Gordon W. Allport (1897–1967) was a highly influential psychologist during the middle decades of the twentieth century. Trained at Harvard University (where he later taught for more than three decades) with subsequent study in Germany and England, Allport contributed seminal theoretical and scholarly approaches to personality theory (including the role of traits and motivation), applied social psychology (the nature of prejudice, values and social attitudes, and the influence of modern communications media), the psychology of religion, and the need for methodological pluralism in psychological research (the need to understand the unique individual person; the use of case studies, life histories, and other personal documents as valid scientific data). In advocating that persons be understood in their actual social and cultural worlds as conscious and maturing individuals, Allport challenged prevailing behaviorist and psychodynamic theories. Many students and colleagues of Allport extended the scope of his work over the last half-century.