, according to Allport, is based on the idea that
people not only respond to their environment, but also form it and cause it to react to them.

Many older theories of personality, according to Allport (1960), did not allow for the possibility of
development. People are driven mainly by needs to relieve anxiety and return to a state of
equilibrium, according to psychoanalysis and various learning theories.

Allport argued that an adequate theory of personality would allow for constructive behaviour:
individuals must be seen as intentionally acting on their environment in a way that promotes
psychological wellbeing.

Allport argued for a psychology that examines both behavioural trends and general laws (traditional
psychology's subject matter) and development and individuality. Theories of unchanging motivations,
according to Allport, are incomplete since they only explain reactive actions. The mature individual,
on the other hand, is driven not only to achieve satisfaction and alleviate discomfort, but also to
develop new motivational systems that are functionally independent of their original motives.

Functional Autonomy:

Allport's most characteristic and, at the same time, most contentious postulate is the principle of
functional autonomy.

Functional autonomy is a reaction to what Allport refers to as ideas of unchanging motivations, such
as Sigmund Freud's gratification theory and the stimulus-response psychology's drive-reduction
hypothesis.

Adult motives, according to Allport, are primarily based on conscious, self-sustaining, contemporary
systems. His effort to describe these conscious, self-sustaining contemporary motivations is called
functional autonomy.

"Any acquired system of motivation in which the tensions involved are not of the same kind as the
antecedent tensions from which the acquired system evolved," Allport (1961) described functional
autonomy (p. 229). A current motive is functionally autonomous to the degree that it seeks new goals,
which means that the behaviour will continue even though the reason for it shifts. For example, a
person may initially plant a garden to satisfy a hunger urge but later develop a passion for gardening
as a hobby. A child learning to walk, for example, may be driven by some maturational motivation at
first, but later on, he may walk to increase mobility or develop self-confidence.

All human motivation cannot be explained by functional autonomy. Eight systems are not functionally
autonomous, according to Allport (1961). (1) biological drives, such as eating, breathing, and sleeping;
(2) motives directly linked to the reduction of basic drives; (3) reflex actions, such as an eye blink; (4)
constitutional equipment, such as physique, intelligence, and temperament; (5) habits in the making;
(6) patterns of behaviour that require primary reinforcement; (7) sublimations that can be traced back
to childhood (8) some neurotic or pathological symptoms.

Functionally autonomous motivations may or may not be involved in the eighth phase (neurotic or
pathological symptoms). Allport (1961) used the example of a 12-year-old girl who had a peculiar
habit of smacking her lips many times per minute as an example of a compulsive symptom that was
not functionally autonomous. This practise began when the girl's mother told her that when she
inhaled, she was breathing good air and when she exhaled, she was breathing poor air. Since she
thought she had ruined the air by taking it out, the girl wanted to kiss it to make it better.

She repressed the explanation for her addiction and started "kissing" the poor air, an action that took
the form of smacking her lips, as her habit continued. This action was the product of a compulsive
desire to prevent good air from becoming bad air, rather than becoming functionally autonomous.

Allport proposed a criterion for distinguishing between functionally autonomous and non-functionally
autonomous compulsions. Compulsions that can be removed by therapy or behaviour change, for
example, are not functionally autonomous, whereas those that are highly resistant to therapy
are.self-sustaining and thus functionally autonomous. The 12-year-old girl was able to avoid smacking
her lips after therapy helped her figure out why she did it. Some pathological symptoms, on the other
hand, are functionally independent of the earlier events that triggered the pathology and serve a
contemporary lifestyle. A second-born child's attempts to catch up to his older brother, for example,
may develop into a compulsive lifestyle marked by unconscious strivings to overcome or defeat all
rivals. Since such a deep-seated neurosis is unlikely to respond to treatment, it meets Allport's
functional autonomy criterion.

The Study of the Individual:

Science of Morphogenesis

Allport distinguished two scientific approaches: nomothetic, which seeks general rules, and
idiographic, which applies to what is unique to each situation.

What are the morphogenic psychology methods? Many were identified by Allport (1962), some of
which were fully morphogenic and others which were partially morphogenic. Verbatim recordings,
interviews, visions, confessions; diaries, letters; some questionnaires; expressive documents,
projective documents, literary works, art styles, automatic writings, doodles, handshakes, speech
patterns, body movements, handwriting, gait, and autobiographies are all examples of wholly
morphogenic, first-person approaches. Self-rating scales, such as the adjective checklist; structured
measures in which individuals are compared to themselves instead of a norm group; the Allport-
Vernon-Lindzey Study of Values (1960); and Stephenson's Q sort technique are all semi-morphogenic
methods.

Marion Taylor's Journals Allport and his wife Ada became acquainted with an incredibly rich source of
personal data about a woman named Marion Taylor in the late 1930s. . Marion Taylor's personal
information included notes in a baby book, school records, scores on several psychological tests,
autobiographical content, and two personal meetings with Ada Allport. The centre of this data was
nearly a lifetime of diaries, but personal information on Marion Taylor also included accounts of her
by her mother, her younger sister, her favourite teacher, two of her relatives, and a neighbour, as well
as notes in a baby book, school records, scores on several psychological tests, and two personal
meetings with Ada Allport Taylor was born in Illinois in 1902, relocated to California in 1908 with her
parents and younger sister, and started keeping a diary in 1911. Her diary entries became more
intimate shortly after she turned thirteen, including fantasies and hidden feelings. She finally
completed her education, received a master's degree, and began teaching psychology and biology.
She married at the age of three and a half, but had no children. Despite having access to a wealth of
personal records on Marion Taylor, Ada and Gordon Allport decided not to publish an account of her
storey. Barenbaum (1997) proposed some potential explanations, but it is now difficult to know for
sure why the Allports did not publish this case history due to significant gaps in Marion Taylor's
correspondence with Ada Allport.

Jenny letter:

Jenny's correspondence These letters contain a surprisingly large amount of morphogenic content.
They were studied and analysed by Allport and his students for years, with the goal of constructing
the structure of a single personality by defining personal dispositions that were essential to that
individual. Jenny's personality was examined using three methods by Allport and his students.

To begin, Alfred Baldwin (1942) devised a technique known as personal structure analysis, which he
used to analyse roughly one-third of the letters. Baldwin gathered evidence for Jenny's personal
structure using two purely morphogenic procedures: frequency and contiguity.

The first simply entails making a note of how often an object appears in the case content. How many
times did Jenny mention Ross, money, or herself, for example? The proximity of two objects in the
letters is referred to as contiguity. How much did the categories "Ross-unfavorable" and "herself-self-
sacrificing" appear together? This method of contiguity was intuitively used by Freud and other
psychoanalysts to discover a connection between two objects in a patient's unconscious mind.
Baldwin, on the other hand, fine-tuned it by calculating statistically which correspondences occur
more frequently than would be predicted by chance alone. Baldwin defined three clusters of
categories in Jenny's letters using the personal structure analysis. The first was about Ross, women,
the past, and herself, and it was about self-sacrifice. Jenny's work hunt was the subject of the second
cluster, and her attitude toward money and death was the subject of the third cluster. Even if a single
subject, such as money, can appear in all three clusters, the three clusters are distinct.
Second, Jeffrey Paige (1960) used a factor analysis to extract Jenny's letters' key personal dispositions.
Paige came up with eight variables in total: aggression, possessiveness, association, autonomy, family
approval, sexuality, and sentience.

Jenny's Central Dispositions Revealed by Clinical and Factor Analytic Techniques:

Factor Analytic Technique (Paige)

Aggression

Possessiveness

Need for affiliation

Need for family acceptance

Need for autonomy

Sentience

Martyrdom

Sexuality

(No parallel)

("Overstate"; that is, the tendency to be dramatic and to overstate her concerns)

Jenny's letters were studied using the third form, which was a commonsense approach used by
Allport (1965). His outcomes are somewhat similar to Baldwin's and Paige's. Jenny's critical
characteristics were to be identified by 36 judges, according to Allport. They compiled a list of 198
descriptive adjectives, many of which were interchangeable. The words were then categorised into
eight groups: (1) quarrelsome-suspicious, (2) self-centered (possessive), (3) independent autonomous,
(4) dramatic-intense, (5) aesthetic-artistic, (6) violent, (7) cynical morbid, and (8) sentimental. As
compared to Paige's factorial analysis, this commonsense, clinical approach comes out on top. Jenny's
letters reveal that she had about eight core characteristics that defined the last 12 years of her life, if
not her entire life. She was abrasive, suspicious, possessive, aesthetic, nostalgic, morbid, dramatic,
and egotistical. These core characteristics were so strong that Isabel (Ada Allport), who knew her well,
and independent researchers who researched her letters both identified her in similar terms (Allport,
1965). The fact that Allport's commonsense clinical approach and Paige's factor analytic method are
so similar does not prove that either is right. It does, however, suggest that morphogenic studies are
feasible. Particularly by using various procedures, psychologists may study the same individual and
consistently classify central dispositions.

Related Research:

Gordon Allport, more than any other personality theorist, was dedicated to the scientific study of
religion during his life and published six lectures on the subject under the title The Individual and His
Religion (Allport, 1950).

The Religious Orientation Scale is a tool that measures how religious people are. Allport
acknowledged that a strong religious devotion was a sign of maturity, but he also believed that not all
churchgoers were mature religiously and displayed discrimination. Allport (1966) proposed a theory
to explain this widely published finding. Allport and J. Michael Ross (1967) created the Religious
Orientation Scale (ROS), which is only applicable to churchgoers, to better explain the relationship
between church attendance and discrimination. The ROS is made up of 20 objects, 11 of which are
extrinsic and 9 of which are intrinsic. "The primary object of prayer is to achieve relief and security,"
"I try
for example, or "What faith gives me the most is consolation when sorrow and misfortune hit."
hard to bring my faith over into all of my other dealings in life," for example, is an
example of an intrinsic object. People with an extrinsic orientation, according to
Allport and Ross, have a utilitarian view of religion; that is, they see it as a means
to an end. Their faith is a self-serving comfort and social convention religion. Their
convictions are flimsy and quickly reshaped when it's convenient. A second
category of individuals, on the other hand, has an inherent orientation. These
people practise their religion and find their ultimate motivation in it. Rather than
using faith to achieve a goal, they align their other desires with their religious
beliefs. They have internalised a belief system and adhere to it wholeheartedly.
Others appeared to disagree with both the Extrinsic and the Intrinsic objects, and
these people formed a fourth category known as indiscriminately antireligious or
nonreligious. A meta-analysis (Trimble, 1997) examined a variety of studies on the
ROS with the aim of determining its psychometric properties. The Extrinsic scale
was found to have only modest reliability, prompting the suggestion that more
things be added to the scale.
 • Religion, Prayer, and Health
Some recent research has looked into the connection between religion and
health. For example, Michael McCullough and colleagues found that religious
participation was linked to lower rates of hypertension, heart disease, stroke, and
cancer in a meta-analytic analysis (McCullough, Hoyt, Larson, Koenig, & Thoresen,
2000). Of course, a correlation like this does not imply a causal connection
between religious participation and health. It's possible that improved health is
due to the psychosocial services offered by religious participation. Religious
engagement, for example, is likely to broaden one's circle of friends and hence the
social support that these friends offer. However, McCullough et al. . after
controlling for social support, their item review showed a small but important
association between religious involvement and death rate; that is, people who
were more religiously involved were slightly more likely to be alive at follow-up
than those who were less religiously involved. These results suggest that religious
practise, regardless of social support, is linked to a small improvement in life span.
Richard Contrada and colleagues (Contrada et al., 2004) recently confirmed that
cardiovascular patients with strong religious beliefs fared better after heart
surgery than those with weak religious beliefs. Patients who had firm convictions
experienced less post-surgery problems and spent less time in the hospital. Prayer
and attendance at religious services were not directly linked to surgical
complications or duration of hospitalisation, confirming Allport's conclusions
regarding extrinsic and intrinsic religious orientation.
Critique of ALLport:
Allport's personality theory was focused on metaphysical speculation and
common sense rather than experimental research. He never intended for his
theory to be entirely new or comprehensive; rather, he was eclectic, carefully
borrowing from previous theories and acknowledging that his critics may have
valid points to make. Is there any evidence that the hypothesis has spawned
research? Allport's theory gets a moderate ranking on this criterion. Multiple
research on the empirical study of faith, beliefs, and prejudice have resulted from
his Religious Orientation Scale, the Study of Values, and his interest in prejudice.
Allport's theory would obtain a low score on the falsifiability criterion. The idea of
four somewhat distinct religious orientations can be confirmed or refuted, but
most of Allport's other observations are beyond science's ability to decide
whether another theory is equally valid.
A good theory will help you organise your findings. Is Allport's theory up to this
challenge? Again, the theory only provides a meaningful organisation for
hypotheses for a limited set of adult motives. Most of what we know about
human personality is difficult to fit into Allport's model. Allport, in particular, failed
to sufficiently explain behaviours driven by unconscious forces as well as those
induced by primary drives. He appeared able to leave the psychoanalytic and
behavioural theories alone, despite the fact that he acknowledged the presence
of these motives. This constraint, on the other hand, does not rule out Allport's
theory.
Accepting the validity of other scientific principles is a valid method of theory
construction. Allport's theory is moderately useful as a practitioner's guide. It
definitely acts as a light for teachers and therapists, illuminating the personality
perspective that indicates people should be viewed as individuals. Regrettably, the
specifics remain unknown.
Allport's psychology of the personality is strongly graded on the final two
parameters of a useful theory. His explicit wording ensures that the principle is
internally consistent and cost-effective.
concept of humanity:
Concept of Humanity
Allport had a generally upbeat and constructive outlook on human nature. As too
deterministic and mechanistic, he dismissed psychoanalytic and behavioural views
of humanity. He claimed that our fates and characteristics are dictated not by
unconscious motivations from childhood, but by deliberate choices we make now.
We aren't all mindless robots responding to powers of reward and punishment.
Instead, we are able to communicate with our surroundings and make it reactive
to us. Not only do we want to minimise tensions, but we also want to create new
ones. We are active, purposeful, and versatile, and we seek both change and
challenge. . Psychological development can occur at any age and people have the
ability to learn a variety of responses in a variety of circumstances. Even though
infantile factors are still strong in some people, personality is not formed in early
childhood. And to the degree that early childhood experiences occur in the
present, are they important. While early protection and love leave lasting
impressions on children, they also require the ability to shape their own existence
creatively, to resist conformity, and to be autonomous, self-directed individuals.
While culture has the ability to shape personality, Allport believes it does not have
the response to humanity's existence. Personality is more important than the
forces that form it, according to Allport. People are essentially proactive and free
to follow the prevailing dictates of society or to chart their own Life course.
Heredity, climate, and the nature of the organism are important; however, people
are essentially proactive and free to follow the prevailing dictates of society or to
chart their own Life course. People, on the other hand, are not entirely healthy.
Allport (1961) took a narrow freedom approach to his research. He was critical of
those who believe in total equality, but he was also opposed to psychoanalytic
and therapeutic views, which he believed denied free will. Allport's place was in
the centre of the pack. Despite the existence of free will, some individuals are
more capable of making decisions than others. A stable adult or child has more
independence than a highly depressed adult. The high-intelligent, reflective
individual has more freedom of choice than the low-intelligent, non-reflective
individual. Despite the fact that freedom is restricted, Allport believes it can be
extended. The greater a person's freedom of choice, the more self-awareness he
or she creates. The greater a person's degree of independence, the more rational
he or she becomes—that is, the more the blindfolds of self-concern and egotism
are removed. We have more rights as a result of our education and information.
The more we understand about a topic, the more freedom we have in that field.
To some degree, having a broad general education means having a larger selection
of careers, leisure opportunities, reading materials, and mates. Finally, our mode
of choice will increase our independence. Our independence is severely limited if
we stubbornly stick to a familiar course of action simply because it is more
convenient. In contrast, if we approach issues with an open mind, we widen our
outlook and extend our options; in other words, we increase our ability to choose
(Allport, 1955). Allport's perspective on humanity is teleological rather than
causal. Personality is affected by past experiences to some degree, but it is our
attitudes that make us human that are inspired by our hopes for the future. To put
it another way, we are healthy people if we set and pursue future goals and
objectives. We are all special, not so much because we have different basic drives,
but because we have different self-created aspirations and intentions.
Raymond Cattell:
Cattell was born in the English county of Staffordshire, where he had a pleasant
childhood.
His parents were strict about the academic expectations they wanted from their
children but relaxed about how they spent their free time. Cattell and his mates
spent a lot of time outside, sailing, diving, exploring caves, and staging mock
fights. They "occasionally drowned or fell off cliffs," he remembered.
When Cattell was nine years old, England was dragged into World War I. He
recalled how a mansion near his home was transformed into a hospital, and how
the experience made him exceedingly serious and conscious of the "brevity of life
and the need to do while one can." These events may have influenced his deep
commitment to work. He also felt intense rivalry with an older brother, and wrote
about the difficulties he faced in preserving his own freedom of growth when
dealing with a brother who could not be "overcome."
Cattell enrolled at the University of London at the age of 16 to study physics and
chemistry, and graduated with honours in three years. His time in London piqued
his interest in social issues, but he quickly realised that his background in physical
sciences did not prepare him to deal with such issues. He concluded that
mastering the study of the human mind was the best option. Since the field of
psychology in England offered few career opportunities and just six academic
professorships in 1924, this was a brave decision to make. Against the advice of
colleagues, Cattell enrolled in graduate school at the University of London, where
he worked with eminent psychologist-statistician Charles E. Spearman, the
inventor of the factor analysis technique.
Cattell received his Ph.D. in 1929 and discovered that his friends were right.
Psychologists have a hard time finding work. While following his own research
interests, he lectured at Exeter University, wrote a book about the English
countryside, and founded a psychology clinic for the city of Leicester's schools.
Whereas Spearman used factor analysis to assess mental skills, Cattell decided to
use the technique to assess personality structure.
Cattell developed chronic digestive problems as a result of overwork, a poor diet,
and being forced to live in a cold basement apartment during this period. His wife
left him because of his poor financial prospects and complete focus on his job.
Cattell, on the other hand, claimed some positive outcomes from that difficult
period. He was forced to concentrate on practical concerns rather than theoretical
or experimental issues, which he would have done if he had been in a more stable
and relaxed situation. “Those years taught me to be as cunning and suspicious as
a squirrel who has endured a long winter. It bred ruthlessness in asceticism and
impatience with insignificance.”

Cattell eventually got a chance to work full-time in his chosen field eight years
after receiving his doctorate. Edward L. Thorndike, a well-known American
psychologist, invited Cattell to spend a year in his laboratory at Columbia
University in New York. Cattell accepted a professorship at Clark University in
Worcester, Massachusetts, the next year, and then moved to Harvard in 1941,
where he said the “sap of creativity” soared (Cattell, 1974a, p. 71). Henry Murray,
Gordon Allport, and William Sheldon, who was working on his personality and
body type theory, were among his colleagues. Cattell married a mathematician
who shared his research interests, and at the age of 40, he accepted a position as
a research professor at the University of Illinois. . He wrote over 500 articles and
43 books, a remarkable achievement that demonstrates his commitment and
perseverance. Cattell joined the University of Hawaii's graduate faculty in his 70s,
where he allowed himself the privilege of swimming in the ocean every day. He
worked "as hard as an assistant professor up for tenure and not confident that it
would be awarded," according to reports (Johnson, 1980, p. 300). At the age of
92, he died in Honolulu. Cattell won the American Psychological Association's Gold
Medal Award for Life Achievement in Psychological Science in 1997. Raymond B.
Cattell has made prodigious, seminal contributions to psychology, including factor
analytic mappings of the domains of personality, motivation, and skills, according
to the citation. Cattell is unparalleled in his ability to integrate analytical,
temperamental, and complex domains of personality into a coherent theory of
individual differences.

Ability, Temperament, and Dynamic Traits:

Skill traits, disposition traits, and complex traits are three other ways to categorise
traits. The efficiency in which we can work toward a target is determined by our
skill traits. Intelligence is a skill trait; our degree of intelligence can influence how
we aim to achieve our objectives. Temperament characteristics characterise our
overall style and emotional tone, such as how assertive, easygoing, or irritable we
are. These characteristics have an impact on how we behave and respond in
different circumstances. The driving forces of action are dynamic characteristics.
They define our motivations, passions, and goals.
Surface Traits and Source Traits:
Surface traits versus source traits is a third classification of traits based on their
stability and permanence. Surface traits are personality traits that are related to
one another but are not factors since they are not decided by a single source. For
example, the surface trait neuroticism is made up of many behavioural elements
such as anxiety, indecision, and irrational fear. Source traits, which are unitary
personality factors that are much more stable and irreversible, are more
important. Each source trait is responsible for a different aspect of behaviour.
Individual factors derived from factor analysis that combine to account for surface
traits are known as source traits. Cattell established 16 source traits as the basic
factors of personality after more than two decades of intensive factor-analytic
analysis (Cattell, 1965). These factors are best known in the context in which they
are most commonly used, the Sixteen Personality Factor (16 PF) Questionnaire, an
objective personality test. Cattell presented the traits in bipolar form, and as you
can see, the personality traits associated with these traits are articulated in terms
we would use to describe our friends and ourselves in daily conversation. You can
probably tell whether you score high, low, or somewhere in the middle on these
simple personality variables just by looking at them. Cattell later defined
additional causes that he labelled temperament characteristics because they have
to do with the general style and emotional tone of behaviour. He cited
exuberance, zeal, self-discipline, politeness, and self-assurance as examples
(Cattell, 1973; Cattell & Kline, 1977). It's important to note that source
characteristics are the fundamental elements of personality in Cattell's scheme,
just as atoms are the fundamental units of the physical universe.
Constitutional Traits and Environmental-Mold Traits:
Constitutional traits and environmental-mold traits are the two types of source
traits defined by their origin. Constitutional characteristics are derived from
hereditary factors, but they are not always inherent. Alcohol consumption, for
example, can lead to carelessness, talkativeness, and slurred speech. These
characteristics are source traits, according to factor analysis. Characteristics of
environmental mould are influenced by our social and physical conditions.
These characteristics are acquired characteristics and habits that impose a
personality pattern. The conduct of someone who grew up in a poor inner-city
community differs from that of someone who grew up in upper-class privilege. A
jazz musician's conduct differs from that of a career military officer. As a result,
we can see that Cattell was aware of the interplay between personal and
situational factors.
Dynamic traits : the source of inspiration Dynamic traits, according to Cattell, are
those that deal with motivation, which is a major topic in many personality
theories. Cattell claimed that describing the effect of dynamic, or motivating,
forces is incomplete, similar to describing an engine without mentioning the
type of fuel it operates on. Cattell suggested ergs and sentiments as two types of
complex, motivating characteristics.
• Ergs The word erg derives from the Greek word ergon. Cattell used
erg to denote the concept of instinct or drive. Ergs are the innate
energy source or driving force for all behaviors, the basic units of
motivation that direct us toward specific goals. Cattell’s identified
11 ergs. These are: ■ anger ■ appeal ■ curiosity ■ disgust ■
gregariousness ■ hunger ■ protection ■ security ■ self-assertion ■
self-submission ■ sex
• Sentiment: A sentiment is an environmental mould source trait,
while an erg is a constitutional source trait because it is influenced
by external social and physical factors. A sentiment is a collection of
learned attitudes about a specific aspect of one's life, such as one's
culture, spouse, profession, religion, or hobby. While both ergs and
sentiments inspire actions, there is a significant distinction between
the two. It can grow stronger or weaker, but it cannot vanish. Since
 a sentiment is the product of experience, it can be unlearned and
vanish, making it irrelevant to a person's existence.
• Attitudes Cattell described attitudes as our feelings and behaviours
toward a particular individual, entity, or event. Cattell's meaning is
more expansive, encompassing all of our feelings and behaviour in
response to a specific object or circumstance.
• Subsidation Our complex traits—ergs and sentiments—are linked
to our attitudes through the principle of subsidiation, which states
that certain elements within the personality subside or are
subordinate to others. Attitudes are dependent on sentiments, and
sentiments are dependent on ergs.
• The Self-Sentiment A master sentiment called the self-sentiment
organises each person's pattern of sentiments. This is our self-
perception, which can be seen in almost all of our attitudes and
actions. The self-sentiment is related to the expression of the ergs
and sentiments and provides unity, coherence, and organisation to
the source traits. It is one of the last of the emotions to achieve its
full potential. The self-sentiment contributes to the fulfilment of the
complex traits and, as a result, regulates all of the personality
structures.
The influence of heredity and environment:
Cattell was particularly interested in the relative effects of heredity and
environment on personality development. By statistically comparing
similarities found between twins reared in the same family, twins reared
apart, non-twin siblings reared in the same family, and non-twin siblings
reared apart, he investigated the role of genetic and environmental
influences. As a result, he was able to estimate the proportion of trait
variations that could be due to genetic or environmental factors. His
findings revealed that heredity plays a significant role in certain traits. .
For example, Cattell’s data suggest that 80 percent of intelligence (Factor
B) and 80 percent of timidity-versus-boldness (Factor H) can be accounted
for by genetic factors. Cattell concluded that overall, one-third of our
 personality is genetically based, and two-thirds is determined by social
and environmental influences.

Stages of personality development:

Cattell suggested six phases in the development of personality that spanned a
person's entire life.
Infancy is the most formative time for a person's personality. Parents and
siblings, as well as weaning and toilet training experiences, have an impact on
the boy. Along with the ego and superego, feelings of security or vulnerability,
attitudes toward authority, and a potential inclination to neuroticism, social
attitudes grow. Cattell was not a Freudian adherent, but he integrated many
Freudian concepts into his philosophy, including the importance of the early
years of life in personality development and the impact of oral and anal disputes
on personality.
There are few psychological issues between the ages of 6 and 14, as one's
personality is forming. This stage heralds the start of a movement toward
parental freedom and increased identification with peers.
Adolescence, which lasts from 14 to 23, is more troublesome and painful than
childhood. As young people experience conflicts based on the drives for
freedom, self-assertion, and sex, emotional disorders and delinquency can
emerge.
Maturity, the fourth stage of development, occurs between the ages of 23 and
50. In terms of career, marriage, and family circumstances, it is a generally
fruitful and rewarding period. When compared to earlier stages, the personality
becomes less versatile, and thus emotional stability improves. During this time,
Cattell saw no shift in people's desires or behaviours.
Personality changes occur in late adolescence, which occurs between the ages of
50 and 65, as a result of physical, social, and psychological changes. Health,
vigour, and physical appearance can deteriorate, and death may be approaching.
People reexamine their ideals and look for a new self during this process. You'll
notice a resemblance to Carl Jung's view of the midlife era here.
The final stage, old age, entails adjusting to a variety of losses, including the
death of partners, family, and friends; the loss of a job due to retirement; loss of
status in a society that idolises youth; and a persistent feeling of isolation and
insecurity.
Concept of human nature:
Cattell's concept of personality reveals a lot about how he thinks about people.
“Personality is that which allows one to predict what a person would do in a
given situation,” he wrote (Cattell, 1950, p. 2). It must be lawful and orderly for
conduct to be deemed predictable. Without personality continuity and
regularity, prediction will be difficult. Since the other spouse's past conduct has
been consistent and orderly, one spouse can normally predict what the other
spouse will do in a given situation with a high degree of accuracy.
As a result, Cattell's interpretation of human nature allows for little spontaneity,
which would make predictability more difficult.
When it comes to the debate between free will vs. determinism, Cattell favours
determinism. He didn't suggest any overarching or required aim to guide our
behaviour, no desire for self-actualization to pull us, no psychosexual disputes to
force us. While he acknowledged the influence of early life experiences, his
writings do not give the impression that he believed childhood forces
permanently dictated one's personality.
Cattell acknowledged the role of both nature and nurture in his life.
Constitutional traits and ergs, for example, are innate, while mould traits are
learned.
Cattell took a cautious stance on the uniqueness-universality debate, noting the
presence of common traits that relate to all in a society and specific traits that
define the person.
Cattell's personal perspective on human nature is more evident. He was positive
about our potential to solve social issues while he was younger. He expected
that we would become more conscious of and in charge of our surroundings. He
expected to see the level of intelligence rise, along with the development of “a
more gracious community life of creatively occupied citizens” (Cattell, 1974b, p.
88). Reality did not live up to his expectations, and eventually he came to
believe that human nature and society had regressed.
Assessment of Cattell:
Cattell’s objective measurements of personality used three primary assessment
techniques, which he called L-data (life records), Q-data (questionnaires), and T-
data (tests).
Life records (L-data). Observers' ratings of individual activities displayed by
people in real-life environments such as a classroom or an office are used in the
L-data technique. Observers might keep track of absences from work, grades in
school, job-related conscientiousness, emotional wellbeing on the soccer field,
or office sociability, for example. The crucial thing to remember about L-data is
that they include implicit actions that can be observed by others and occur in a
naturalistic setting rather than in a controlled environment like a psychology lab.
Questionnaires (Q-data) Questionnaires are used to gather information (Q-data).
Questionnaires are used in the Q-data methodology. Unlike L-data, which allows observers
to rate research participants, Q-data requires participants to rate themselves. Cattell was
well aware of Q-weaknesses. data's First, some study participants may only have a
semblance of self-awareness, so their responses may not represent their true personality.
Second, even though research participants are well-versed in themselves, they do not want
researchers to be well-versed in them. As a result, they can purposefully falsify their
answers. Because of these issues, Cattell cautioned that Q-data should not be taken at
face value.

Personality tests (T-data). The T-data method employs what Cattell refers to as
"objective" evaluations, in which an individual reacts without understanding
what element of their conduct is being assessed. By making it impossible for a
subject to know exactly what a test is measuring, these tests overcome the
limitations of Q-data. You can't distort your reactions to hide your characteristics
if you can't figure out what the experimenter is trying to figure out. You
probably wouldn't be able to tell if the researcher's interpretation of your
answer showed that you were cautious, calm, adventurous, or apprehensive if
you were showing an inkblot. Tests like the Rorschach, the Thematic
Apperception Test, and the word association test, according to Cattell, are
objective because they are immune to faking. However, most psychologists
believe that using the term objective is deceptive; such assessments are
commonly referred to as subjective because of the prejudices that influence
scoring and perception.
The 16 PF (Personality Factor) TestThe 16 PF (Personality Factor) Test is a
questionnaire that asks you 16 questions about yourself. Cattell devised a
number of personality tests. The 16 PF, which is based on the 16 main source
traits, is the most notable. The test is designed for people aged 16 and up, and it
provides scores on each of the 16 scales. Computerized scoring and analysis are
available for the answers, which are scored objectively. The 16 PF is a
personality test that is commonly used in testing, clinical diagnosis, and
predicting occupational performance. It's been translated into more than 40
different languages. Consider the following sample 16 PF Test profi le for an
airline pilot (see Figure 8.2). We can see that this individual is emotionally
secure, attentive, adventurous, tough-minded, realistic, self-assured, managed,
and comfortable by reading the high and low points of the test score storey. The
pilot is not tense, nervous, or fearful. The 16 PF Test was developed by Cattell in
several variations. Scales have been developed to assess particular facets of
personality, such as anxiety, depression, and neuroticism, as well as for specific
reasons including marital therapy and executive performance assessment. The
test is also available in versions for use with children and teenagers.
Researches:
Bivariate, clinical, and multivariate methods are three ways to research
personality, according to Cattell. The typical laboratory experimental method is
the bivariate, or two-variable, approach. The psychologist manipulates the
independent variable to see how it affects the actions of the study participants
(the dependent variable). Since only one variable is studied at a time, this
method is also known as univariate. Cattell acknowledged that bivariate study is
scientific, systematic, and quantitative, but argued that it only looked at a small
portion of personality. In reality, personality is influenced by a number of
interconnected factors. . Furthermore, significant emotional experiences cannot
be manipulated and duplicated in a conventional artificial laboratory
environment. As a result, Cattell believed that the bivariate method was too
limited to say anything about personality traits.
The clinical approach As we stated in the chapters on psychoanalytic theorists,
the therapeutic method, which includes case studies, dream interpretation, free
association, and other related strategies, is highly subjective. These approaches
do not provide data that can be checked and quantified. “The clinician has his
heart in the right place, but we may conclude that he remains a little fuzzy in his
head,” Cattell wrote (1959, p. 45). Cattell decided to investigate personality
using a multivariate approach. This results in extremely specific data. It entails a
complex mathematical technique known as factor analysis. Cattell advocated for
two types of factor analysis: the R and P techniques. The R method entails
gathering vast volumes of data from a large number of individuals. To assess
personality factors or traits, correlations between all of the scores are made.
The P method entails gathering a vast volume of data from a single topic over an
extended period of time. Consider only a handful of Cattell and his colleagues'
hundreds of factor-analytic reports. We noticed that he was interested in the
relative impact of heredity and environment on personality. . Cattell concluded
that three source traits were predominantly determined by heredity based on a
factor analysis of 16 PF data from 3,000 male subjects ages 12 to 18. (Cattell,
1982). Factor F (serious versus happy-go-lucky), Factor I (tough-minded versus
tender-minded or sensitive), and Factor Q3 are the root traits (uncontrolled
versus controlled). Factor E (submissive versus dominant), Factor G (expedient
versus conscientious), and Factor Q4 were found to be primarily influenced by
environmental factors (relaxed versus tense).
The 16 PF Test was also used by Cattell to define the connection between
personality traits and marital stability. The participants in the study were
married couples who were classified as having a stable or dysfunctional
marriage. The stability criterion was whether or not a couple had taken action to
dissolve their union. The test scores may be used to predict marital stability,
according to factor analysis. In stable marriages, partners had similar personality
traits, while in dysfunctional marriages, partners had somewhat different
personality traits.