Book excerpt: One of the oldest of all psychological disciplines, the field of personality assessment has seen no shortage of scientific study or scientific literature. This Oxford Handbook provides a comprehensive perspective on the contemporary practice of personality assessment, including its historical developments, underlying methods, applications, contemporary issues, and assessment techniques. The Oxford Handbook of Personality Assessment details both the historical roots of personality assessment and the evolution of its contemporary methodological tenets. This provides the foundation for the handbook's other major focus: the application of personality assessment in clinical, personnel, and forensic assessments. This handbook will serve as an authoritative and field-encompassing resource for researchers and clinicians from across the medical health and psychology disciplines (i.e., clinical psychology, psychiatry, social work, etc.) and would be an ideal text for any graduate course on the topic of personality assessment.