ABSTRACT
Kirsch’s chapter is noteworthy for several reasons. First, he is attempting to clarify differences and similarities between the terminology of analytical psychology and psychoanalysis. He notes that what may be conventionally pathologized as ‘schizoid’ overlaps with what Jung termed introversion’ (see below). But he has also formulated ways in which the two states are different Second, what he has to say about the matching of types in analysis speaks to the issue posed by Edwards (and mentioned in my Introduction): the whole question of a fit between patient and analyst. Here, as elsewhere in the chapter, Kirsch is quite open about his changing views. Third, Kirsch shows how the personal· ity of the analyst influences his interpretive stance—and does so with a wealth of clinical detail
For some readers, typology may be an unfamiliar subject. It is a system developed by Jung to demonstrate and ascertain 128 different modes of psychological functioning in terms of ‘psychological types’. Some individuals are more excited or energized by the internal world and others by the external world: these are introverts and extraverts, respectively. But, in addition to these basic attitudes to the world, there are also certain properties or functions of mental life. Jung identified these as thinking—by which he meant knowing what a thing is, naming it and linking it to other things; feeling—which for Jung means something other than affect or emotion: a consideration of the value of something or having a viewpoint or perspective on something; sensation—which represents all facts available to the senses, telling us that something is, but not what it is; and, finally, intuition, which Jung uses to mean a sense of where something is going, of what the possibilities are. A person will have a primary or superior function: this will be the most developed and refined of the four. The other three functions fall into a typical pattern. One will be only slightly less developed than the superior function, and this is called the auxiliary function. One will be the least developed of all. Because this is the most unconscious, least accessible and most problematic function, it is referred to as the inferior function.
Using the two attitudes and the superior and auxiliary functions, it is possible to produce a list of 16 basic types. Several psychological tests exist, based on Jung’s hypotheses. These are used by some analytical psychologists clinically and also have educational and industrial application. There is a difference of emphasis in analytical psychology between those who welcome the scientific tenor of typology and those who use it as a rule-of-thumb approach, the value of which lies in providing an overall assessment of a person’s functioning.
Jung worked on his typology as a means of understanding the differences between himself and Freud (to put it concisely, he felt he was introverted and Freud extraverted). It seems to be the case that interpersonal dysfunction can be understood in terms of typological difference.
A.S.
