Psychological type and the religious quest for wisdom and maturity

摘要

Self-knowledge is seen by many religious traditions as a key to growth in wisdom and maturity. It is also a key practical goal of all attempted taxonomies of the human personality. A distinctive feature of the MBTI® psychological type approach is its affirmation of the intrinsic value of both polarities of the key preferences, for example extraversion and introversion. The absence of value judgement in MBTI® psychological type is personally affirming, but could encourage complacency and narcissism. However, each type preference logically entails a weakness in using its polar opposite, and therefore preferences are also limitations, biases that cause and perpetuate blind spots and incapacities. Accepting this can lead individuals to recognise those situations in life where their type preferences are no guide or basis for behaviour and to work on their less preferred attitudes and functions. Thus self-knowledge can generate the self-control that biblical writers see as integral to wisdom and maturity.View full textDownload full textKeywordspsychological type, MBTI®, personality trait, wisdom, maturity, self-knowledge, self-controlRelated var addthis_config = { ui_cobrand: "Taylor & Francis Online", services_compact: "citeulike,netvibes,twitter,technorati,delicious,linkedin,facebook,stumbleupon,digg,google,more", pubid: "ra-4dff56cd6bb1830b" }; Add to shortlist Link Permalink http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13674676.2012.685607