Gordon Allport
American psychologist of personality and prejudice
American psychologist at Harvard who built an early trait theory of personality, wrote The Nature of Prejudice (1954) and, with Leo Postman, The Psychology of Rumor. He sorted traits into cardinal, central and secondary levels.
Why this person matters
Allport treated traits as real features of individuals and sorted them into levels, then gave prejudice the same close attention. He spent nearly all his academic career at Harvard and helped found the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues. Students meet him in personality and prejudice chapters.
Main contributions
Trait theory of personality
With Henry S. Odbert, Allport compiled about 4,500 trait-like words from the dictionary. He described cardinal traits (rare and dominant), central traits (general characteristics found to some degree in everyone) and secondary traits (seen in particular situations). Personality: A Psychological Interpretation appeared in 1937.
The Nature of Prejudice
The 1954 book drew on his work with refugees during the Second World War and treated prejudice as a subject for psychological study. It developed the contact hypothesis: interaction between groups may reduce prejudice, with equal status and shared goals among the proposed favourable conditions.
Psychology of rumour
With his student Leo Postman he published The Psychology of Rumor in 1947.
Context and limits
Allport's personality theory put him at odds with many American psychologists shaped by behaviourist empiricism. Later writers attacked the trait concept itself, arguing that people's behaviour is often inconsistent across situations, and he died before he could respond. Later trait models include those of Raymond Cattell, who used factor analysis, and Hans Eysenck. Later reviews find that contact can reduce prejudice, while effects vary by setting and evidence for some policy applications remains limited.
In your introductory course
Personality.He appears in personality chapters as an early trait theorist and in social psychology chapters through his work on prejudice.
Related course reading: Psychology 2e, section 11.7. This is course context rather than a biographical source.
Years of active work
- 1921
He published Personality Traits: Their Classification and Measurement with his brother Floyd Allport.
- 1937
He published Personality: A Psychological Interpretation.
- 1939
He was elected president of the American Psychological Association.
- 1954
He published The Nature of Prejudice.
Sources
- New World Encyclopedia, Gordon AllportReference work. Reference article inspected.
- Wikipedia, Gordon AllportReference work. Reference article inspected.
- DeAngelis (2001), All you need is contact, APA MonitorSociety or association. Reference article inspected.
- Paluck, Green and Green (2018), The contact hypothesis re-evaluated (abstract and historical discussion)Publisher. Selected passages inspected.
- Allport and Odbert (1936), Trait-names: A psycho-lexical study (publication metadata)Original work. Publication record inspected.