Introduction into Socionics (draft): Part 2

© Dmitri Lytov, Marianna Lytova, January 2005
First presented as Internet lectures to pedagogues and students
of the St. Kliment Okhridsky University (Sofia, Bulgaria).

Part 1—Part 2—Part 3

Subjectivity or Objectivity? Testing Jungian Types (Non-socionic)

Let us discuss today methods of determining the types in socionics, as well as in other directions of Jungian typology.

Jung himself detected types intuitively, this means, he was the only expert in their determining. Later some of his disciples learned to do it, but Jung anyway understood that his criteria of types must be subjective, and he did not publish any methodology of determining types.

In 1938 (?) Gray and Wheelwright proposed their first test determining Jungian types. You can find this test (in English) here:

http://www.gesher.org/Myers-Briggs/GW_Test.html

This test contained only three of the four scales (the scale rationality/irrationality, or judgment/perception, was missing). It is still used by some American psychologists.

Of course, this test was primitive from the viewpoint of today's achievements of psychology. But it was – the first of its kind. Gray and Wheelwright started a longitude study of validity of their test.

For about 30 years they, and later their disciples Katherine Bradway and Wayne Detloff, performed testing of the same group of people in order to measure dynamics of their test results. They found that a big group of the respondents had slight deviations in their results: e.g. ENT (1st testing) … ENT (2nd testing)… INT (3rd testing) – testing was repeated after several years. Sometimes even 2 of the three criteria changed in time.

Did it mean that the type also changed? They could not answer this question. Their only tool of measuring types was the test, and they even did not offer their own type descriptions – instead, they referred to Jung's Psychological Types.

There were some other tests: the famous Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, and the less popular Singer-Loomis Inventory (measuring functions instead of dichotomies).

Isabel B. Myers was not a professional psychologist – she was a schoolteacher. Her mother Katharine Briggs was one of Jung's disciples and thus learned about his system of types. The main background of her test was the idea that people are born different, and it is necessary to respect and develop these differences, instead of leveling them. Myers considered these inborn (!) differences as the key to future talents: the earlier these gifts are recognized, the earlier they begin to develop, thus providing this person with more opportunities in his/her career and self-realization. Interpersonal compatibility was not interesting to her, or at least, she did not see ways of its objective studying.

Unlike the Gray-Wheelwright Test, her test consisted of all 4 binary scales. However, she made something that became, on the one hand, a key to the fantastic success of her test in the future, but on the other, a reason of stagnation in its further development (you will not find much difference between MBTI-related articles written 10 years ago and nowadays). We do not remember any link to her test on the Internet, but most probably you will find it here (together with a lot of other information about Myers):

http://www.capt.org/

So what did she do? She just tried to explain Jung's scales IN SIMPLE PLAIN WORDS.

The difference between the original Jung's typology and the approach of Isabel Myers is not evident at once. She used the same 4 dichotomies, and she gave them similar definitions.

However, as we have already noticed, Jung did not consider all the 4 dichotomies equipotent. He divided them into 2 groups: functions (T/F, S/N) and attitudes (E/I, Rat/Irrat). The first two manifested clearly and obviously in mental activity, in occupational success, etc. The second two described rather dynamics of the neural system, and thus represented something like “fine tuning” of types. In MBTT, all the 4 dichotomies are equipotent. We would describe it as comparing meters to liters and kilograms :)

Well, on the other hand, it is easy to criticize Myers based on the actual level of psychology, but at that time, about 50 years ago, her work was a significant progress, compared to the level of psychology at the time of the first publication of Jung's Psychologkcal Types. Jung's terms were too vague, allowed multiple interpretation. Myers proposed maybe simplified, but easily recognizable descriptions of the 4 dichotomies.

In addition, her approach was influenced by American cultural traditions. One of the dichotomies, Judgment/Perception, from this viewpoint is the most different from the original Jung's approach.

Let us remind, Jung used TWO synonyms for the same dichotomy: rationality/irrationality and judgment/perception. Myers chose the second name, and described this dichotomy similarly to Jung's ideas, but also added something new: in her interpretation, Judging types are decisive, self-disciplined, strong-willed, resolute, while Perceiving types are careless, unpunctual, somewhat infantile. This of course made her types somewhat different from the original Jung's types.

She understood it, too. And she proposed a hypothesis: her dichotomy Judgment/Perception was not the same as Jung's Rationality/Irrationality! She guessed that Rational = EJ + IP, Irrational = EP + IJ.

In fact, such a hypothesis was much controversial and resulted in misunderstanding and confusion. Myers herself wrote that her hypothesis somewhat contradicts to empirical data. In her book Gifts Differing (1968) she wrote that the criterion J/P sometimes does not work well for introverted types.

So why could not she return to the original Jung's interpretation of Rationality/Irrationality? We think, maybe because her typology would become more abstract, would lose its “American taste” and thus would not become so popular in the US. After all, abstract ideas are not too easy to sell...

According to Myers, the type is the result according to her test. At least it was so when she was alive. According to the actual rules of CAPT (Center for Application of Psychological Type, http://www.capt.org/ ), which owns the copyright for MBTI, this is not enough. First, you need to pass the MBTI test, then you need to be interviewed by a advisor, which confirms or corrects the test results. This is important. The test result obviously reflects certain personality traits, but it can also reflect certain social stereotypes, "masks".

The Myers-Briggs typology appeared in 1956, but it remained not widely known until 1984, when David W. Keirsey, a well-known American psychologist, published his Please Understand Me (with Marilyn Bates). This popular bestseller made MBTT really popular. However, instead of the long Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, which included approximately 150 questions, Keirsey proposed his own shorter test of 72 questions, the so-called Keirsey Temperament Sorter (KTS)—you can find this test at www.keirsey.com

The terminology of Keirsey's book exactly matched the MBTT terminology. He gave just the same definitions as Myers did. Except for one detail: his test gave somewhat different results for the same people. Not always, but often at least one of the four dichotomies mismatched in both tests (e.g., certain John Smith could be ESFJ, according to MBTI, and ESFP, according to KTS). For this reason, later Keirsey proclaimed that his typology was “not the same as MBTI”. Here is what his son wrote to me:

There is a difference between the Myers-Briggs material and Keirsey Temperament, although we know that many don't see or understand the differences. Mixing the two is not to my father's liking. To my father, he does not want to assist, or seem to assist, in promoting any material that he does not believe presents an accurate picture of temperament, which Myers-Briggs material and its derivatives have problems in this regard.

Under “temperaments" Keirsey understood the groups NT (Rationals), NF (Idealists), SP (Artisans), SJ (Guardians), which he identified with Hippocrates' temperaments. We read his books, but we failed to find any valid proofs of correlation between these groups and classical temperaments – Keirsey simply declared it!

This again raised the questions, whether Jungian (or Myers-Briggs) types are “objective”, or they represent something like social stereotypes?

“Objective" Parameters of Types: Tiegers in the US, Augusta in the Former USSR

If the Myers-Briggs were “objective”, then they were possible to identify by any other way, without tests. Objectivity means independence from the personal factor, i.e. two different researchers should obtain the same result under equal circumstances if they use the same approach and have the same object of research. The type should have some objective parameters.

Both Myers and Keirsey, as well as some other famous adherents of MBTT (e.g. Kroeger and Thuesen) in their books used similar approach: they simply described the 4 dichotomies, then gave a test, and then described the resulting 16 types. They did not give any valid methodology of determining types without tests.

So, when we visit different sites dedicated to the Myers-Briggs typology, or Keirsey typology, we will find there long lists of celebrities distributed by types… in different ways! Adherents of MBTI could not agree even about the types of American presidents!

Such disagreement makes sense, since we remember that MBTT methodology relies primarily upon tests. How can we test a celebrity? Even when they come to MBTI consultants or analysts, they rather prefer to keep their results in secret.

The situation changed at the end of 1990s, due to the spouses Paul Tieger and Barbara Barron-Tieger. They contributed a lot to MBTT. In their books, they developed a methodology of determining types without tests – by observation, interviewing etc. They also performed some more interesting experiments. However, today we are not going to discuss their methodology, nor its bugs. You can visit their site:

http://www.personalitytype.com/

Before coming back to socionics and Augusta. let us tell some words about MBTI in Russia.

MBTI is used in Russia. For the first time it was mentioned in Russian in 1984, in a book translated from English: Б.Шнейдерман, Психология программирования, М.: «Радио и связь», 1984. This book contained only a short description of the 4 scales, but did not contain the test itself and descriptions of the 16 types.

Later our famous psychologist, Academician Yuliya B. Gippenreyter, developed an adapted version of MBTI, which is now used by several psychological organizations in Russia.

Several books dedicated to Myers-Briggs and Keirsey typology have been translated into Russian.

As for the Keirsey test, there was a not really good story with it. Keirsey granted the right for its usage in Russia to a Russian psychologist Konstantin Pavlov. The latter misused Keirsey's authorization and published, together with two other people, “his” book, which, in fact, was a plagiated version of D.Keirsey's fundamental work: Keirsey D., Bates M. Please Understand Me.

Several years ago we corresponded with D.Keirsey's son. As a result, he granted us the right to create an adapted Ukrainian version of his test, which he later placed at his site:

http://www.keirsey.com/Ukrainian.html

We will consider below both advantages and lacks of the tests used in Jungian typology.

Early Socionics: Functions Instead of Dichotomies! And if not Testing, What Else?

From our previous posts you may have got an impression that we criticize previous approaches, for example the Myers & Briggs Type Theory, in order to say: they are obsolete, while socionics is good. Well, if you did – it is wrong impression. We are just starting to speak about socionics, and we will consider it critically, too. Socionics had its bugs, especially at early stages of its development.

The problem of socionics # 1 was that Augusta set much more global goals than Myers did, while possessing much scarcer resources.

NOTE: Augusta's real surname is Augustinavichiute. It is difficult to write and pronounce, isn't it? She used the pseudonym Augusta only in few of her articles and in letters. All her books and articles have been published under her real surname – it is important to remember when you decide to look for her publications in a library.

What do we mean under “scarcer resources” (we have already written about the goals)?

1. Personality typology was not developed in the Soviet psychology (except for Hippocrates' temperaments and psychiatric typologies). Augusta had to rely mostly on old Western books published or imported into Lithuania before 1940.

2. The same sad situation was with testing. Of course, there were many popular “tests” in magazines etc., but these were not real tests. Some good Western tests, such as the Cattell Inventory, were known among few psychologists and pedagogues. In 1982, a very good theoretical work of A.Anastasi about methods of psychological testing was translated and published in Russian, but for many psychologists it remained too abstract, since they had never seen the tests considered and discussed in this book.

3. She also did not know about developments in Jungian typology. In fact, she learned the Myers-Briggs typology only in 1985. No wonder: at that time the Myers-Briggs typology was not widely known even in its homeland, in the US. And this meant that Augusta had to rediscover by her own means some things already known in the West.

The lack of knowledge about Western developments in this branch, on the one hand, delayed the development of socionics; on the other, it was a positive factor. Having no idea about the tests determining Jungian types, Augusta had to develop her alternative methods. While MBTT relied mostly on verbal testing, socionics gradually developed good technologies of determining types without tests.

Were there problems with the American tests, i.e. these of Gray & Wheelwright, Myers&Briggs and Keirsey? We see at least three problems.

1) Some questions in their tests proposed an artificial choice: just choose YES or NO! They did not provide such options as “no idea” or “both”.

2) The tests were influenced by some American stereotypes, especially the most controversial dichotomy J/P, which according to this test could easily be renamed into “successful – not successful”. Of course success is a real vital factor, but it has nothing common with the human nature studied by Jung.

3) The most important problem, however, was that the authors of these tests did not see any difference between people's self-evaluation and their perception by other spectators. Such approach was also a part of the Western culture, at least at that period: people were supposed to tell frankly everything if they were “correctly asked”.

The situation was quite different in the Soviet Union. It was a totalitarian state. It was not usual for Soviet people to speak so directly and straightforwardly as Americans used to do. For this, and for many other reasons, Augusta had to develop different methods of determining Jungian types than verbal testing.

In 1970, (approximately) she created an informal circle, a group of friends and adherents where she discussed Jungian types, methods of determining them and ways of creating a system of relationships between them. It is hard to say when the term “socionics” was born. It was invented as a hybrid of the terms “society” and “bionics” (biological modeling) – thus, “socionics” was considered a method of social modeling.

Both Isabel Myers and her mother Katharine Briggs belonged to ethical (feeling) types, and maybe for this reason their approach was HUMANITARIAN: to discover people's talents and to develop them. On the other hand, Augusta, her husband and many people of her informal club belonged to logical (thinking) types, and their approach could be described as SCIENTIFIC: to build consistent models of behavior of particular people and of relations between them. Augusta did not determine types behind people's back – on the contrary, if she had a hypothesis (or even two or three hypotheses) about the type of a certain person, she discussed it (them) with that person until they came to a common viewpoint. The types were interesting for her as the keys to forecasting of people's behavior. When her prognosis about a certain person came true, then his/her type was considered to have been determined correctly.

The most important difference from the approach of Myers and Keirsey (although she did not know about them yet) was that she considered the type as a DYNAMICAL PHENOMENON, as something ever-changing. She believed that the Jungian dichotomies described only the “skeleton”, the most stable part of the type. According to her, each person possesses both strong and weak traits; if we describe a person only in terms of its strong functions (as Myers and Keirsey did), then we will lose something important. These weak traits represent the key to one's internal problems and thus to one's dependency from other people. We should not forget that, in spite of the human right for freedom, all the relationships are based on certain dependency and responsibility.

Very soon, she became dissatisfied with such a “handicraft” approach (i.e. just watching people and determining their type in discussion by consequent comparison of their traits with all the Jung's type descriptions). She began to create a theoretical basis of socionics. As we have already mentioned, she did not know about Myers or Keirsey at that time, so she had to create descriptions of the 4 dichotomies and of the 16 types from the very beginning.

She completed her first work describing basic principles of socionics in 1979 and registered it in the Lithuanian Academy of Science. Next year she published a short article describing her model.

The article met very harsh criticism from the official psychologists. For the next 10 or even more years her biography became much similar to that of Isabel Myers :)

Her main “sin”, according to these critical articles, was that she was not a psychologist by her education. Such sayings were nothing but hypocrisy: psychology (and sociology) became independent disciplines in the USSR only 10-15 years before these events, and earlier they were considered parts of the philosophy (of course only Marxist-Leninist). In fact, Augusta infringed “unwritten rules of a game”. She did not use terminology consistent with the Marxist-Leninist approach. She touched the “sacred cow” of the Soviet psychology – the role of “society”, “social influence” (i.e. of the ruling Party) in people's lives. Let us remind that for the same reason many other important trends of the world psychology, such as etiology, were ignored by the official Soviet psychology. Even Alexander Luria, a famous Soviet psychologist, one of prominent neurophysiologists, became widely known only after his death. No wonder that Augusta's works also proved to be “unwished”.

However, she made a smart move: she made a popular psychological “game” out of socionics. She gave the 16 types impressing nicknames (Robespierre, Jack London, Dostoyevsky, Hamlet etc.). In this “outfit” the ideas of socionics began to spread slowly through popular newspapers, illustrated magazines etc.

There was only one problem: Augusta was not able to develop her theory alone. She created a lot of drafts, but only few finished articles. Her descriptions of the dichotomies and of the types were “raw”. Then, in 1984, Igor Weisband, one of her disciples, which now lives in Germany, on the base of her works created a first manual of socionics.

Weisband “wiped out” many of Augusta's unproven hypotheses and left only those, which could be proved by more or less facts. Based on her “raw” descriptions and on self-told stories of representatives of different types, he created new descriptions of these types. Wesband's work was really a great feat. In fact, Augusta wrote, like Jung, in a very vague and ambiguous language, and was not always easy to understand. Well, it is always a problem of discoverers of something new: WHEN IT IS REALLY NEW, THE LANGUAGE LACKS WORDS NECESSARY TO DESCRIBE IT!

When Weisband was about to complete his manual, he occasionally learned about the Myers-Briggs typology. It was the already mentioned above B.Shneiderman's book with short descriptions of the 4 dichotomies and some more few words about the MBTI – that was all! However, it was an important information. It helped to clarify some moments in the descriptions of types and dichotomies. At that time, neither Augusta nor any other socionists realized the difference between the definitions used in socionics and MBTT. However, they quickly understood the methodological difference.

Based on her 15 years of people watching, Augusta developed methods of determining people's types without tests. Later these methods were improved and described by Victor Gulenko, a psychologist from Kiev. We are sorry that his article has not been translated into English yet; however, if anybody of you understands Russian, you can read his article here:

http://www.socioniko.net/ru/articles/diag.html

Still, socionics is far from perfect methods of determining types. The arguments between socionists about the types of certain celebrities sometimes are as strong as in the US, between the adherents of different branches of MBTT. However, the fact that socionists did not rely much upon tests resulted in a very important difference between the descriptions of socionic types and those of types according to Myers and Briggs.

In MBTT, type descriptions are “politically correct” and thus seem to be somewhat superficial, they consist mostly of positive traits.

In socionics, types are described “from close distance”, and contain both strong and weak traits. The socionic type is a model describing balance between strong and weak traits, explaining how perfection in some traits “costs” imperfection in others.

In MBTT, type descriptions are static: they describe something stable, unchanged.

In socionics, type descriptions may seem also static. However, socionics uses the so-called Model A, which describes types in dynamics. It distributes type traits into 1) more or less stable; 2) situation-dependent; 3) obviously weak, requiring somebody else's support. This model makes possible forecasting trends of relations between people. Only trends, not the whole gamma of real people's communication, friendship, hostilities, competition, etc.! However, sometimes these trends are so important that it is even possible to forecast chances of a married couple to divorce.

In 1980—1995 socionics existed as a "club of adherents" outside the official psychology. Groups of socionists appeared in different cities of the Soviet Union, but this was not enough to make socionics recognized by official psychologists. On the one hand, such isolation from psychologists positively influenced socionics: it developed without Marxist-Leninist stereotypes that overloaded Soviet psychological works of that time. On the other hand, such isolation created an illusion among many socionists that socionics were not a part of psychology, it rather were “a new science” with its own methods, subject etc. This was a dangerous trend: there was a real danger that socionics would turn into something esoteric, mystical.

Then the Soviet Union collapsed.

By that time, Augusta created a framework of socionics. But it needed a reform. The necessity of a reform became obvious in the last years of perestroika (1989 – 1991). Although official psychology was still under strong influence of the official ideology, more and more Western psychological books came to Russia, were translated and published. In the beginning, there were only few authors – Eric Berne, Sigmund Freud, Erich Fromm, Carl Jaspers. But from now on socionics had to compete with other trends in psychology, because Soviet (and later post-Soviet) psychology became pluralistic.

Two researchers from Kiev, Victor Gulenko and Alexander Boukalov, reformed socionics: they defined its subject and methodology, and created its terminology, which is used until now. Due to their activity, Kiev (Ukraine) became an “informal capital” of the socionics.

Alexander Boukalov was a young mathematician (born in 1960). He founded the International Socionics Institute in Kiev, and started publishing socionic journals (in 1995 the first of them appeared, and now they are three). His approach may be described as “abstract modeling”. He criticized the “old psychology” for being too descriptive and considered socionics as a method of making psychology more “precise” and forecasting. He invented a lot of hypotheses (frankly speaking, we – Dmitri and Marianna – accept only a part of them).

Victor Gulenko (born in 1958) began his career as a translator and interpreter of German, English and Dutch. His approach in socionics can be described as “humanitarian”. He studied modern psychological researches and tried to find their correlations with the socionic ideas. He was the first who performed a detailed comparison between socionics and the Myers & Briggs Type theory, and described their similarity and the difference between them. He noticed positive achievements of the Myers & Briggs theory, and appealed to other socionists for a scientific competition with their American colleagues, for studying their ideas and inventing something more perfect. He also tried to reform the socionic terminology, to make it closer to the existing psychological terminology. In 1997 (?) he defended a dissertation dedicated to application of the socionic approach in the work of school teachers. He also applies socionic ideas in personnel consulting. Finally, he published more books than any other socionist did.

It is interesting that both Boukalov and Gulenko started from the presumption that socionics were something different from psychology, and finally concluded that it was not, that socionics was rather a part of psychology, and thus contributed a lot to the recognition of socionic ideas by other psychologists.

Socionics Today: Testing is Dead, Long Live Testing!

Starting from the beginning of 1990s, socionists gradually began to find a “common language” with psychologists. It was a long and not easy process. It was necessary for both of the parties (i.e. socionists and other psychologists) to be not “too proud” of their achievements, to be able to notice positive traits of the opponent. Victor Gulenko was probably the one who provided a basis for such mutual understanding. As a “popular game” (see above), socionics became widely known among young students, but that of course was not enough. Yes, it was like an epidemic: young people in many cities of the former USSR were anxious to know their types, to learn their relationships with each other. AT THE SAME TIME, THE SOCIONIC THEORY REMAINED “RAW", SOMETIMES CONTRADICTORY. THE VERY METHOD OF DETERMINING TYPES WAS STILL NOT PERFECT. Socionists needed to exchange their experience with specialists of neighboring disciplines, such as psycho-diagnostics, social psychology, neuropathology, sociology etc., because very often these disciplines already “knew” how to solve some problems that still existed in socionics.

We wrote that for some time socionics rejected tests as something unreliable. However, such a situation could not last too long. More and more Western books were published in Russia, people discovered more and more tests in these books, and they asked: why are tests absent in socionics?

Well, the first attempt to make a socionic type test was made in 1985 by Igor Weisband. His test was very primitive; it proposed a 4-step tree of binary choices. Later some more similar “tests” were published in popular books on socionics, with a disclaimer that they were not too reliable. What did these tests look like? They much reminded the Myers &Briggs test, but significantly reduced and shortened. In fact, they represented just short and easily recognizable descriptions of the 4 dichotomies, so that people familiar with socionics could easily "cheat" these tests.

Socionics pretended to be more advanced than the Myers &Briggs theory, because of its theory of intertype relationships, but none of those tests reflected this advantage. The relationships were based NOT ON MERE DICHOTOMIES BUT ON THE FUNCTIONS. However, creation of a functional test reflecting the dynamical nature of the type (as it was considered in socionics) was an insoluble tasks for socionists of that time.

And one more unpleasant fact. Although we said “socionics discovered methods of determining types without testing”, it was not a singular discovery – it was a long and thorny process of proposing various hypotheses, full of both mistakes and brilliant ideas. In fact, determining the type in socionics was similar to medical diagnostics. If a person was watched for a sufficiently long period, considered in all aspects, then the diagnosis was very highly reliable. But people are people – they are impatient, especially when they are young! Along with profound researches, a “pop socionics” also appeared, which proposed “express testing”. No wonder that such “express testing” resulted in EXACTLY THE SAME PROBLEM AS IN THE US, AMONG THE ADHERENTS OF MYERS &BRIGGS THEORY: discrepancies in determining types of the same people. Especially famous people.

Fortunately, the situation changed at the end of 1990s. The time of enthusiasts passed away, and more and more professional psychologists were interested in methods of socionics. The process of intellectual exchange started. In 1997, for the first time a chapter on socionics was included into a manual of General Psychology (the 5-th edition of that book was published in 2002: Столяренко Л.Д. Основы психологии: Учебное пособие для студентов высших учебных заведений – 5-е изд., перераб. и доп. – Ростов-на-Дону: Феникс, 2002. – 672 с.), and from this year on a thin stream of socionic book gradually turned into an avalanche. Instead of making “discoveries”, socionists began to perform experiments, to verify and validate their methods.

Well, it will be a long story to tell about all these experiments (n fact, it should be one of the last topics of our seminar). We will tell only about the advance in testing.

Socionists tried to use also American tests (MBTI, Keirsey test etc.) for determining socionic types. However, they finally discovered that the American types were “somewhat different”. It cost years to understand the difference. In 1985, when Augusta for the first time learned about MBTI, she was absolutely sure that the American types were “the same”, only without a theory of intertype relationships. There were some comparative experiments (one of them was organized and performed by us – Dmitri and Marianna – together with Michael Morozov, the administrator of http://www.socionics.org/ site). These experiments finally confirmed that the American scales were somewhat “displaced” compared to the socionic scales. How? Let us tell.

In 2000, Victor Talanov from St. Petersburg proposed a first dynamical socionic test. He used a multifactor approach, and his test was “self-learning”. We cooperated with Talanov for a year, but later we disagreed with some ideas used as the fundament of his test. Thus he began to develop his own test, and we developed our own Multifactor Test (MT). Out of more than 2000 respondents, about 900 sent us their feedback, which proved that our test was highly reliable. Then we published several articles about our test (you can find links in the list of literature). We believe that the multifactor approach has big perspectives for the diagnostics of types, since only this approach allows detecting the “dynamism” of the type, the know-how of socionics that distinguishes it from MBTI and many other typologies.

In the next topics we will tell you about the works of other socionists. They are really interesting. Socionics is actually applied in family and marriage consulting, in career guidance, in personnel management etc. At the same time, researches of the nature of types go on. And communication with our colleagues abroad (in Finland, Estonia etc.) was really useful for us. Each country's psychology has its specialization. For example psychology in Russia is close to pedagogy and philosophy, in Finland it is closely related to brain studies, in Germany to neural studies etc. And the intellectual exchange between different countries allows creating something new and improving old ideas.

The Socionic Theory

Let us consider basic definitions of socionics – we mean, the 4 basic criteria (dichotomies, dimensions), the 8 basic functions and the 16 types. Is it too much? It is not, because all these concepts are closely related to each other.

We will describe all them in comparison with the definitions of Myers-Briggs typology, because you seem familiar with this typology.

To start, you can read a short but funny article describing the scales in the Myers-Briggs typology:

http://www.socioniko.net/en/articles/leaver-personality.html

and then we will consider their difference from the socionic scales.

We will also consider practical, vital examples of all these dichotomies, functions and types to make them easy memorizable.

The 4 Criteria (Dimensions, Dichotomies)

Socionics uses the terms “criterion” and “dichotomy” (Greek: ‘splitting into two parts'). MBTT uses the terms “dimension” or “choice” instead. Why “dimension”? Because these criteria remind the system of Descartes coordinates where each axis splits space into 2 equal parts.

In addition, both MBTT and socionics use the term “scale”.

So many terms, are they all necessary? However, it is not a whim of the authors of these typologies; it is just the diversity of human language.

1. Thinking / feeling (in socionics: logic / ethic).

The definitions of this dichotomy seem to be equal both in socionics and in MBTT. If we even noticed certain differences, they were caused by own perception of their authors, not by any traditions.

The only difference is the name. Let us remind: the term used in the US may lead to confusion (which was noticed by Jung himself), because, for example, the word “feeling” describes not only the emotional sphere (which is really described by this part of the dichotomy), but also human perception.

In determining this criterion without testing, Victor Gulenko and Catherine Filatova pointed at the following basic differences:

1. Impersonal (logical types) or evaluative (ethical types) type of judgments and expressions. Logical types usually have slow reaction towards other people's emotions and/or slowly awake their own emotions. This, on the one hand, sometimes causes problems in communication or in “self-advertising”, but on the other, it's an advantage, which allows being "cold-minded", evaluate facts soberly.

Mimicry is often an obvious evidence of the person's being a logical or ethical type. Mimicry of ethical types is always rich, even when they are introverted, restrained. Mimicry of logical types is rather monotonous, too obvious (joy – grief, satisfaction – dissatisfaction). Often ethical types understand their own influence on people and even “play little dramas”. Logical types rather get angry when they lose control over the situation.

This difference becomes especially noticeable when we watch women actresses. Society usually expects that women should be emotional, somewhat capricious, tender. However, actresses that belong to logical types do not demonstrate lots of emotions, they are rather over-realistic in their roles.

Examples of actresses belonging to logical types: Meryl Streep, Meg Ryan, Helen Hant, Sharon Stone, Glenn Close, Patricia Kaas, Uma Thurman, Demie Moore.

Examples of actresses belonging to ethical types: Barbra Streisand, Elisabeth Taylor, Melanie Griffith, Nastassia Kinsky, Susan Sarandon, Fannie Ardan, Liza Minnelli, Nicole Kidman.

IMPORTANT NOTE: in all cases when we give examples of type representatives, we have verified his/her type by biographical materials. We did not (and will not) determine his/her type by appearance, texts and other indirect sources – we analyzed their life and behavior. We also avoid mentioning people whose types are still argued

2. Laconism (logical types) or adjective-overloaded speech (ethical types). When we do not watch somebody personally, we can at least judge his/her speech. Writers of logical types may write very long sentences and books, but they speak about facts, not something "subjective". They do not concentrate their attention on emotions, they just give facts and thoughts. On the other hand, ethical writers are masters of word, they often use a lot of adjectives, describe passions that rage between people—and this sometimes results in a sad fact: a lot of passion, but very little action.

Good examples of “logical” writers are Stanislaw Lem, Anton Chekhov, Maxim Gorky, Ayn Rand, Jack London, Somerset Maugham, Agatha Christie, Haruki Murakami.

Examples of ethical writers: Thomas and Heinrich Mann, maybe 60-70% of poets, Alexandre Dumas (both father and son), Victor Hugo, Theodore Dreiser, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Leo Tolstoy, Stefan Zweig, Gerald Durrell.

NOTE: again, we (or other socionists) have determined types of these people not by their texts but by biographical data. The texts were analyzed only afterwards.

3. Behavior in arguments: focus on facts (logic) / on relations, people (ethic); explanation of his or her own opinion (logic) / persuasion, induction (ethic) etc.

Representatives of ethical types are usually good talkers, but when they become managers or even politicians, they are afraid of making unpopular decisions, they prefer that somebody else would do unpopular things behind their backs. For example, Hitler was a very soft, joyous and even sometimes compliant in communication; he preferred not to see “unpleasant things” by his own eyes and, unlike many dictators, very rarely used reprisals against people from his surrounding.

Logical types are much more often represented among managers, but they often lack somewhat called “charm”, they seem to be too “dry”. Some people of logical types sometimes succeed in becoming more attractive to others, but their saying are often explicit and straightforward. They do not "play games", they "do their job".

Examples of politicians of ethical types: Mikhail Gorbachev, Georgi Dimitrov, Nicolae Ceausescu, George W. Bush Jr., Jacques Chirac, Leonid Brezhnev, Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Examples of politicians of logical types: Vladimir Putin, Saddam Hussein, Donald Rumsfeld, Tony Blair, Margaret Thatcher, Charles de Gaulle, Winston Churchill, probably also Czar Simeon II (sorry, we do not know much about him, we just watched his interviews on TV).

One more interesting note. Jung wrote that about 2/3 of “thinking” (i.e. logical) types are represented by men, and about 2/3 of “feeling” (ethical) types by women. Isabel Myers was not so flat in her sayings, but she also noticed such a trend: from the very childhood, “feeling” traits are cultivated in girls, and “thinking” in boys.

This, however, does not mean that men of ethical types are “feminine”, and women of logical types are “masculine”. The reality is more complicated and more interesting! Independently from each other, Victor Talanov and we (Dmitri and Marianna) discovered an interesting tendency in the results of our tests. Men of ethical types had always had higher scores on the logical scale than women or corresponding types. And vice versa: women of logical types had higher scores on the ethical scale than men of the same types.

In other words: logic/ethic has very indirect relation to masculinity/femininity; the last scale reflects rather distribution of these traits among men and women of the same psychological types. In other words, AVERAGE women are more “ethical” than AVERAGE men, and that is all.

Moreover, men of ethical types often look sexually attractive; they instinctively feel what attracts other people in them, and emphasize these traits. Examples of famous men actors of ethical types: John Travolta, Michele Placido, George Clooney, Jeremy Irons, Hugh Grant.

By contrast, men of logical types are not too demonstrative: they simply “do what is useful”. And they do not demonstrate much emotions – they ACT. Examples of famous actors of logical types: Brad Pitt, Bruce Willis, Woody Allen, Robert De Niro, Anthony Hopkins, Tim Robbins.

And finally, let us once more tell about our Multifactor test. We told already that most of its questions were "responsible" for combinations of Jung's criteria, e.g., "sensation + logic", or "intuition + introversion + rationality", etc. However, some of its questions were responsible for "pure criteria". Let us list the questions “responsible” for logic/ethic.

Please just remember that using these questions ONLY does not always a well reliable result – sometimes people tend to “play roles”. The questions responsible for combination of criteria proved to be much more valid!

Logic: positive answers

1. I usually estimate my own and other's actions from the viewpoint of their logicality and expediency.

3. When I make important decisions, arguments of reason mean more for me than the "voice of my heart".

198. I know quite a bit about technical aspects, and can repair household appliances etc. if needed.

235. In evaluation of human relations I pay attention to the obvious facts and often neglect small nuances.

251. I can logically and consequently explain complicated problems, but sometimes people reproach me of being "somewhat dry".

Ethic: positive answers

4. My remarkable feature is the capability to sympathize to others, to help them to calm down and release emotional stress.

14. I usually notice right away that my friend (partner etc.) is tired or does not feel good, and I am there to help.

28. When somebody is in trouble, I immediately feel emotional response to this unlucky event in my soul, even when I do not know him/her personally.

157. I can brightly imagine, “hear by my inner ear" live voices of my relatives and friends with their characteristic timbre, tone, intonations.

172. I like to read books whose authors directly express their evaluation of the event, their moral; I also like movies with emphasized people's moral traits.

252. I sense the reality not as much by reasoning but by compassion and emotional evaluation.

265. I am a very emotional person; even passing feelings capture me totally.

266. During communication I absolutely need the feeling of emotional contact and emotional feedback

282. I am very sensitive towards emotional disharmony, unpleasant intonations, and insincerely expressed feelings.

289. My friends or acquaintances often come to me to tell about their life collisions. Sometimes it is too boring, but I do not like to hurt them by my refuse to listen.

2. Sensation / intuition.

The definition of this criterion in socionics has some difference from that used by Myers and Briggs, but these differences do not become obvious at once.

Jung described intuition as an “ever-unconscious function of psyche”. Let us imagine the process of thinking. One part of our consciousness focuses on what is going on around, and another part “sleeps”, i.e. combines acquired images with each other and builds associations. Sometimes these associations are fantastic (.e.g. moon may be associated with cheese for its shape and color), but sometimes they allow forecasting events. Imagination and attention are processes that coexist but sometimes “overlap”, interfere with each other, impede each other.

Sensory people live “here and now”, they do not much trust their imagination and prefer to rely on what they can get, “grab” now. They are sensitive to such small nuances as rumors, changes of somebody's status, more or less prestigious outfit, etc.

Intuitive people are often considered inattentive and/or impractical; they quickly get bored with “details, details!” If asked to express their opinions, intuitive types rather present their “vision” than a detailed description.

Up to this moment, the definition of sensation/intuition was the same in socionics and MBTT. Where do disagreements come from?

Socionics describes one more important characteristic trait of the sensing function: the control of one's own physical space. Such a trait has nothing in common with imagination – on the contrary, it is opposite to imagination, it deals with perceiving of what is going on here and now, i.e. with sensation. It is probably the most ancient of human instincts, and maybe Americans avoid describing this characteristic trait of sensing types for the reasons of “political correctness” :)

For example, the literary hero Sherlock Holmes told a lot about his “intuition”, and for this reason our American colleagues, adherents of the Myers & Briggs typology, consider him to be “intuitive”. However, let us recall that Sherlock Holmes' knowledge was detailed but very narrowly specialized (Conan Doyle wrote that even in chemistry Holmes omitted many important discoveries only because they did not directly concern issues of crime detection). He was perfect in noticing smallest details, in various kinds of manual arts, up to boxing and Japanese combat art, but his imagination left much to be desired, Dr. Watson had always to offer him a lot of useless versions just in order to “wake up” his friend's imagination. All these traits are characteristic for sensory, not intuitive types. (In socionics, the type logical-sensory extravert (rational) is also known under the nickname Sherlock Holmes – we will tell later about “game nicknames” of the socionic types).

Another reason for disagreement: adherents of Myers-Briggs and Keirsey typologies sometimes (not always) determine many famous politicians as intuitive types. They say, “those people must have had strong strategic thinking in order to become so successful!”. The reality, however, is simpler than beautiful theories. Intuitive types, even in spite of their brilliant minds, can lose competition because of their inattentiveness, because of getting quickly bored of monotonous work, they do not like permanent watching the competitor's activities. For example, Leon Trotsky was a brilliant intellectual, master of forecasting, but he lost competition to Stalin, who was a bad forecaster, who considered life as a game where nothing was predictable – but Stalin was a very persistent, attentive, hard-working person. For Stalin, nothing was “boring” if it could contribute to success, and he never avoided routine chores.

Does it mean that sensing types win over intuitive types? Let us consider Mikhail Gorbachev. Although David Keirsey (www.keirsey.com) believes he was intuitive, it is a greatest mistake. Gorbachev became a reformer in spite of his own will; he never planned such large-scaled reforms. He was a master of diplomacy and intrigues, was really brilliant in balancing between opposite opinions, and strived for solutions that could satisfy everybody. There was only one problem: he lacked imagination. Each new event, especially unpleasant, happened “suddenly” and “unexpectedly” to him. In fact he HAD TO make reforms, because he had no other way to stay at power. His views were conservative enough, and no wonder that he surrounded himself by other conservators, which just proved to be harder than him and finally attempted to overthrow him. The situation in 1991 was paradoxical; this year was probably the peak of Gorbachev's popularity, but it was when he completely lost his power. An intuitive type, Boris Yeltsin, got the power, and although he was criticized for a lot of chaotic, inconsistent actions, he anyway always felt the “needs of time”. Actually, Russia is ruled by another intuitive, Vladimir Putin. He is probably the smartest leader of Russia for the last 100 years (and this is why his popularity is extremely high), but on the other hand, Putin lacks strong will and decisiveness (because he is not only intuitive, but also introverted), and sometimes his reforms remain uncompleted.

Examples of intuitive politicians: Tony Blair, José Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, Charles de Gaulle, Nicolae Ceausescu, John Kennedy, Condoleezza Rice, Osama Bin Laden.

Examples of sensory politicians: Gerhard Schroeder, Silvio Berlusconi, Jacques Chirac, Leonid Brezhnev, Winston Churchill, Saddam Hussein, Donald Rumsfeld.

So who are more successful – sensory or intuitive types? Neither, if they stand alone. The S/N criterion is probably the one where mutual support of S and N is especially important. One can somewhat “train up” his/her weak sensing or intuitive function, but will anyway feel unsure in activities related to it. Cooperation between intuitive and sensing people is successful, when "practical approach" and "imagination" work together. Alas, much more often sensory and intuitive types criticize each other: sensors criticize intuitives for being “impractical” and “absent-minded”, and intuitives criticize sensors for being “shortsighted”, greedy”, “flat-minded”. Sensors and intuitives need some time to “accustom” to each other, only then they can begin work together successfully (or understand that their views are too different, and they had better work in a different team).

After this long introduction, let us tell how to distinguish intuitives from sensors in real life?

First: by the aptitude towards abstract or concrete (applied) thinking: the first is more characteristic to intuitives, the second – to sensors. It is easy to notice even at school years: some of pupils are successful in understanding abstract terms, but fail in applied subjects, others – vice versa.

Second: by contents of their speech. Sensors usually memorize a lot of details and use them in their speech, while intuitives used to present their “general vision”.

Third: by their eyes. The look of intuitives is somewhat distracted, as if this person looks not directly at you (or any other object), but rather above you or even through you! :) Sensors usually stare at objects directly, even when their eyes seem inattentive.

Fourth: generally by their appearance. Sensors are much more attentive to their appearance from their very childhood than intuitives. For sensors, their outfit means a lot: comfort of feelings, status, fashion etc. Even movements of sensory types seem to be better coordinated, more decisive than those of intuitives (however, the last much depends on people's interest to sport; some intuitives may have train their body very well, but generally, sensors look better trained, because there are more attentive to the needs of their body).

And finally—some more examples of intuitive and sensory personalities.

Sensory actors: Robert De Niro, Dannie De Vito, Al Pacino, Bruce Willis, Alain Delon, Gerard Depardieu, George Clooney, Malcolm McDowell, Anthony Hopkins, Tom Cruise.

Intuitive actors: Dustin Hoffmann, Tim Robbins, Tom Hanks, Brad Pitt, Hugh Grant, Jeremy Irons, Franka Potente.

Sensory actresses: Michelle Pfeiffer, Elisabeth Taylor, Glenn Close, Sharon Stone, Madonna, Catherine Deneuve, Cameron Diaz, Meryl Streep.

Intuitive actresses: Penelope Cruz, Uma Thurman, Gwyneth Paltrow, Jennifer Aniston, Nastassia Kinsky, Fannie Ardan, Meg Ryan, Annette Bening.

Sensory writers : Leo Tolstoy, Andre Maurois, both Dumas, Stefan Zweig, William Faulkner, Ernest Hemingway, Guy de Maupassant, Somerset Maugham, George Amado.

Intuitive writers : Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Jorge Luis Borges, Stanislaw Lem, Brothers Strugatsky, Robert Sheckley, Jack London (especially characteristic is his Martin Eden!), Ernst Th.A.Hoffmann, Thomas and Heinrich Mann, Franz Kafka, Mark Twain, Anton Chekhov.

And finally, let us once more tell about our Multifactor test. We told already that most of its questions were "responsible" for combinations of Jung's criteria, e.g., "sensation + logic", or "intuition + introversion + rationality", etc. However, some of its questions were responsible for "pure criteria". Let us list the questions “responsible” for the already considered criteria, i.e., sensation/intuition and logic/ethic.

Here are the questions from our test that correlate with sensation/intuition.

Intuition: positive answers

53. When I lack facts, I often and successfully use my imagination.

85. Often, without any specific goal, just for fun, my imagination travels through time and space.

96. I can work without a warranty of a good pay if I feel enthusiastic about a new business.

109. Chasing new possibilities and discoveries, I am willing to live for a while without a comfort.

111. My treasures are my "inner look", fantasy, imagination, which lead me into fictitious worlds, not limited by any temporal or spatial borders.

213. Daydreamers are close and understandable to me.

Sensation: positive answers

40. The main drive in my life is maximizing comfort and pleasures and avoiding discomforts.

86. The most important thing for me is a feeling of the current moment, in other words, making myself feel good here and now, instead of some day later elsewhere.

112. I am a person liking pleasures and simple worldly joys, they are important to me.

164. My new acquaintance's appearance means very much for me – it tells a lot about qualities of this person.

165. The person's potential and capabilities do not mean much to me – I judge people by results they already can demonstrate.

184. I like to eat slowly and enjoying the taste of the food in the process and really hate when somebody hurries me up or spoils my pleasure by his champ.

3. Extroversion (extraversion) / introversion.

In our colloquial language “extravert” means an open, sociable, communicable person, while “introvert” means a reserved, reticent, shy one. Such definition was given to these words not by Jung, but by Hans Jurgen Eysenck, who borrowed these words from Jung's works. According to Myers &Briggs, these words have just the same meaning. Keirsey somewhat changed his views on them: initially, in his test extroversion was associated with communicability and activity, but in its last version – only with communicability.

However, socionics uses somewhat different definitions of these words.

We just need to repeat what we have already said: if we accept the definition according to Myers and Keirsey, such definition will strongly correlate with two other criteria, sensation/intuition and feeling/thinking. The extravert according to Myers and Keirsey will be a little bit more sensory than intuitive, and a little bit more feeling than thinking. And the introvert according to Myers and Keirsey will be, on the contrary, more intuitive than sensory, and more thinking than feeling.

In socionics, extroversion/introversion is associated with INITIATIVE. Extraverts tend to extend their activity, to be anxious whether they did all the could, or can do something more; introverts, on the contrary, rather want to avoid redundancy.

As you can see, this is INDIRECTLY related to communicability. For example, an intuitive-logical extravert can feel embarrassed in human relations, but he will show a lot of initiatives in intellectual activities. On the contrary, a sensory-ethical introvert is often smiling, gladly talks to pleasant people (especially of the opposite sex), and may be misperceived for an extravert; but in fact, he does not like to extend the circle of his activities, and especially does not like when his life becomes unstable (while extraverts perceive instability as a challenge).

Victor Gulenko, a socionist from Kiev, defined extraverts as “energy –spending”, and introverts as “energy-saving” people. Extraverts strive for new achievements, while introverts strive for stabilization. According to him and to Augusta, under the rule of extraverts, economy usually becomes dynamically developing but unstable; under the rule of introverts, it stabilizes… but later, if such stabilization lasts for too long, it gradually stagnates.

Here are the questions from our test that correlate with extroversion-introversion.

Extroversion: positive answers

25. Switching between different tasks and activities is never a problem for me, furthermore I enjoy it and it helps me to stay active and alert during a day.

45. I often take an extra risk because of my curiosity.

61. During vacations, I prefer to discover new places rather then to visit familiar ones.

117. I would like to try myself in extreme sports, like parachute jumping, mountain climbing, alpine skiing etc.

181. I would not restrict myself in my sayings and actions for the only reason that they can amaze conservative people and cause their irritation.

182. I easily accustom myself to a new party, and soon feel free and active.

237. I think more often about the possibilities ahead than about previous fortunes and misfortunes.

246. I do not like long preliminary preparations, and try to do everything at maximum speed.

Introversion: positive answers

12. At my work, I try to avoid excessive responsibilities, work loads and initiatives even when I know that all this extras would be good for my career growth.

38. I can really relax only in the circle of my closest friends.

49. I really hesitate speaking in public.

144. I can only concentrate well on one business at a time.

171. I belong to the group of people which are permanent in their habits: I keep fidelity to the same unchanging group of friends, work, place of residence, hobbies.

231. I really like the principle: hurry up slowly.

270. I do not like to stand out by my appearance, e.g. to be dressed in too bright colors.

Extraverted politicians: George W. Bush Jr., Silvio Berlusconi, Tony Blair, Jacques Chirac, Gerhard Schroeder, Boris Yeltsin, Bill Clinton, Junichiro Koizumi, Vladimir Lenin, Georgi Dimitrov, Leon Trotsky, Ronald Reagan, Adolf Hitler, Che Guevara, Fidel Castro Ruz.

Introverted politicians: Saddam Hussein, Vladimir Putin, Czar Simeon, Leonid Brezhnev, Yuri Andropov, Nikita Khrushchev (during the last years of his life he was very sociable, and sometimes he is misperceived for an extravert, but in fact, reforms under him were only superficial, and economy began to stagnate, and for many years he was known as a reticent and sly person), Charles de Gaulle, Richard Nixon.

Extraverted actors and actresses: Anthony Hopkins, Brad Pitt, Nicole Kidman, Uma Thurman, Dustin Hoffmann, Elisabeth Taylor, Quentin Tarantino, Whoopy Goldberg, Liza Minnelly, Marlon Brando, Tom Hanks, Franka Potente, Pierre Richard, Fannie Ardan.

Introverted actors and actresses: Robert de Niro, Tom Cruise, Suzan Sarandon, Tim Robbins, Michelle Pfeiffer, John Travolta, Glenn Close, Meryl Streep, Gwyneth Paltrow, Gerard Depardieu, Catherine Deneuve, Alain Delon, Michele Placido, Isabelle Huppert.

4. Judgment/perception (in socionics: rationality / irrationality; C.G. Jung used the BOTH terms as synonyms, while Myers and Keirsey distinguish them).

The socionic criterion of rationality/irrationality, according to Jung, describes rigidity or lability of the central neural system. Rational types are rigid, judgment-focused: they strive for being consistent, systematic in their deeds, keep plans even when situation changes. By contrast, irrational people are more flexible, perception-focused: they adapt to the changing situation, and their emotional outbursts do not last too long, even when they are strong.

This descriptions was first given by Jung, accepted by Isabel Myers… and misinterpreted by her! She understood judgment as strong will, perception as weakness of character. Since such her interpretation contradicted to the original Jung's descriptions of types, she later invented a very strange model, where judgment/perception was described as something else than rationality/irrationality. Still, her model embarrasses people when they read original Jung's works! And such interpretation resulted in some bugs in her test, which we have already described above.

But let us return to socionics. Augusta completely accepted the original Jung's description of this criterion. However, initially she made another mistake. She wrongly identified this criterion with E.Kretschmer's schizothymes / cyclothymiacs. Later this hypothesis was disproved by other socionists. But still, some adepts of socionics, who read only early Augusta's work, wrongly believe that rationals are “gaunt and asthenic, with strict motions”, while irrationals are “cat-gaited, with roundish motions”.

Here are the questions from our test that correlate with rationality/irrationality.

Lability (irrationality): positive answers

13. When I practice my hobby, time ceases to exist for me. As a result, I can even forget about some important plans or promises made to other people.

64. I live in harmony with my feelings and do not like to force myself to do things which I do not like or limit myself with plans and schedules.

166. I believe that successful solutions are determined rather by freedom and spontaneity than by planning and organized actions.

253. When I fulfill any of my ideas, a different tempting idea can easily distract me, and then I can abandon my undertaking halfway.

283. Even possessing good thinking, I often lack the skill and desire to plan my work.

Rigidity (rationality): positive answers

31. I can easily plan my day so I can make all the needed contacts and visits in time.

42. I do not like to leave a work uncompleted.

91. First my work, then my rest, but never vice versa!

210. I prefer to schedule my time in advance, and for this reason, I have to now about other's people plans.

219. I am consequent in my actions.

254. I succeed in keeping my affairs in order, and I am allergic to any chaos or unsystematic actions.

261. I am a person of obligations (before my family, friends, and work).

275. When my work is more or less complicated, I first plan it, and then methodically follow my plan.

291. I never give worthless promises and do not respect people who make them too easily.

This time, we are not going to give you examples of rational and irrational politicians and actors, because this criterion is not easily recognizable from a distance. It would be the same as e.g. diagnosing whether a person is AIDS-infected by the color of his/her face.

However, the functional analysis, which we have just approached, allows diagnosing this criterion very precisely. Let us speak about the 8 functions.

Correlation Between the Criteria,
or Why American Tests Cannot Be Used to Test Socionic Types.

As a post scriptum to this topic, we would like to tell some words about correlation between the 4 Jung's criteria. Are they independent from each other?

At least, they were supposed to be. However, such approach a little bit contradicts to what we actually know about the mechanisms of brain and their functioning.

Although we can describe specific brain zones responsible for certain processes, such as Wernicke zone, Broca zone, etc., these zones also interact with each other and influence each other, especially when they are bordering. For example, we know the following phenomenon: when people think about something abstract, they begin, unconsciously, to move their fingers in the air, as if trying to grasp at something. This is just because the zone of motive activity of fingers closely borders the zone of abstract imagination, so that when one of these zones activates, another also gets somewhat excited.

And the same regularity is valid in regard to the 4 Jung's criteria. It was first mentioned and studied by Victor Talanov (see for example: Таланов В.Л., Малкина-Пых И.Г. Справочник практического психолога. – СПб.: Сова, М.: ЭКСМО, 2002. – 928 с.). Then, as we have already mentioned, Talanov created a series of multifactor tests, in whose results he really found certain correlation between the 4 criteria. In our own test, we obtained almost the same results as Talanov did, so let us describe our results.

What does “correlation” mean? Let us take two groups, ST (sensory + logical) and NT (intuitive = logical) types. When we compared answers of these two groups to the questions of our test, we have noticed that the second tended to answer positively to T-relevant questions more often than the first. Such correlations were watched for all the 4 criteria. Important note: they were small enough, so that we can consider the 4 Jung's criteria as approximately independent. However, if we ignore such correlations, they sometimes can distort the test results, not always, but sometimes.

In the American tests (Myers & Briggs Type Indicator, Keirsey Temperament Sorter etc.) all the questions have equal scores. No mathematical corrections are used in order to reckon with such correlations. In fact, our American colleagues have never even asked themselves, whether such correlations really exist. In our test (as well as in Talanov's tests), complicated mathematical formulas are used in order to eliminate such correlation-relevant deviations. And – one more important note – the questions we have listed above are also not equally scored!. In fact, the score of a particular question depends even on the type of the person that answers the test questions.

On the below diagram we represent the correlations that we have found in our test (the first publication of the figure: Лытова М.Ф., Лытов Д.А. Многофакторный самосогласованный соционический тест (МТ): предварительные итоги. Ч.2 // «Соционика, ментология и психология личности», 2004, № 5).

We think that the top part of our picture correlates with the RIGHT brain hemisphere, and the bottom part – with the LEFT brain hemisphere. However, this hypothesis needs to be researched further.

1. Yes, such comparison was made by Augusta herself, and by Victor Talanov. If we find links to their articles, we will post them to this topic.