DESCRIPTORS *Behavioral Science Research; Personality; *Personality Assessment; *Psychological Studies; *Social Psychology; State of the Art Reviews

In the last half dozen years, the field of personality psychology has been asked to reconsider certain premises that traditionally have guided conceptualization and research. The most influential questioner and critic has been Mischel. The essential_criticism, advanced and buttressed in a number of ways, is an.empirical One: namely, the research evidence accruing over the years supports only weakly or not at all the assumption by pshchologists that traits or dispositions importantly govern behavior. Mischel develops this conclusion in a widely-read review of the personality assessment literature. Mischel's 1968 conclusions have become widespread and blandly accepted. This paper offers an "assessment of Mischel's assessment of the state of personality assessment, " and indicates some of the ways in which his negative evaluation can be countered. This essay reads the research evidence differently and, in addition, introduces some recent pertinent findings that permit a different structuring of the accomplishments and deficiencies characterizing personality reseath. (Author/HMV) Documents acquired by ERIC include many informal unpubliged * materials not available.froa other sources. ERIC makes every ffort * * to obtain the best copy available. Neverthelesr, items of marginal * * reproducibility are often encountered and this affects the quality * * of the microfiche and hardcopy reproductions ERIC makes available * via the ERIC DIfilment Reproduction Service (EDRS), EDRS is not * responsible for the quality of the original document. Reproductions *. * supplied by EDil; are the best that can be made from the original