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Should Kelly's Personal Construct Theory and Allport's trait approach be classified as idiographic or nomothetic?
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Should Kelly's Personal Construct Theory and Allport's trait approach be classified as idiographic or nomothetic? This essay will discuss whether Kelly's Personal Construct Theory and Allport's trait approach should be classified as idiographic or nomothetic. "The idiographic approach takes the view that we are unique individuals and should be studied as such." (Abbott, 2001 p9) In contrast the nomothetic approach "attempts to unearth general principles about human behaviour" (Ewen, 1998 p286) It can be seen, even from the definitions of these approaches, that they are two completely different ways of classifying personality theories. This essay will probe deeper into these distinctions and decide where the pendulum of classification should rest. Both Allport and Kelly are mainly classified as idiographic theorists as they "emphasise the uniqueness of the individual" (Birch & Hayward, 1994 p43) in their theories. Both Allport and Kelly were happy to be classified as idiographic theorists and felt that...
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