Personality theory

Disclaimer

(Dammit, Jim,) I'm a physicist, not a psychologist. (That's why I put this on a "back" page.) And psychology is the least exact of all the sciences. (Experiments are hard to control, considering the subjects.) In particular, theory of personality is generally controversial. (It discusses religion; how can it not be?) However, some use is made of it (mostly vocational counseling). The following is based on earlier models & personal experience. Probably it isn't totally unreasonable.

The personalities

			type	motivation	instinct	philosopher	learning	economics	politics	history
metaphysical ⎧ ⎨ (ideas) ⎩	passive	6	scientist	knowledge	curiosity	Ayer	scientific method	ignore	technocracy	(future Earth)
metaphysical ⎧ ⎨ (ideas) ⎩	aggressive	5	artist	creativity	beauty	Thoreau	imagination	avoid	anarchism	(future Earth)
psychological ⎧ ⎨ (people) ⎩	passive	4	humanitarian	friendship	love	Lennon	consensus	share	socialism	"Post-Modern"
psychological ⎧ ⎨ (people) ⎩	aggressive	3	entrepreneur	influence	ambition	Rand	experience	invest	capitalism	Modern
physical ⎧ ⎨ (things) ⎩	passive	2	official	security	trust	Moses	training	save	feudalism	Medieval
physical ⎧ ⎨ (things) ⎩	aggressive	1	athlete	vigor	thrills	Nietzsche	instinct	spend	slavery	Classical

The ingredients to personality can be classified as levels of development of individuals or societies; either one is a mixture of the above. The basic idea is that personality traits are attempts to make primitive emotions reasonable (e.g., viable in the long term, or premeditated). Each is associated with its own period of history ("phylogeny recapitulates ontogeny") & definition of truth. Thus a person's philosophy (not only ethics, but also epistemology) is more a statement about his own personality than the external world.

In other words

ambiguous
warrior, survival [→ physical]	1,2
introvert (vs. extrovert) [→ metaphysical]	5,6
materialism (vs. charity), power [⊂ aggressive]	1,3
conformist (vs. individualist), saint [⊂ passive]	2,4
libertarian [⊂ aggressive]	3,5
ascetic, mystic	2,5
pragmatic	3,6
useful (for what?)	---
happy, pleased (about what?)	---
self-esteem/actualization, growth (for/of what?)	---

	connotative
	to self (+)	to others (-)
6	thoughtful, considerate, understanding objective	calculating unfeeling, unintuitive
5	independent avant-garde	unrealistic bohemian
4	cooperative caring, empathic	dependent, aimless soft
3	leader charismatic	domineering demagogic
2	loyal dutiful righteous strict	fearful slavish self-righteous pedantic, narrow-minded
1	strong victorious	brutish unfair

Relation to previous models

M	S	M	A	G	H
	6	6	⎫ ⎬ 6,5 ⎭	6	1
5	1	⎛5⎞ ⎜ ⎟ ⎝3⎠	⎫ ⎬ 6,5 ⎭	5	6
4	5	⎛5⎞ ⎜ ⎟ ⎝3⎠	⎫ ⎬ 3,4 ⎭	4	5
3	4	4	⎫ ⎬ 3,4 ⎭	3	4
2	3	2	⎫ ⎬ 2,1 ⎭	2	3
1	2	1	⎫ ⎬ 2,1 ⎭	1	2
0				0	↺

	Marx (1846)	Spranger (1914)	Maslow (1943)	Alderfer (1969)	Graves (1959)	Holland (1959)
6	---	theoretical	self-actualization	⎫ ⎬ growth ⎭	information	investigative
5	communism (future)	esthetic	self-esteem	⎫ ⎬ growth ⎭	self-esteem	artistic
4	socialism (soon)	social	love/belonging	⎫ ⎬ relatedness ⎭	belonging	social
3	capitalism (Modern)	political	esteem	⎫ ⎬ relatedness ⎭	mastery	enterprising
2	feudalism (Medieval)	religious	safety	⎫ ⎬ existence ⎭	order	conventional
1	slavery (Classical)	economic	physiological	⎫ ⎬ existence ⎭	survival	realistic

Ambiguous identifications are in italics. Right table shows how these models would order my level numbers.

Karl Marx had also a "primitive communism (prehistory)": I numbered it "0". ("Communism" really means "anarchism".)
Eduard Spranger's "dimensions of value" were applied by G.W. Allport, P.E. Vernon, & G. Lindzey (updated by R.E. Kopelman, J.L. Rovenpor, & M. Guan.)
Abraham Maslow's "hierarchy of needs" had 5 levels. (Also, his "self-actualization" included art, so my "5" includes some of that.)
Clayton Alderfer's "ERG theory" combined Maslow's split 6 levels into 3.
Clare W. Graves' "levels of existence" (also somewhat from Maslow) changed in number (& naming scheme). (He added a couple of speculative levels on top or prehistoric ones below, which seem redundant to the 2 levels closest to either.) The version I took (1966-9) had an extra level (my "0", an abnormal "autism"). His "aggressive/passive" was "adapts environment to self/self to environment". (He also proposed periods of history, but nothing like Marx'.) A version of Graves' classification has been applied by D. Beck & C. Cowan's "Spiral Dynamics".
John L. Holland arranged his "Holland codes (RIASEC)" in a circle. (I indicated the "RIASEC" ordering above.) However, a study by R.C. Reardon, S.H. Vernick, & C.A. Reed comparing job type to educational level has my ordering.