Personality Types: A Systems Science Explanation - Paperback

by Walter Lowen (Author), Lawrence Miike (Author)

Lowen partitions 'mental space' four times to yield 16 'cognitive skills, ' and 'consciousness' develops as the skills awaken and begin to interact. He provides unique definitions, symbols and functions for each skill, as well as the sequence and general time frame in which they develop. What brings his model to life are his ingenious ideas about how information flows among the skills at different levels of consciousness, leading to personality types, short- and long-term memories, inputs and behavioral outputs. In the 16 personality 'profiles' that emerge from the model, each uses all 16 skills but at different levels of consciousness. To stimulate one's creativity, Lowen suggests engaging one's least conscious 'processing mode'; i.e., kinesthetic (SF), tactile (ST), verbal (NF) or intellectual (NT). While Jung's famous 'psychological preferences' (extroversion, introversion, etc.) are embedded in the model and largely compatible with it, they are not primary to its basic structure

Author Biography

Walter Lowen was the founding dean of what is now the Thomas J. Watson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences at the State University of New York at Binghamton. He retired in 1990 and was Emeritus Professor of Systems Science until his death in May 2006. He earned his Dr. Sc. at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, held an M.S. in mechanical engineering from North Carolina State University, and attended the Oak Ridge School of Reactor Technology Dr. Lowen was assisted in this publication and its 1982 predecessor by Lawrence H. Miike, M.D., J.D., who is now retired and living in Hawaii after a career in public policy at both the federal and state levels.