Question

Summarize the theorist "Gordon Allport" in two pages, PLEASE!!

Answer 1

• Gordon Allport was born in Indiana in 1897. Hereceived an undergraduate degree in philosophy and economics from Harvard univeristy.
• He believed that psychologically healthy individuals are motivated by present,conscious drives and that they not only seek to reduce tensions but to establish new ones as well.
• He also said that people are capable of proactive behaviour suggesting that people can consciously behave in new and creative ways that leads to change and growth in them
• Gordon Allport was the first modern trait theorist and worked along with Henry Odbert.They both looked through some of the most comprehensive English dictionaries and extracted around 18000 personality describing words.From this list,they reduced it to 4500 words describing personality traits.
• Allport defined personality as "the dynamic organization within the individual of those psychophysical systems that determine his characteristic behavior and thought".
• Allport gave traits in a hiearchal form of three levels:-
• Cardinal traits were the traits which dominate and shape an individual’s behavior, for example, Mother Theresa’s altruism. These traits are the first in the hierarchy and are collectively known as the individual’s master control.
• They are considered to be an individual’s core traits. These traits are powerful, and some people have personalities which are dominated by a single trait.But,most of us have personalities which are composed of multiple traits.
• Central traits come next in the hierarchy. These traits are general characteristics which are found in varying degrees in each one of us like, loyalty, kindness, agreeableness, friendliness, sneakiness etc.These traits are considered to be the basic building blocks of our personality which shapes most of our behavior.
• Secondary traits are the last in the hierarchy and are not quite as obvious or consistent as central traits. These traits are plentiful but are only present under specific circumstances.They include things like preferences and attitudes of a person.
• They tend to explain why an individual may at times exhibit behaviors that seem incongruent with their usual behaviors. For example, a friendly person gets angry when people try to tickle him.
• Allport also mentioned that internal and external factors tend to influence our personality and behaviour,called genotypes and phenotypes.
• Genotypes are internal forces which influences how a person retains information and uses this information to interact with the world,while phenotypes are external forces which explains how individuals accept their surroundings and how the presence of others influences our behaviour.
• Another distinctive concept he gave was the theory of functional autonomy,which holds true that some human motives are functionally independent from the original motive responsible for a particular behavior.