Inspirational Quotes by Gordon Allport (American Psychologist)

Gordon Willard Allport (1897–1967) was an American psychologist and educator who developed an original personality theory. Considered one of the first humanist theories, it argues that humans are autonomous beings with free will, and they are motivated by more than their instincts and impulses.

Born in Montezuma, Indiana, Allport attended Harvard as an undergraduate. He taught sociology in Turkey and then returned to Harvard to earn a PhD in psychology. He traveled to Berlin, Hamburg, and Cambridge for additional study, spent four years teaching at Dartmouth, and returned to Harvard for the rest of his career 1930–67.

Allport’s best-known concept is that of “functional autonomy”—even though adult motives emerge from infantile drives, they become independent. His approach emphasized the problems of the adult personality rather than on those of infantile emotions and experiences. He published widely on social psychology, including books on The Nature of Prejudice (1954,) The Individual and His Religion (1950,) and The Psychology of Rumor (1947.)

Allport consistently related his approach to the study of personality to his social interests. He was a prominent one of a growing number of psychologists who sought to introduce the leavening influence of humanism into psychology. His essential works on the theory of personality were Personality: A Psychological Interpretation (1937,) Becoming: Basic Considerations for a Psychology of Personality (1955,) Pattern and Growth in Personality (1961,) and Letters from Jenny (1965.)

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