Type Theories

Modified: 2024-07-08 2:40 PM CDST

• Type theories assume that personalities can be described by a limited number of categories or types.
  • Probably the earliest type theory was that of Hippocrates, the father of medicine (remember the Hippocratic Oath?).
    • He described personality as being determined by the proportion of four fluids in the body:
    • phlegm,
    • black bile,
    • yellow bile,
    • and blood.
  • Personality was alleged to depend on how much of each you have.
  • While we do not believe in Hippocratic theory anymore, the terms used to describe people by that theory are still around:
    • sanguine (blood), bilious (yellow bile), melancholic (black bile) and phlegmatic (phlegm). Look them up in a dictionary.

• Much later, at the end of the 19th century, Cesare Lombroso attempted to describe the criminal type.
  • To do so, he visited Italian prisons, and then classified the inmates he found there by their physical characteristics.
  • Eventually, he ended up with characteristics like a slanting forehead, flat nose, and large jaw.
  • You might be rightly skeptical of his theory at this point.
  • Do all criminals look alike?
• Scientific type theories started in the early 20th century.
  • In Germany, Kretschmer visited insane asylums and carefully measured inmates with differing diagnoses.
    • He was able to create three basic types, plus one catch all category for those who would not fit the basic types.
    • Kretschmer's approach was later subverted and used to justify Nazi logic about racial differences.
    • So it lost its scientific value.
• Sheldon, in the U.S.A., conducted a more detailed analysis of body type than did Kretschmer, rating people on how closely they approached three body types.
  • Subjects' proximity to each type was rated on a 1-7 scale.
    • Sheldon did find that body type and personality were related.
      • But what did he really find?
  • He did not find a direct relationship between body type and personality, but an indirect one.
    • People with different body types do differ in personality, but they do so because of differential treatment.
    • In other words, endomorphs are treated differently than ectomorphs, and that treatment contributes to the development of their personalities.
    • Look at how advertisers pitch their wares, especially at women, and you will see that ectomorphy is promoted as desirable.
    • Other societies have different values with regard to body type, and personality will vary accordingly.
    • Today, type theories are viewed as too simplistic.

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