PTypes - Correspondence (Archive 4): Previous messages

Archive 4 of messages to Correspondence of five personality typologies

Disclaimer. I have correlated PTypes personality types with David Keirsey's type descriptions in Please Understand Me (1984). Nothing that I say in these pages about the Keirsey and the Myers-Briggs® types should be construed to mean that I consider these two different systems to be identical. However, I do, also, correlate the Myers-Briggs® types with PTypes. But, as with Keirsey's, I am not asserting a scientific, or even logical, relationship between the Myers-Briggs® types and the PTypes personality types, but a correlative one.

MBTI, Myers-Briggs, and Myers-Briggs Type Indicator are trademarks or registered trademarks of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator Trust in the United States and other countries.

Previous messages

From:	jorge cisneros
	cisnerosja@31meu.usmc.mil
Date:	Mon, 20 Aug 2001

where and how can I obtain a book on the different types of the Ennegram?

+++I'm no longer reading about the Enneagram, Jorge, but my favorite book on it is Personality Types (1987) by Don Richard Riso. You could get a used paperback copy of it through half.com.

From:	kitty mcgee
	http://herekitty.blogspot.com
Date:	Mon, 20 Aug 2001

...as far as it applies to me, the correspondence is dead-on.

no matter how many different tests i take, i *always* come up intj, 5 with 4 leanings. i agree with the idiosyncratic and rationalist descriptions and the schizotypal definition definitely reflects my darker side. cancerian by birth, i am quite aggressive and yes, aries-like.

thanks for a great site and all the extra references included! gimme gimme knowledge :)

kitty

+++Thanks Kitty. It's nice to start a Monday with such a ringing endorsement and testimonial.

From:	W.
	identity@mediaone.net
Date:	Sun, 12 Aug 2001

The Aries INTJ description is perfectly accurate. But tell that to the rest of The Enneagram Aficionados that see me as a 4w5.

But I filter everything through my intellect?

From:	Dr.T.PThankappan
	sandrams@satyam.net.in
Date:	Fri, 10 Aug 2001

From:	Mody
	mperaltasosa@hotmail.com
Date:	Mon, 7 Aug 2001

I'm medical student, and i have a questions about diagnostic criteria for personality disorders: Wich age is the exactly for the diagnosis, because i read about criteria but not about age.
Thank you

+++I believe that the most recent official pronouncement by the American Psychiatric Association on this point has been made in the DSM-IV-TR (2000):

Personality Disorder categories may be applied to children or adolescents in those relatively unusual instances in which the individual's particular maladaptive personality traits appear to be pervasive, persistent, and unlikely to be limited to a particular developmental stage or an episode of an Axis I disorder. It should be recognized that the traits of a Personality Disorder that appear in childhood will often not persist unchanged into adult life. To diagnose a Personality Disorder in an individual under 18 years, the features must have been present for at least 1 year. The one exception to this is Antisocial Personality Disorder, which cannot be diagnosed in individuals under age 18 years. Although, by definition, a Personality Disorder requires an onset no later than early adulthood, individuals may not come to clinical attention until relatively late in life. (pg. 687)

From:	lissette
	ana_lissette@hotmail.com
Date:	Mon, 7 Aug 2001

I'm an INFP, Enneagram type 5. Is it possible or could I have gathered the wrong information. If I have, how can I be sure to obtain the right information? Please set me straight. Lissette

+++The way I understand it, a personality type is not a real thing. It's an idea, or mental construct. You've chosen to describe yourself with these two mental constructs. Someone else may have chosen others. I've speculatively matched the the MBTI® and Enneagram types as ideas. It's totally my own view. But I'd like you to know that my view is very well educated.

From:	Robyn
	t_robyn@hotmail.com
	www.robyn.on.net/robyn
Date:	Mon, 6 Aug 2001

Hi,

I started 10 years ago as an astrologer and have gradualy been introduced to MBTI, Enneagram and DISC over that peroid as well. I am particularlay interested in the correlations between all these.

I am a Gemini, ENTP, 7-8w (although I believe I am very 3-4w!! and friends agree).

I don't agree with al the astrological correlations you've found, but I do agree with some of them, including Gemini, which I had already decided fits ENTP. However, I beleive all Air Signs fit ENTP. :)

Now, you have yourself labelled a personality type Mercurial. That is the same as calling it Gemini or Virgo in Astrological language.

There's no way I would call ESFP Libran.

I see a greater correclation in astrology to the following:

Sensate: earth Intuitive: fire
Air: thinking Water: feeling

That is tradition astrology. AN ESFP is sensate and feeling so is more likely to be Taurus or Pisces, in my opinion. I won't go through the whole lot, but that's an example.

A Mercurial personality would be an NT.

Well, that's my little bit of input.

Thankyou for your interesting site.

Robyn

+++Thanks Robyn. I'm happy to hear, from someone who knows more about astrology than I do, that a Mercurial personality would be an NT; because, that's what I thought. I inherited the name Mercurial (from Oldham), where it does a pretty good job of defining the style he has in mind. But it does present a conceptual inconsistency when matched up with the MBTI® and astrological types.

From:	Rich

Date:	Sun, 29 Jul 2001

Mr Kelly
I want to thank you for the sensible and useful advice you gave me 07-12-01.I fogot the typewatching law:"a person is more than the sum of their parts."(Shortly after you told me a person "has a personality",a lady told me,maybe I was role playing as a"SJ" etc.And that I should just be me,)Thank you again for a personally very helpful observation!

From:	BuddhaFrog
	BuddhaFrog@aol.com
Date:	Sun, 22 Jul 2001

Mr Kelly:

I am an INTJ Scorpio for the record :) If I am inclined to any personality disorders (and who isn't) it would not be the one listed. Idiosyncratic (PT) seems like a sort of arbitrary term. I agree with the enegram type but not the others. I could see where a Leo would be histrionic but how could a histrionic person be introverted (INFP)? Some of the descriptions seem to conflict. I would be interested in what sort of correlations you can determine from other users' feedback.

+++I see the extroverted behavior of the histrionic person as acting. For example, Michael Jackson and Prince are extroverted when performing, but I bet that, if they were being interviewed by Jay Leno on The Tonight Show, you would see that they are really introverted.

From:	Drew
	PlutoThree@msn.com
Date:	Sat, 21 Jul 2001

I applaud your efforts!! Typology cross-matching is extremely important to human beings in all areas of social existence. The FBIs famous Investigative Support Unit is just one institutioin in which the knowledge of personality typologies has proved to be very useful.

Unfortunately, I disagree with most of your chart.

Here's how I see it:

First of all, I think Brau's typology is woefully inadequate. Any practicing astrologer knows that you MUST consider the aspects of all ten luminaries, the North and South Nodes, and usually Chiron in order for the "signs" to have any revelatory significance in regard to personality. Brau's typology uses "Sun-sign" generalities to describe personality, which has long been known to be inadequate.

The other typologies are useful and pertinent, with the Enneagram being the most extensive and the DSMR-IV system and the P Self-Portrait types also being very useful.

I'll send my cross-matches in a future email so you can see the differences. I do agree, across the board, with your cross-matching of the Aggressive style and also the Idiosyncratic style.

--Drew

Date:

Wed, 18 Jul 2001

+++A personality disorder is a particular type of bad character.

From:	Rich

Date:	Wed, 18 Jul 2001

Mr. Kelly:
You really should be saving your answers.You have a talent for pithy (and wise)sayings!Some of your rivals cann't say what you messaged Leo in several pages of babble about typology. And they wouldn't deal with the real issues,either....

From:	leo
	leej1@email.com
Date:	Mon, 16 Jul 2001

Interesting. I do think if you overlay the chinese astrological variants with these it would change the picture entirely. Also,if you added all the multiple variables of personality theories possible there are infinite permutations of personality typings possible.

+++Using the Chinese signs wouldn't change much, here. In the Correspondence, I really don't take the astrological signs, or their attributes, seriously. The signs are listed, mainly, to assert the comprehensiveness of the PTypes scheme.

The purpose of a typology is to reduce, in a systematic and comprehensive way, the infinite number of possible types to a manageable number. Each type could have subtypes. Every personality theorist, and every other famous person that is listed here, could stand as the basis of a subtype.

From:	Rich

Date:	Sun, 15 Jul 2001

Mr.Kelly:
Visitors to your site get exposed to a lot of new material,that normally we would never.Thanks to you I read Littauer,and learned a lot more than I thought I would.... Also,thank for the work you have done in your correlations!I am reasonably familiar with DISC and Littauer and a student of Kiersey,so I can see the huge amount of work you have put into keeping this all straight!How some parts match almost perfectly,and other parts not too well.Keep us informed!

+++Will do.

From:	Rich

Date:	Fri, 13 Jul 2001

Mr. Kelly:
You are right that I was treating ideas as concrete things! Are you going to add your answer to Lisza to your main menu?Its the best single examination of the various typologies rationales that I have seen! As you have been pointing out,there is a lot of mistakes out there...!

+++Thanks for the praise, Rich, and your support of my thinking. I'd want to have the idea developed more. We'll have to wait and see what the spirit brings.

From:	Rich

Date:	Thur, 12 Jul 2001

Mr. Kelly:
Could you tell us your views on the MBTI I/E function?Kiersey says its subjective for the external observer.Also could you tell us your views on Keirsey's saying the personality is an organic whole?So the personality contains all 16 personality styles,Ennea wing types etc. Some are used and some are not.That could be why real people can have "impossible combinations". Rich

+++I don't have a view on the MBTI® I/E function.

As to your second point, this is the inappropriate use of scientific style thinking when talking about types. Types don't attempt to describe the real structure of personality. The personality doesn't contain personality styles, enneagram wings etc. The person isn't a type, he has a type. You can paste on all of the types, styles, subtypes, whatever on to your image of yourself, and it won't increase your personality one bit. The type is just a mental construct useful in providing context. After you have the context then you go on to look at the real live person, his actual patterns of behavior, thought etc.

From:	Lisza

Date:	Wed, 11 Jul 2001

About SCORPIO and NT:

Although I don't think astrology signs correlate with MB/Enneagram types in reality, I think the profiles written for Scorpio sound very INT. In many cases I've noticed that INTJ profiles sound very Scorpionic. I've heard people say that Scorpio cannot be NT because being a Water sign it is an emotional sign. This ignores the fact that NT's can be emotional too, and from looking at profiles in Astrology text books I think it is very possible for Scorpio to be NT because the nature of Scorpionic emotions sound like the kind of emotions that come from a feeling function this is NOT in dominant place. If we look at INTJ, introverted feeling is in 3rd place and works with introverted intuition in the inner world. Although INTJ is seen as being mainly intellectual--mostly because of the TJ which is most visible, the emotional side of this type exists in the inner world and can be quite hidden from others, which often sounds like the emotional side of Scorpio.

However I don't mean to say that INTJ and Scorpio correlate with each other perfectly, or that INTJ correlates only with Scorpio and vice versa. I'm an INTJ and I'm NOT Scorpionic.:)

+++Thanks Lisza. I want to say something about the difference between scientific thinking and typological, or correlative, thinking, but after I think about it a while.

+++The problem that I have with this kind of reasoning is that I see it as scientific rather than typological, or correlative. I agree with this study (Abstract) which found that, while the MBTI® is similar to the Big Five as a 4 factor profile, it was not found to represent a true type system, nor was the theory of functions which Briggs and Myers adapted from Jung found to be valid.

Your intuition that there's some correlation between INTJ and Scorpio is just as valid as the correlations that I have listed above. After all, the Correspondence is just one man's view. It's not scientific.

But I prefer to not pay attention to the, really, pseudo-scientific function theory of the MBTI®, along with other scientific pretensions like Astrology, the Four Humors of Hippocrates, the numerology which is the basis of the Enneagram, and even psychiatry's use of the medical model to interpret the so-called personality disorders ( after all, they're just personality types, too).

The MBTI® has some scientific validity and empirical usefulness. But I prefer the more typological use of it made by Keirsey.

From:	Beau
	beau@fretware.com
	www.fretware.com
Date:	Tue, 10 Jul 2001

Dead-on INTP here, but a scorpio.

To:	pork ^(oo)^

Date:	Mon, 9 Jul 2001

I ran across some photos of yourself that you posted to one of the boards at 9types.com. Your types are 4w5, INFJ, Sensitive/avoidant (95% confidence).

Dave Kelly

From:	Celvin Ruisdael
	celvin@enitel.no
Date:	Mon, 9 Jul 2001

I am an INFJ. In my case the correspondence with the other personality typing systems shown in your table are 100 % : My enneatype is 4 with a 5-wing, I do belong to the Sensitive ptype with some Avoidant traits and was born in Pisces !

Celvin

+++Good news. Thanks Celvin.

From:	Rich

Date:	Mon, 9 Jul 2001

Mr. Kelly: Could you explain your thinking in going back to the old classifications? Keirsey has made the temperments so detailed, either seem to make sense.... Thanks,Rich

+++They do! It was the only way that I could get rid of the knot in my stomach. The rationale would be that I still believe Keirsey's interpretation is better, and that having a "depressive" Traditionalist type goes along with the evolutionary psychology theory that I am using to account for the temperaments' adaptive motivations. Under this Rank Theory, the Depressive is the "yielding subroutine" and the Hypomanic is the "winning subroutine."

From:	Rich

Date:	Fri, 6 Jul 2001

Dear MR. Kelly Thank you for fixing that problem!I first read Kiersey in 1986,and watching "SJs",it never made any sense!Also thank you for the work you are doing on the 4 temperments.Your charts and correlations are inspired.( I loved your putting DISC in!) I have been thinking about what you said about "serious" as 9w1.I can see I had too narrow a view of 9- as lazy and non-productive,instead of blending into reality.Thanks again! - Rich

Okay, Rich.

From:	Rich

Date:	Thur, 5 Jul 2001

Mr Kelly:
Could you explain a little more about
your reordering of the 4 temperments?
It really changes Kiersey!

+++It's "embrace and extend," Rich. PTypes wants to gobble up, conceptually, all other typologies. All these 4 type systems that are based on the 4 temperaments are on the table right now. They differ with Keirsey. As far as I can tell, they follow the classical view and trace their idea, that the melancholics are what we're calling the Idealists, back to Aristotle. It seems that the terms for the temperaments mean different things to different people, now. Keirsey mentioned the problem in his first book and then dropped their use. The contribution of PTypes, I think, is the arrangement of the psychiatric categories of personality into a true typology. Kretschmer's category names of hyperesthetic, anesthetic, depressive, and hypomanic are more attractive to me and, I think, to the audience that I wish to reach. So, those are the terms *I'll* be using. The four motivations of perfection, power, peace, and popularity, are important to me right now, and I believe that the differing views of Keirsey and these other temperament theorists can be adequately synthesized within these four categories. Thanks Rich.

From:	pork ^(oo)^
	rfd3_5@hotmail.com
Date:	Wed, 4 Jul 2001

I have no research basis, even on the level of subjective assessment (is there any other kind, really?), but I suspect that your Enneagram-Ptype correlations have a higher applicability rate than your Enneagram-MB correlations. I don't know if I'm primarily a Dramatic character maybe, but if so, that Ptype in me is colored significantly by Serious, Conscientious, and Sensitive elements. If I can be said to "come close" to constituting any particular DSM disorder, it's probably Avoidant or Obsessive-Compulsive, though neither of these affect me to a clinical degree. As for my astrological sign... well, if it means anything to you, I'm a Cancer, but let's not even get into that. :) PS - your use of the phrase "those who believe they know their Myers-Briggs and Enneagram types" is striking, if I may. Do you believe you know other people better than they know themselves? That's a common pitfall among young, brash typology students, and I truly hope you haven't falle! n into it. ^(oo)^

+++Thanks for the correction. Which astrological sign do you think most closely matches the 4w3?

From:	pork ^(oo)^
	rfd3_5@hotmail.com
Date:	Mon, 2 Jul 2001

What percentage of the population do you think fits your MB-Enneagram correspondence hypothesis? I'm a 4w3 and an INFJ. I've known 4w3's with the following MB types: INFP, INFJ, ISFJ, ENFP, ENFJ, ESFP. I've known 4w5's with the following MB types: ISFP, INFP, INFJ, ENFP. I've heard of "Thinking" Fours (INTP, INTJ, ISTJ, etc). Aesthetic focus is an axiom of both Feeling Judgment and 4, if not necessarily a strict criterion - hence, the conspicuous 4-F correspondence.

+++Thanks pork ^(oo)^. From my own perspective: 95%. From the perspective of those who believe that they know their Myers-Briggs® and Enneagram types: 30%.

From:	Victoria
	vic@netgrrl.com
Date:	Mon, 2 Jul 2001

I've taken both Myers-Briggs & the Ennagram test... separated by years. I am an ENTJ and an 8, which match. Interesting to me as a student of astrology is that my rising sign, Aries, also corresponds.

+++Thanks Victoria. You're lucky.

From:	Valkyrieh
	valkyrieh@hotmail.com
Date:	Tue, 26 Jun 2001

Very interesting, and in my case at least, very accurate. I am an INFJ, and a FOUR on the enneagram (although, I have a three wing, not a five). I am, however, a Virgo--BUT, my rising sign is Pisces!

+++Thanks Valkyrieh.

From:	Rich
Date:	Wed, 20 Jun 2001

Mr Kelly: The confusion is not yours!I was refering to Oldham's problem with the
"big picture".What does my serious-
inventive-leisurely-sensitive all add up
to?If I hadn't already know about the
Enneagram when I read Oldham's book,I
would have had...?Its too much for ISTJ.
My ISTJ seems more like 1w9 with
4 issues, not moral issues.But I cann't say that you are wrong that it is 9w1.
You have studied this a lot more than I
have.ATT paid for The MBTI in 1990-1991.
Just about everyone was a SJ of some
sort.I try not to type others,but for the obvious Ennea types,type 9 was way
over represented for such a small
sample!Reality beats theory....

From:	Rich
Date:	Tue, 19 Jun 2001

Mr Kelly:
Thank you for the information!I am
ones of those people who seem to follow
into the cracks,being variants instead of the standard model....I worked with
a male ISTJ-9w8.I was very surprised to
find that we had much the same styles
but in different strenghts aand order.
Oldham is great in talking about component personality
parts,but his
lack of complete profiles leads to
confusion...!

+++The fault is mine, not Dr. Oldham's, Rich. He has very good descriptions of his 14 styles (not Inventive or Artistic) in his book referenced below.

From:	Rich
Date:	Mon, 18 Jun 2001

Mr Kelly:
I want to thank you for the graet job
you are doing!I also want to thank you
for the "inventive style",it sounds a
lot more like me than the self confident
does....You have a much more open mind
than most of the people working on the
MBTI,Enneagram etc.They seem to feel
that one size does all that there is a
basic,standard verison....
I have one queation about the serious style.You match
it with the
9w1.Cory Caplinger makes it 1w9.The
1w9 profile seems more like what I experience.Until I was in my 30s,I had
the "dogged determination",since then,
I also have the hyperactive crash speed.
But 9w1 would go well with 9w8 leisurely
...?

+++Thanks Rich. I believe that the Depressive type is better associated with the 9w1 than the 1w9. Though depression can be found in all of the types, and I realize that depressive disorders have been associated with obsessive-compulsive disorder, my position is necessitated by the fact that I have adopted Keirsey's scheme which associates the SJs, and particularly the ISTJ, with the melancholic, or depressive, temperament. It seems to me, though, that the noteworthy examples that Don Riso gives for the 9w1 are, in fact, better classified as the depressive type than are the ones he gives for the 1w9. Compare, for example, Abraham Lincoln with Thomas Jefferson, Queen Elizabeth II with Margaret Thatcher, and "Edith Bunker" with "Mr. Spock."

From:	Patrick Malone
	taylormalone@home.com
Date:	Sat, 16 Jun 2001

Thank you for providing information on a subject that is near to my heart and soul. An integrated personality system would help world probably more that feeding everyone. I am working on a MB, Enegram, Western Astro, Eastern Asto, Learning type, Generations, Sex, and birth order personality system.

+++Thanks Patrick.

Messages: Archive 3

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