| Abstract: | Lamiell (1981, 1982a) has recently advanced an idiographic approach to the measurement of personality that he has labeled “idiothetic” In contrast to classical nomothetic strategies, the idiothetic method of scaling personality traits discounts normative transformations of attribute scores and, according to Lamiell, provides the basis for a useful index of cross–situational behavior consistency An analysis of Lamiell's procedures indicates several problems with the idiothetic approach to personality assessment and with the proposed measure of behavior consistency Notable is the fact that the method does not account for base rates of behavior in situations and, therefore, may suggest anomalous interpretations of personality characteristics and of behavior consistencies It is argued that conventional nomothetic methods are sufficient for the goals of explaining and predicting behavior |
