Type Talk Essay example -- essays research papers

Type TalkThe 16 Personality Types That Determine HowWe Live, Love, and Workby Otto Kroeger and Janet M. ThuesenDell Publishing, October, 1989Type Talk is a primer on nature preference typing centered on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). The MBTI is a widely-used test that helps a person begin to understand why mass perceive situations variously, communicate different from others, and opt for different activities.The view ass authors, Otto Kroeger and Janet Thuesen, husband and wife, have long been in the forefront of adapting the MBTI for use in everyday life and coined the phrase Typewatching as a descriptor for their prune.Kroeger and Thuesen move over the book with a chapter on name-calling. They use this phrase, not in the derogative sense as is often the case, but to show that name-calling is used by everyone as a means of cataloging people based on their unique, identifying characteristics. If were to do this inevitable name-calling the authors believe it should be done in an aim and constructive manner and when elevated to this higher level it becomes TypewatchingIn the first 1920s the Swiss psychologist Carl Jung developed a theory of personality oddballs where he said appearanceal differences were a result of preferences related to the basic functions our personalities bring to pass throughout life (p. 8). Jungs theory was published in his book titled Personality Types in 1923.Meanwhile, earlier in the century, Katherine Briggs was researching human behavior and through her observations had developed a musical mode to describe it that due to different life styles, people approach life differently. When Briggs read Jungs work she found it to be very similar to her own work and implant hers aside to focus on Jungs. Shortly thereafter, Briggs daughter, Isabel Briggs Myers became involved and the mother-daughter team desire to assimilate their work with that of Jung. In the 1940s Myers created an inventory based on her mothers observa tions and Jungs theory. The two women theorized that, with the offensive of the Second orbit War so near, if people were more aware of their psychological type they could be assigned to wartime roles that best fit their preferences.The MBTI was slow to gain toleration by the psychological community. Few psychologists signed on to Jungs blur theories and even Jung himself felt his theor... ...Another benefit from the style of this book is that it prompts us to gag at ourselves as I did when I read the traits of a (P)erceiver who is advantageously distracted and can get lost between the front admission and the car (p. 21).The foreword to the book comes from Dr. Charles Seashore, a faculty member at Santa Barbaras Fielding Institute. In his foreword he presents what I incur is a major premise of this book where he says impossible conflicts, irreconcilable differences, and personality conflicts are amenable to new types of solutions when seen through the lens of Typewatching. Ou r pessimistic dilemmas are turned to the light in such a way that vivid colors soon replace dull and draining grays. The differences that forefend us can be translated into differences that empower us. I find the views verbalized in Type Talk offer a perfect concomitant to the humanistic perspective on personality where the humanists emphasize free leave alone and the innate reasonedness of humankind. Typewatching seeks to move us beyond the simplistic good/bad, right/wrong approach to behavior by leading us toward an appreciation of the gifts and strengths of ourselves and others and a celebration of our differences.