Editorial

JUNG's TYPOLOGY continues to provide a fruitful topic for research. It was last commented upon in the Editorial of our July 1976 issue. We draw attention to it again because of two widely different papers in this issue.

The first, by Bradway and Wheelwright, contributes some answers to questions of which analysts, and indeed most professional and reflecting people, never tire: who are we, and what are we doing? The incidence of types among analysts and their spouses, compared with other populations, in the statistical sense, provides, in part at least, an answer to the first question; the influence of what we are like and what kind of patients we choose (or do better with) gives a clue to the second. It leads further to enquiries as to the kinds of ideological interpretations we emphasise, varying possibly with our geographical distribution, and thereby to the details of our practice, e.g. frequency of sessions.

The other study, by Meier and Wozny, has by contrast a succinct focus. It constitutes a critique of the probably most frequently used test, the Gray-Wheelwright scales and the resulting profile. Working in Zürich, the authors used a computerised method which they claim to be more nearly objective psychometrically, to arrive at clusters of personality patterns. These are equivalent, to a degree, to Jung's psychological types without, however, presupposing their existence. The outcome, if confirmed by others and on a larger scale, seems to be that out of the sixteen theoretically possible types only eight can truly be discriminated. Whatever the results of their argument and method, few would disagree that ‘the emotive character of language’ easily finds its way into the construction of all tests.

It is felt that the difference between approaches reflected by the two papers is fundamental to all research in this area. Further publication of papers dealing with the pragmatic value of the typology is highly probable. Readers as well as authors may, therefore, wish