Dr. Allport Makes Unique Ratings of Personality

On tag day for benefit of charities or schools have you been tagged when you really did not want to be? Frequently? Occasionally? Never?

At a reception-or tea do you seek to meet the most important person present?

A salesman takes manifest trouble to show you a quantity of merchandise; though you are entirely suited, do you purchase?

Have you been asked, or have you volunteered to solicit funds for a cause in which you are interested? Do you feel reluctant to do such soliciting?

Beggars solicit you with hard luck stories. Do you give them money?

Do you feel that any older members of your family, of your relatives, or any older friend of childhood, dominates you against your will?

Do you feel self-conscious in the presence of superiors in the academic or business world?

Do you disapprove of the custom of tipping as prevalently practiced? Do you customarily tip in the usual places according to convention? Do you usually feel conspicuous or embarrassed when you fail to meet the expectations of the beneficiary?

Have you gone hatless, worn knickers, or followed any style of dress merely because you wished to, even though you knew that the practice would be commented on, since the innovation you proposed was not according to custom?

Have you crossed the street to avoid meeting some person?

Have you haggled over prices with tradesmen or junk men?

In a barber chair, have you been persuaded to have more tonsorial attention than you really wanted (e. g. shampoo, massage, tonic)? Do you find it difficult to say No to the barber?

On the back platform of a crowded street car, in answer to the conductor's question from inside the car, All right, back there? have you answered, All right!?

You desire to board a boat or train to see a friend off, or to enter an exhibition or park; the guard forbids you on what seem to be entirely unnecessary technicalities, do you argue with him or bluff your way past?

When you were 10-12 years of age were you the goat for your playmates? In playing war would they force you to fight on the unpopular side?

The above questions to determine the force of personality are taken from the questionnaire designed by Dr. Gordon W. Allport '19, Instructor of Social Ethics and Tutor in Psychology, to measure personality.

By means of a series of standardized questions, or "represented situations," he thinks it is possible to establish, with reasonably constant results, a practical guide to character measurement.

Dr. Allport adocates a questionnaire for each trait of a man's personality, covering his "ascendance" or force or personality, his "drive," his "expansion."

He has submitted these questionnaires to his students in his Social Ethics 8, "Personality and Social Amelioration," a course, new this year, which is unique in university instruction. He has noted that there seems to be a tendency for the results to place among the ranks of those of more submissive personality, a tendency, he explains, easily understood in the light of our grading system, which places a premium upon the conscientious student who learns accurately the material assigned to him.

"These methods," said Dr. Allport, "are attempts to get objective measurement of traits of personality. It is a step beyond intelligence tests, because problems of adjustment in social environment are problems of more than simple intelligence. In business as in society it is personality that counts rather than a mere high intelligence quotient. A man's associates care less about his intellectual level than they do about his habitual ways of reacting; that is, his personality.

"It is very hard to establish the validity of personality tests, but it is rather easy to establish their reliability. Reliability is the question of whether you can return and repeat the tests and still have a high measure of constancy. The only check by which to determine the validity of a test is the correlation obtained between the test and ratings by associates, and such ratings tend to be unreliable.

"Self-rating is frequently more reliable than ratings by associates, espescially when the individuals have been trained. On the whole, however, individuals tend to overrate themselves in the possession of desirable qualities; notably, a sense of humor and possession of self-knowledge.

"I want to add one important word of caution in regard to interpreting the result of these personality tests," said Dr. Allport, discussing the limitations in the application of his tests. "A series of test scores for isolated traits of personality can never be substituted as a wholly adequate representation of the total personality.

"Comprehending the individual personality seems to rest on intuition, a process which psychologists do not entirely understand. Common sense in character judgments of the intuitive sort, correctly attributed to women, rest upon just such an apprehension of the total personality. Analysis of personality will help us to understand people, but it will never supplant this intuitive appreciation of the personality of our associates."

"Beware of the professional character analyst and the 'applied psychologist,'" he warned in closing. "Interest in character analysis is universal, but unfortunately this interest is not as discriminating as it should be. The public flocks to hear the oracular Hindu and his kind, but these advertising experts usually contribute little or nothing to the capacity of their patrons for understanding people. As a matter of fact, the scientific analysis of personality and character has just begun, and any attempt to commercialize the slight knowledge we have runs the danger of being premature and harmful."