PTypes’ Typology (continued)

>>Dave, I'm not an expert in personality research, but the first question that comes to mind is whether you have derived your types empirically (e.g., through factor analysis), or purely on conceptual grounds. If the latter, do you plan to validate your system empirically?<<

These types are based on 16 categories of personality disorder which either are official personality disorders listed in the Diagnostic Manual of Mental Disorders, or once were included or considered for inclusion, or they are currently being considered for inclusion - all but one.

14 of the personality disorders were featured in books by two leading personality disorder theorists: Theodore Millon and John Oldham. Oldham has popularized these concepts in The New Personality Self-Portrait where he derives 14 personality "styles" from the disorders. I use the names of Oldham's 14 personality styles in the representation of the typology that I linked to in my previous message and whenever it is inappropriate to use the personality disorder names, which are off-putting.

The American Psychiatric Assn. does what they can, I guess, to validate the personality disorder categories, but I, like others, do not consider them to be empirically verifiable scientific categories. The "factor analysis" psychological researchers believe that psychiatry's personality disorders should be defined by dimensional profile, like the Big Five, and not typologically as they are now. A proposal for use of the dimensional model is included in the current DSM, but I think that the psychiatrists are going to hold on to their types for quite a while. I like that prospect because I consider the personality disorders to be the state-of-the-art and the cutting-edge of personality typing.

I see the types as heuristic devices rather than empirically derived scientific categories.