Summary of Key Personality Type Concepts
Introductions; see:
https://ericbolden.medium.com/an-introduction-to-classic-temperament-161c36fe8e3f
https://ericbolden.medium.com/an-intro-to-myers-briggs-type-d4ac97131f0b
COGNITIVE:
Functions (S/N/T/F) are basically responses of “YES” or “NO” to data.
•Perception (Sensing or iNtuition) is an involuntary (“irrational”) form of “yes” or “no”, as to whether something just “IS” or “ISN’T”.
•Judgment (Thinking or Feeling) is a more willful (rational) determination of “yes” or “no”, where WE determine something is “RIGHT” or “WRONG”.
The functions’ focus:
S=material [“known/unknown”];
N=hypothetical [“guessed/nayed”];
T=mechanical [“true/false”];
F=”soul”-affecting [“good/bad”].
i=determined by subject;
e=adopted from the environment
These can be seen as “divisions of reality”, like between space or time “directions” when we are facing one way and the other directions are then less conscious.
NEUROLOGICAL (what’s going on in the brain with the functions):
Se: Neural connections made by CURRENT, DIRECT input
Si: Neural connections made by PREVIOUS, DIRECT input
Ne: CURRENT neural connections from INDIRECT input
Ni: PREVIOUS neural connections from INDIRECT input
Te: Previous neural connections instruct current ones based on impersonal objects
Ti: Current neural connections matched with previous ones based on impersonal objects
Fe: Previous neural connections instruct current ones based on our emotional state
Fi: Current neural connections matched with previous ones based on our emotional state
ARCHETYPAL:
Type preference (which is function position), is set by COMPLEXES within the psyche (starting with the ego or “hero” [dominant], and the “caretaker” or “Parent” [auxiliary]). Complexes are our senses of “I”, with the “ego” being the main one.
These complexes, starting with the ego itself, will choose one function, and an internal (i) or external (e) orientation of that function, where the corresponding “yes” or “no” answer will be determined either by the individual “subject” or environmental “objects”. (The dominant will be determined in the type code by the initial “I/E”, and the orientation will be determined by the final “J/P”. The remaining six possible function-attitudes will be carried by six additional complexes; the functions and complexes “mirroring” those first two).
AFFECTIVE and conative:
“Temperaments” are measurements of our response to stimulation from the outside world; both approaching or not approaching others (expressiveness), and consciousness of our need for interaction, which determines the criteria of how much we tend to want or not want to be approached by others (responsiveness).
This is on three levels: social, action-taking or leadership, and openness in deeper relationships.
The first two are what connect to cognitive type. They start with a:
“Hippocratic” temperament (four “humors” or body fluids)
“Platonic” temperament (four “kinds of men”, or trades).
The humors (blood, black bile yellow bile and phlegm) were once believed to shape our surface social skills (represented as Sanguine, Melancholic, Choleric and Phlegmatic) and were framed in terms of the temperature (warm/cool) and texture (dry/moist) of the associated “four elements” (air, earth, fire and water), which corresponded with expressiveness and responsiveness, respectively.
Plato’s four kinds of men (Artisan, Guardian, Rational and Idealist) added the factor of observant vs imaginative (forerunner to S/N), and were picked up for type by David Keirsey, (They can also be expressed in terms of expressiveness and responsiveness, and thus matched as a second level of the humor temperaments).
Using these together merges the 16 types with classic “humor” temperament theory, where there are 16 combinations of four temperaments. This can help explain apparent out of preference temperament traits.