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On Sustaining Critical Discourse with Mainstream Personality Investigators

Problems and Prospects

GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY, lamiellj{at}georgetown.edu

In an American Psychologist article published in 1981, the author of the present contribution began a critique of the epistemic tenets of the traditional individual differences framework for personality research, which has long dominated the field. Though at first that article and others published soon thereafter generated some needed critical discourse within the discipline, mainstream investigative practices remain now just as they have long been, and, in the meantime, the critical discourse itself has largely ceased. In the present contribution, the author relates his attempts to understand these developments through historical research into the roots of mainstream thinking. Given the nature and depth of these roots, the continuing resistance to change within the mainstream is more readily understood. Nevertheless, it is argued, the need for such change remains, and it is observed that in the prevailing intellectual climate of the discipline, such change still does not appear imminent.

Key Words: critical discourse • historical considerations • individual differences • individuals • personality psychology • statistical thinking

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