Human Traits: If someone asked you to describe the personality of a close friend, what kinds of things would you say? Some things that might come to mind are descriptive terms like outgoing, kind, and even tempered. All of these represent traits. What exactly does this term mean? A trait can be thought of as a relatively stable characteristic that causes individuals to behave in certain ways. The trait approach to personality is one of the major theoretical areas in the study of personality. Trait theory suggests that individual personalities are composed of these broad dispositions. Unlike many other theories of personality, such as psychoanalytic or humanistic theories, the trait approach to personality focuses on differences between individuals. The combination and interaction of various traits forms a unique personality for each individual. Trait theory focuses on identifying and measuring these individual personality characteristics. Gordon Allport's Trait Theory In 1936, psychologist Gordon Allport discovered that a single English-language dictionary contained more than 4,000 words describing different personality traits. He classified these traits into three levels: • Cardinal Traits: These are traits that dominate an individual's entire life, often to the point that the person becomes known specifically for these traits. People with such personalities often become so famous for these traits that their names are often synonymous with these qualities. Let us consider the origin and meaning of the following descriptive terms: Freudian, Machiavellian, narcissistic, Don Juanian, Christ-like, etc. Allport suggested that cardinal traits are rare and tend to develop later in life. • Core Traits: These are the general traits. ..... in the center of the card ......bels for each dimension, the following are most commonly described:1. Extraversion2. Pleasantness3. Conscientiousness4. Neuroticism5. OpennessEvaluation of the Personality Trait Approach While most agree that people can be described by their personality traits, theorists continue to debate the number of core traits that make up the human personality. Although trait theory has an objectivity that some personality theories (such as Freud's psychoanalytic theory) lack, it also has weaknesses. Some of the most common criticisms of trait theory focus on the fact that traits are often poor predictors of behavior. Although an individual may score high on ratings of a specific trait, he or she may not always behave this way in every situation. Another problem is that trait theories do not address how or why individual differences in personality develop or emerge.