Keirsey Temperament Sorter

The location of Keirsey's four temperaments within the MBTI.

The Keirsey Temperament Sorter is a personality test which attempts to identify which of four temperaments, and which of sixteen types, a person prefers. Hippocrates, a Greek philosopher who lived from 460–377 B.C., proposed four temperaments, which are related to the four humours. These were sanguine, choleric, phlegmatic, and melancholic. In 1978, David Keirsey and Marilyn Bates reintroduced temperament theory in modern form and identified them as Guardian, Artisan, Idealist, and Rationalist. After developing modern temperament theory, Keirsey discovered the MBTI, and found that by combining intuition with the judging functions, NT and NF, and sensing with the perceiving functions, SJ and SP, he had descriptions similar to his four temperaments. This chart compares modern and ancient aspects of the theory:

c. 400 B.C.	Hippocrates's four humours	blood	phlegm	yellow bile	black bile
→	Season:	spring	winter	summer	autumn
→	Element:	air	water	fire	earth
→	Organ:	liver	brain/lungs	gall bladder	spleen
→	Qualities:	warm & moist	cold & moist	warm & dry	cold & dry
→	Characteristics:	courageous, hopeful, amorous	calm, unemotional	easily angered, bad tempered	despondent, sleepless, irritable
c. 325 B.C.	Aristotle's four sources of happiness	hedone (sensuous pleasure)	propraitari (acquiring assets)	ethikos (moral virtue)	dialogike (logical investigation)
c. A.D. 190	Galen's four temperaments	sanguine	phlegmatic	choleric	melancholic
c. 1550	Paracelsus's four totem spirits	changeable salamanders	industrius gnomes	inspired nymphs	curious sylphs
c. 1905	Adicke's four world views	innovative	traditional	doctrinaire	skeptical
c. 1914	Spränger's four value attitudes	artistic	economic	religious	theoretic
c. 1920	Kretchmer's four character styles	hypomanic	depressive	hyperesthetic	anesthetic
c. 1947	Erich Fromm's four orientations	exploitative	hoarding	receptive	marketing
c. 1958	Myers's cognitive function types	SP – sensory perception	SJ – sensory judgement	NF – intuitive feeling	NT – intuitive thinking
c. 1978	Keirsey's four temperaments	artisan	guardian	idealist	rational
Keirsey, David (1978). Please Understand Me II: Temperament, Character, Intelligence. Prometheus Nemesis Book Co Inc; 1st ed edition (May 1, 1998). ISBN 1885705026.
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Describing the temperaments

Guardians (SJs) seek membership or belonging and are concerned with responsibility and duty. Their greatest strength is logistical intelligence, which means that they excel at organizing, facilitating, checking, and supporting.

Artisans (SPs) seek freedom to act and are concerned with their ability to make an impact on people or situations. Their greatest strength is tactical intelligence, which means that they excel at acting, composing, producing, and motivating.

Rationals (NTs) seek mastery and self-control and are concerned with their own knowledge and competence. Their greatest strength is strategic intelligence, which means that they excel at engineering, conceptualizing, theorizing, and coordinating.

Idealists (NFs) seek meaning and significance and are concerned with finding their own unique identity. Their greatest strength is diplomatic intelligence, which means that they excel at clarifying, unifying, individualizing, and inspiring.

External links

Keirsey Temperament and Character The Web Site for the Keirsey Temperament Sorter and Keirsey Temperament Theory.

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Temperament

Categories: Psychometrics