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Subject PSYCHOLOGY
Paper No and Title Paper No 5: Personality Theories
Module No and Title Module No 2: Introduction to the Dispositional domain,
Gordon Allport’s trait approach
Module Tag PSY_P5_M2
Table of Contents
1. Learning Outcomes
2. Introduction
2.1 Dispositional Domain
2.2 Gordon W. Allport
3. A look into Allport’s Life
4. Allport’s approach to Personality Theory
4.1 Freud’s Psychoanalysis v/s Allport’s Approach
4.2 What is Personality?
4.3 What is the Role of Conscious Motivation?
4.4 What are the Characteristics of a Healthy Person?
5. Key Ideas in Allport’s Trait Theory to Personality
5.1 Structure of Personality: Personal Dispositions
5.2 Proprium
5.3 Functional Autonomy
6. Assessment in Allport’s Theory
6.1 Assessment Approaches
6.2 Personal-Document Technique
7. Evaluative Comments
8. Summary
PSYCHOLOGY Paper No 5: Personality Theories
Module No 2: Introduction to the Dispositional domain, Gordon
Allport’s trait approach
____________________________________________________________________________________________________
1. Learning Outcomes
After studying this module, you shall be able to
Reflect on Allport’s life history.
Define the notion of personality as advanced by Allport.
Identify the cornerstones of Allport’s approach to personality and characteristics of a
healthy person.
Understand the major tenants of the Trait Theory.
Know the assessment methods in Allport’s theory
Evaluate Allport’s Trait Approach to Personality
2. Introduction
2.1 Dispositional Domain
The dispositional domain or more commonly referred to as trait approach deals essentially with
the manners in which individuals are different from one another. The study of traits makes up the
dispositional domain. Traits are generalized action tendencies or dispositions that people possess
in varying degrees. They are relatively steady over time and reliable over situations and lend
coherence to a person’s behaviour. Variations in the strength and combination of traits lead to
individual differences in personality.
The fundamental goal of personality psychologists in the dispositional domain is to recognize the
imperative traits or characteristics that can be used to summarize an individual’s personality. The
focus is on developing a taxonomy or classification system that would describe the personality
structure of an individual. The dispositional domain is also heavily concerned with the
measurement of personality. It uses quantitative statistical techniques to measure personality
traits. Influential personality tests have been developed that are often used in educational, clinical,
vocational and other settings. Thus, the major questions for psychologists working in the
dispositional domain are: How many personality traits exist? What is the best taxonomy or
classification system for traits? How can we best discover and measure these traits? How do traits
interact with situations to produce behaviours?
Although the central tenets of modern trait theory are not novel (Stelmack & Stalikas, 1991), in
their modern form, they owe a great deal to 3 founding fathers of trait psychology: Gordon
Allport, Raymond Cattell and Hans Eysenck. In this module, we will be examining trait theory
advanced by Gordon Allport.
2.2 Gordon W. Allport
Gordon W. Allport or Gordon Williard Allport was born on November 11, 1897. He dies at
the age of 70 on October 9, 1967. An American psychologist, was fairly the foremost
psychologist to bring forth personality in to focus, and is frequently known as one of the founders
of personality psychology. He discarded the prevailing approaches to personality on the grounds
of their depth and focus. He felt that the psychoanalytic approach went too deep, while the
behavioural approach could not produce much information. He highlighted the distinctiveness of
PSYCHOLOGY Paper No 5: Personality Theories
Module No 2: Introduction to the Dispositional domain, Gordon
Allport’s trait approach
____________________________________________________________________________________________________
every person along with the significance of the present
circumstance, opposing to past history, as lens to looking at
personality.
Allport had a flair for attacking and largely conceiving fascinating themes like prejudice, religion,
rumour, traits. He made deep and lasting impressions on his students like Stanley Milgram,
Jerome S. Bruner, Leo Postman, Anthony Greenwald, M. Brewster Smith, Thomas Pettigrew
among others who went on to have important psychological careers.
3. A look into Allport’s Life
Allport was the son of Nellie Edith and Dr. John Edwards Allport of Montezuma, Indiana. He
attended the public schools of Cleveland, Ohio. As a country doctor, his father ran a hospital at
his residence. Owing to insufficient hospital amenities at the time, their dwelling served as an
improvised hospital inhabiting the patients and the nurses. Allport and his brothers grew up in this
hospice environment and frequently assisted their father. Jobs like washing bottles, dealing with
the patients and tending office was considered to be important aspects of the early life of Allport.
Words like timid, assiduous boy, lonely were used to describe Allport’s early years. Due to a
birth defect, Allport had eight toes and became the subject of high-school mockery. Allport ran
his own printing business during teenage and alongside worked as an editor of the high school
newspaper. At the age of 18 he graduated from Glenville High School and came second in his
class in the year 1915. He was able to attend Havard University because of the scholarship. His
elder brother, Flod Henry Allport was pursuing his PhD at the same time from Havard University
in Psychology.
Change of climate and morals were very different in Havard that compared to his home and thus
moving had a great impact on his life. In the year 1919 Allport got his degree in Philosophy and
Economics. His interest in merging of psychology of personality and social psychology was
obvious in his use of his free time at Harvard in social service: visiting for the Family Society,
directing a boy's club in Boston, serving as a volunteer probation officer, aiding foreign students
and registering homes for war workers.
After that he taught in Robert College, Philosophy and Economics in Istanbul, Turkey for about a
year and then in the year 1920 he went back to Havard University to pursue PhD. in Psychology.
His first book was co –authored with his elder brother, Flyod Allport. The title of the book was
"Personality Traits: Their Classification and Measurement" and it was published in the year 1921.
In the same year Allport earned his Master’s degree. He studied for his master’s under Herbert S.
Langfeld. In the year 1922 he completed his PhD. under Hugo Münsterberg.
The Meeting with Freud: After returning to United States, he stayed in Vienna, Austria so as to
visit his brothers. He sent a letter to Sigmund Freud and was invited to visit. On entering Freud’s
office, Allport found Freud sitting patiently, waiting for him to elucidate the reason for coming.
The uncomfortable silence prolonged until a discomfited Allport uttered a story of an episode he
saw during the travel there. He narrated watching a little boy with an evident fear of dirt. All
appeared dirty to the child. He changed his seat while he was telling his mother that she should
not let a dirty man sir next to him.
The properly dresses, prim young man was considered by Freud and then he questioned, “Was
that little boy you?” Frued asked him this question to show him that he himself betrayed very
PSYCHOLOGY Paper No 5: Personality Theories
Module No 2: Introduction to the Dispositional domain, Gordon
Allport’s trait approach
____________________________________________________________________________________________________
own unconscious conflicts and fear in the narrative. Allport
considered Freud as a very neat, orderly, punctual, and
meticulous. Freud’s question left Allport stunned and astonished. Although, for the rest of his life
he denied being the clean, properly dressed little boy who was in the narrative but he had a
profound impression all through his life from the incident. Much later he wrote, “My single
encounter with Freud was traumatic” (Allport, 1967, p. 22).
From the incidence and experience with Freud, he stated that Psychoanalysis intensely poked the
unconscious. Allport also stated that Psychology must pay attention to motivations that are
conscious and visible. Thus, he was able to choose his path of study of psychology. Allport felt
that Freud’s endeavour to reduce this observed interaction to some unconscious event from his
personal distant childhood as dismissive of his present motivations, intentions and experience.
Allport, under no circumstances, denied the role of unconscious and historical variables in human
psychology (particularly in the immature and disordered) but his own work constantly highlighted
conscious motivations and current context.
Allport was then awarded a coveted Sheldon Traveling Fellowship which he later described as “a
second intellectual dawn”. He spent his first Sheldon year studying the new Gestalt School, that
fascinated him, in Berlin & Hamburg, Germany and the second year at Cambridge University,
England.
In the year 1924, Allport returned to Havard Universityand started teaching his course
“Personality: It's Psychological and Social Aspects”. In America this was considered to be the
first course in Personality. Later Allport married Ada Lufkin Gould who was a clinical
psychologist and they had a son, who went on to become a paediatrician. For 4 years, Allport
taught introductory courses on social psychology and personality Darthmouth College and then
returned to Havard for the rest of his life.
During the period of 1930 to 1967, Allport served as an influential member of the faculty at
Harvard University. In the late 1940s, he created a quite popular and thorough preparatory course
for the new Social Relations Department. The Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology had
Allport as the editor at the same time.
In the year 1939, Allport became the president of the American Psychological Association. Also,
he was selected as the president of the Eastern Psychological Association in the year 1943. By
1944 Allport became the president for the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues.
"The Individual and His Religion.", Allports third book was published in the year 1950 and in the
year 1954 his fourth book, "The Nature of Prejudice" was published. He also wrote another book
titled; "Becoming: Basic Considerations for Psychology of Personality." In the year 1955. The
American Psychological Foundation awarded Allport with the Gold Medal in the year 1963. In
the year 2964 Allport was honoured with APA’s Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award.
October 9, 1967 was the day when Allport took his last breath in Massachusetts and died of lung
cancer.
4. Allport’s approach to Personality Theory
4.1 Freud’s Psychoanalysis v/s Allport’s Approach
Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalysis was the major thrust in the theory of personality around the
same time but Allport disagreed:
1. According to him, an emotionally healthy individual function rationally and on conscious
terms, who is aware of and controlled by the forces which motivate him. Allport did not
PSYCHOLOGY Paper No 5: Personality Theories
Module No 2: Introduction to the Dispositional domain, Gordon
Allport’s trait approach
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