Interpersonal Diagnosis of Personality: A Functional Theory and Methodology for Personality

546 Pages·2004·23.05 MB·English

by  Timothy Leary

NTERPERSQ
FUNCTIONAL THEOR
...D METHODOLOGY FOR
PERSONflnTY EVALUATION
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Timothy Leary
Interpersonal Diagnosis
of
Personality
A Functional Theory and Methodology
for Personality Evaluation
TIMOTHY LEARY
DIRECTOR OF PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH
KAISER FOUNDATION HOSPITAL
OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA
Resource Publications
An imprint of Wipfand Stock Publishers
199 West 8th Avenue • Eugene OR 97401
Resource Publications
A division of Wipf and Stock Publishers
199W8th Ave, Suites
Eugene, OR 97401
Interpersonal Diagnosis of Personality
A Functional Theory and Methodology for Personality Evaluation
By Leary, Timothy
Copyright© 195 7 by Leary, Timothy
ISBN: 1-59244-776-7
Publication date 7/30/2004
Previously published by John Wiley & Sons, 1957
To
Marianne Leary
Preface
This book is concerned with interpersonal behavior, primarily as ex-
pressed and observed in the psychotherapeutic setting. Its value lies
in its emphasis on the complexity and variety of human nature and
on the objectivity and clarity of the empirical procedures it sets forth
for multilevel diagnosis. The research on which it reports was made
possible by grants from the United States Public Health Service and
the Kaiser Foundation.
The interpersonal factors of personality are those conscious or
unconscious processes which people use to deal with others and to
assess others and themselves in relation to others. The aim of the inter-
personal machinery of personality is to ward off anxiety and preserve
self-esteem. One of the major results of these operations is to create
the social environment in which each person lives.
Everyone tends to make his own interpersonal world. Neurosis
or maladjustment involves the limiting of one's interpersonal appara-
tus and the compulsive use of certain inflexible, inappropriate inter-
personal operations which bring about results that are painful, unsatis-
factory, or different from one's conscious goals. Adjustment is char-
acterized by an understanding of one's personahty structure, by the
development of mechanisms flexible enough to deal with a variety of
environmental pressures, and by the management of one's behavioral
equipment in such a way as to avoid situations where the mechanisms
will be ineffective or damaged.
Any statement about human nature, however, is restricted in
meaning unless the level of behavior to which it refers is made clear.
The first step must be a definition of levels and an ordering of data in
terms of levels. The aim of the research work described in this book
has been to develop a multilevel model of personality and to present a
series of complex techniques for measuring interpersonal expressions
at these different levels of personality. A conceptual and empirical
method for converting observations of interpersonal behavior is set
forth. The reader will encounter new theories about the effect of
interpersonal behavior, the meaning of fantasy expressions, the social
language of symptoms, and the nature and functional meaning of con-
flict. These theories and systematic procedures constitute the Inter-
vi PREFACE
personal System of Peisonality, developed by the Kaiser Foundation
Psychology Research Project.
The approach employed might be called a dynarmc behaviorism.
There are two dynamic attributes. The first refers to the impact one
person has or makes in interaction with others; the second refers to
the interaction of psychological pressures among the different levels
of personality. The behavioristic attributes of the system derive from
the procedure of viewing every response of the subject (overt, verbal,
symbolic) as a unit of behavior which is classified by objective
methods and automatically sorted into the appropriate level of per-
sonality. The patterns and clusters of thousands of these responses,
sorted into different levels, are then converted by mathematical tech-
niques into indices and into a multilevel diagnostic code summary.
These are then related to clinical events or prognoses. In the develop-
ment of the interpersonal system more than 5,000 cases (psychiatric,
medical, and normal controls) have been studied and diagnosed.
In addition to describing and validating the process of interper-
sonal diagnosis in the psychiatric clinic, this volume demonstrates how
these theories and methods may be applied in four other practical set-
tings—in the psychiatric hospital, in psychosomatic medicine, in
industrial management, and in group therapy.
This book should be interpreted in the light of its environmental
and professional contexts. It is the product of clinical psychologists
working in a psychiatric setting, and practical answers have been
required of the interpersonal system at each stage of its development.
This gives the book its functional cast. As to its implications for the
profession of psychology, in my own mind at least, a new concept of
the "clinical psychologist-as-diagnostician" has emerged. In the
Introduction, I have detailed the genesis of the research which has
resulted in the book, and have set forth the contributions of the many
people who have helped to bring it to fruition.
Timothy Leary
Berkeley, California
October, 1956