... of common traits" (Birch & Hayward, 1994 p43) which are generalised across society. Therefore Allport's trait theory is not as idiographic as he liked to believe. Although Allport believed that some traits can be generalised he also believed that "some traits only occur in one person...in fact it seemed to him that there may be as many traits as there are people" (Abbott, 2001 p27) However traits must have to be generalised as there are simply not enough traits in the world to apply to only one individual. But surely this approach does not have to become nomothetic just because it sometimes uses generalisations? As mentioned before both theorists do generalise traits and constructs across societies. However it is difficult to decide whether - in the case of these theories - generalisations should be classified as idiographic or nomothetic. This is because even though people have similar traits e.g. cleanliness ...

See this essay or coursework document in full right now