V. L. Talanov

A Brief Exposition of Model «T»: A Physiological Model of Information Metabolism in the Human Psyche

As a development of A. Augustinavičiūtė’s traditional socionic model (Model «A»), the psychophysiological Model «T» is proposed. It uses not 8 but only 4 of C. Jung’s psychic functions, each of which, however, is characterized not by a socionic «color» but by two parameters at once: excitation and inhibition thresholds. The program and mobilizing functions are unbalanced and have different threshold levels in the excitation and inhibition channels, while the creative and contact functions are balanced and have identical thresholds in the excitatory and inhibitory channels. The model offers solutions to several problems of differential psychology, psychophysiology, and socionics; within the latter it describes and explains intertype relations, interactions among functions within a TIM, and the content of a number of Reinin dichotomies. The model is continuous with and develops socionic Model «A»; it is supported by the substantive content of the Reinin dichotomies, is simple to understand and apply, connects facts from socionics, differential psychology, psychophysiology, and the physiology of higher nervous activity into a clearer and more coherent picture, explains many psychological and socionic regularities, including those difficult to derive from Model «A», and also predicts new regularities. In addition, the model resolves old problems in the physiology of higher nervous activity that arose in the research tradition of the Pavlov-Teplov-Nebylitsyn school. In the full version of the model, in addition to the partial thresholds of functions, general strength-weakness properties of the individual with respect to excitation and inhibition, identical for all functions, are specified. The general excitation threshold determines which of the four functions will be the program function. The general inhibition threshold determines TIM accentuation. Extraversion and extratimity are separated by the model and prove to be orthogonal properties: the former, for the individual as a whole or for individual functions, corresponds to high excitation thresholds; the latter, to low inhibition thresholds. Vertness and the excitation-threshold level of the first two functions coincide with the individual’s vertness, while those of the last two are opposite to it; extra- or introtimity corresponds to the generally accepted socionic «color» of functions, with black functions being extratimal, i.e., having low inhibition thresholds.

Keywords: socionics, psychophysiology, psychophysics, physiology of higher nervous activity, psychological types, properties of the nervous system, personality model, extraversion.

Contents:

Why Model «T» Was Created

Structure of Model «T»

Interaction of Functions Within a TIM

The «Democrats-Aristocrats» Dichotomy

Explanation of the Content of the Reinin Dichotomies on the Basis of Model «T»

How Model «T» Predicts and Explains Intertype Relations

How Model «T» Makes It Possible to Take a New View of Long-Standing Problems of Differential Psychophysiology

The Full Model «T», or What Follows from Additionally Specifying the General Properties of the Nervous System

Comparison of Model «T» and Model «A»

Literature

Why Model «T» Was Created

Model «T» was first publicly presented in a scientific report by V. L. Talanov on September 18, 20, and 22, 2006, in Kyiv at the XXII International Conference on Socionics. In the conference program the report was entitled «Substantive Content and Physiological Interpretation of the Socionic Dichotomies “Constructivists-Emotivists,” “Tacticians-Strategists,” “Yielding-Obstinate,” and “Careless-Farsighted”», although its content extended beyond the title. In October 2006, a series of articles by the author containing a detailed exposition, analysis, and experimental substantiation of the proposed new socionic model was submitted to the journal «Socionics, Mentology and Personality Psychology».

In 2000, the author became acquainted with socionics and was captivated by it as a psychological typology that most adequately reflected, and explained, the division of people into psychological types. The theory of intertype relations, which arose uniquely within the socionics of Aušra Augustinavičiūtė and satisfactorily explained the relations that develop between people of different psychological types, was particularly compelling. The sense of fascination did not disappear over time, but there also came an understanding that socionic Model «A», proposed in its time by Aušra Augustinavičiūtė and giving rise to socionics as a branch of psychological science, is not without shortcomings. Let us recall some of them:

• Model «A» handles the description and explanation of intertype relations introduced into science by Aušra poorly. Many features of intertype relations recorded in the long-term collective empirical experience of socionists and practicing psychologists are not only not predicted by it unambiguously and clearly, but are also explained retrospectively only «with difficulty» and with obvious forcing.

• The same deficiency in «explanatory power» also applies to the Reinin dichotomies. The existence of 15 psychological dichotomies was predicted by Aušra and Reinin, generally speaking, independently of Model «A», with 11 of them first predicted by them in addition to C. Jung’s four «basic» dichotomies. Yet Model «A» handles prediction and explanation of their substantive content poorly, although the existence of indisputable substantive content for some of the additional 11 dichotomies has already been quite well confirmed experimentally and today raises little doubt among researchers.

• Model «A» is not parametric. It is purely qualitative. In particular, for this reason, the diversity of psychological accentuations actually observed within one type of information metabolism, hereafter TIM, cannot in principle receive explanation or interpretation from the standpoint of Model «A». Still less can it predict accentuations, their type, and their character. Likewise, because it is not mathematically parametric and therefore handles the description of interactions among more than two objects poorly, Model «A» is of little use for predicting the influence on an individual’s relations and information metabolism exerted by a small group consisting of representatives of more than one TIM. It is also poorly suited to research on the so-called «integral type» of collectives, again because of its nonparametric nature.

• Model «A» is not continuous with the long-term, past and present, research of neurophysiology and psychophysiology of the brain and does not correspond in any way to physiological interpretations of nervous-system types and temperament types developed experimentally by numerous scientific schools, including those of I. P. Pavlov, B. M. Teplov, V. D. Nebylitsyn, P. V. Simonov, V. M. Rusalov, H. Eysenck, and others.

• Model «A» was created by Aušra Augustinavičiūtė as a more or less satisfactory theoretical response to empirical observations of intertype relations. In this respect Model «A» represented an enormous step forward compared with the work of C. Jung and his American followers. Although not essentially parametric, the model nevertheless qualitatively incorporated one parameter in the form of the differing «color» of functions. As we shall see below, Jung’s functions have not one but, quite probably, two independent parameters. The absence of the second parameter in the model was compensated for by artificially introducing a second ring of functions. Owing to the additional ring, intertype relations nevertheless became partly predictable, although sometimes by means of rather contrived and artificial explanations. The sacrifice made for this was the unity of each «Jungian» function in the individual. During the thirty years of socionics’ existence, practicing socionists appear to have become accustomed to this circumstance, but for many theoreticians and especially specialists in adjacent fields, the «splitting» of functions still seems to be a purely artificial device that takes Model «A» far away from describing reality. Much in science has long indicated that this criticism is justified.

For these reasons, the author sought to go beyond Model «A» and find a theoretical explanation of the empirical laws of socionics that would be free of the shortcomings listed above.

Model «T» is a sufficiently simple and visually clear version of such a new explanation. Among other things, it indeed proves to be more transparent than Model «A» and, apparently, possesses greater predictive capacity: most socionic regularities are explained by it logically, easily, and quite unambiguously, practically «on one’s fingers», without additional assumptions or forcing. If experimental facts contradicting it are not found, and the author has not yet found any, then application of the psychophysiological model could substantially facilitate the practical use of socionics by validating it as a discipline grounded in a natural-scientific foundation. It should also be noted that Model «T» predicts a number of regularities and facts that were previously either entirely unknown or known empirically but lacked theoretical substantiation.

For example, whereas Model «A» specified the order of functions in the ring as a certain «given», the new model motivates and explains this order from the standpoint of physiological laws. Importantly, the model offers its own way of decoding the duality that socionists have long noted in the concept of socionic extraversion and the so-called «vert coloring» of socionic functions, because of which the concept of «extratimity» was introduced in opposition to extraversion. The new model separates these concepts, providing its own interpretation of the content of each. The model may be useful not only to socionists and psychologists but also to psychophysiologists. Some problems posed in psychophysiology and in the physiology of higher nervous activity but never resolved in the twentieth century become more «transparent» under the model. For example, it predicts the circumstances under which the correlation of psychophysical thresholds with extraversion may turn out positive in an experiment and those under which it may turn out negative. What remains is to test these predictions.

So what does Model «T» consist of? We shall first present its simplified form, which nevertheless successfully explains known socionic facts and laws while simultaneously allowing new conclusions to be drawn.

Structure of Model «T»

In the work of V. D. Nebylitsyn’s psychophysiological school, the concept of partial thresholds of analyzers was developed. There is a lower threshold, the signal-detection threshold, and an upper threshold, beyond which both the probability and the intensity of the response decrease. Between them lies a zone of optimal responding. For «weak-signal» specialists it lies in the region of low-intensity signals; for «strong-signal» specialists, in the region of high-intensity signals. Thus, the excitatory input of each analyzer has a filter tuned to a certain range of signal intensities. The same applies to the inhibitory input: its input filter likewise has its own passband, with a setting that is independent of the excitatory input.

If we replace the concept of an analyzer with the concept of a Jungian psychic function, logic, ethics, intuition, or sensing, we obtain the result that each of the four functional spheres is characterized by a combination of two input filters, namely one on the excitatory channel and one on the inhibitory channel. The «partiality», or literally «partness», of the filters means that their specific passband is characteristic only of the given functional sphere; in the other three psychic functions, filter characteristics, whether high or low passbands, may well be different.

The range of outgoing signals of each function corresponds to the setting of its excitatory input filter, because it is assumed a priori that the function, first, responds with signals of approximately the same intensity as those it perceives at its input and, second, that the signals generated by the function must, for feedback purposes, also be heard by that same function, and therefore their magnitude must likewise correspond to the settings of the input filter.

It is assumed that a function is plastic, flexible, well regulated, and controllable if the passbands of its excitatory and inhibitory filters are identical. This corresponds to the concept of «balance» of the nervous system. In this case, the function’s own outgoing signals can be both excitatory and inhibitory for it, and thus can carry out its self-regulation. If the excitatory and inhibitory threshold filters are mismatched in level, then in the worst case the function becomes inert, rigid, inflexible, and disobedient, sometimes to the point of obsessiveness; in the best case, its operation becomes detached from conscious control and turns into something like a constant automated background of the psyche. Why does this happen? Because when the threshold filters are mismatched, the signal outgoing from the function corresponds in intensity to the excitatory input but does not pass through the inhibitory-input filter, and therefore cannot cause effective inhibition of the function.

In the first case, when the excitatory and inhibitory thresholds are equal, we speak of a balanced function. In the second case, of an unbalanced function.

In the more general case, the concept of threshold level can be replaced by the passband of certain arbitrary filters, and generally speaking these filters need not even be associated with psychophysical characteristics, that is, with the level of sensitivity thresholds of certain analyzers. For example, instead of two threshold filters that select weakly overlapping bands of high- and low-intensity signals, one can consider filters tuned to the specificity of signal processing by the right or left hemisphere, the old or new cortex, the ergotropic or trophotropic regulatory system of the brain, and so forth. But all these are hypothetical possibilities for developing and correcting the model; for now we shall adhere to the simplest psychophysical interpretation of its filters, as a system of thresholds that selectively pass only either high- or low-intensity signals.

Let us now draw the simplified Model «T» for the ILE type, formula 1:

(1) ^hI_l ^hL_h ^lS_l ^lE_h

Here I is intuition, L is logic, S is sensing, and E is ethics. The indices attached to the functions indicate the settings of the partial filters. The upper-left indices are for the function’s excitation channel. The lower-right indices are for its inhibition channel. The index «h» denotes selective tuning predominantly to high-intensity signals, while the index «l» denotes tuning to low-intensity signals.

The order of functions corresponds to the first ring of Aušra Augustinavičiūtė’s Model «A». For what follows, we shall retain the names of function positions traditionally accepted for the first ring of Model «A». We shall call the first function the program function, the second the creative function, the third the contact function, and the fourth the mobilizing function. And what of the fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth functions located in the second ring of Model «A»? We shall never need them again. Do we also lose information about the TIM by losing them? No, we do not; all information is now concentrated in the thresholds of the functions of the first ring. Does this mean that the second ring was not needed? Exactly so, it was not needed. There are four Jungian functions, and the individual likewise has exactly four. C. Jung’s functions regain their unity. But each function can take four different states, based on the combination of the values of its thresholds. In a particular TIM, and therefore in a particular individual, only one of these possible states is actualized.

Since a function can be in four different states rather than two, as Model «A» held, encoding its two different values with different colors, two colors will no longer be sufficient to encode the state of a function. We shall therefore abandon color altogether and encode function states only by indices indicating the settings of its threshold filters. We shall merely remember that the former black color of functions will always, in all cases, correspond to the inhibitory, i.e., lower-right, index «l», while the white color will correspond to the inhibitory index «h». The former black functions of Model «A» are those that have low inhibition thresholds; they are effectively inhibited by any incoming low-intensity signals. We shall henceforth call such functions extratimal. White functions are selectively inhibited predominantly by high-intensity signals; they are «knocked off course», switched, and controlled by the action of such signals. We shall call them introtimal.

Excitation thresholds, however, are in no way connected with the color of functions. Yet they are necessarily identical for the first two functions of the TIM model. For all extraverted TIMs, the excitation thresholds of the first two functions are «h», which means a preference in the excitation channel for high-intensity signals. By contrast, in introverts the excitatory channel of both the program and creative functions is tuned to low-intensity incoming signals.

We shall call functions whose excitatory channel is tuned to high intensity extraverted functions, and those whose excitatory channel is tuned to low intensity introverted functions.

As we can see, the concepts of extraversion-introversion and extratimity-introtimity have diverged and become independent. The former is connected with thresholds of the excitatory channel, the latter with thresholds of the inhibitory channel. The color of functions turns out to be connected only with the inhibitory channel. At the same time, both functions closer to the beginning of the chain, the program and creative functions, turn out to be completely identical in terms of their excitatory-channel settings. Both will simultaneously be, and henceforth be called, either extraverted or introverted, depending on the level of their excitation threshold.

Let us now consider the balance-unbalance of functions. The first and fourth functions for any TIM will always be unbalanced, that is, they will have different indices for their excitatory and inhibitory thresholds. The creative and contact functions, by contrast, are characterized by equality of the excitatory and inhibitory thresholds, that is, identical settings of the corresponding threshold filters, and are balanced. The excitation threshold of the first two functions is identical and equals «h», high-intensity signals, for extraverted TIMs, while for introverted TIMs it always equals «l». For the remaining two functions, the third and fourth, the values of the excitation thresholds will necessarily be the opposite of those of the first two, that is, «l» for extraverts and «h» for introverts. As for the inhibition thresholds, the right-hand indices attached to the functions, they necessarily alternate in passing from one function to the next, which ensures the balance of the two middle functions of the model and the unbalance of the first and last.

Let us apply these simple rules for constructing Model «T», for example, to the LII. The order of its functions is L I E S, logic, intuition, ethics, sensing. The LII is an introvert, so the excitatory, left-hand, indices must have the value «l». For the first function the inhibitory threshold must necessarily differ from the excitatory threshold, and therefore must equal «h», while thereafter the inhibitory thresholds must alternate their values. Finally, for the LII we obtain:

(2) ^lL_h ^lI_l ^hE_h ^hS_l

We have formulated the two necessary and sufficient rules for constructing the model:

• For extraverts, the first two functions have high excitation thresholds and the last two low ones; for introverts, the reverse.

• The levels of the inhibition thresholds of the functions alternate, while the inhibitory threshold of the first function is opposite in level to its excitatory threshold. As a result of this rule, the first and last functions prove to be unbalanced in the levels of their excitatory and inhibitory thresholds, or threshold filters, while the two middle functions prove to be balanced.

But where do these rules themselves come from? They are neither a guess nor the result of revelation. They follow directly and logically, without ambiguity, from experimental data on the substantive content of the socionic dichotomies Constructivists-Emotivists, Tacticians-Strategists, Yielding-Obstinate, and Careless-Farsighted. Without dwelling on this here in particular detail, the details are contained in our other works, we note that our studies established unbalance of ethics, and therefore inequality of its excitatory and inhibitory thresholds, and balance of logic, and therefore equality of the thresholds, at the Constructivist pole; for the Emotivist pole, the reverse. Similarly, Tacticians proved unbalanced in intuition and balanced in sensing, while Strategists showed the reverse. Careless types proved to be «low-signal specialists», with low excitation thresholds, in sensing and «high-signal specialists» in intuition, while Farsighted types showed the reverse. «Yielding» types proved «high-signal» in logic and low-signal in ethics, while «Obstinate» types showed the reverse. If all these experimental facts are placed together in one table, all the above rules for alternation of function threshold levels follow from it with unambiguous necessity.

How do the excitatory and inhibitory thresholds drawn for each function of a TIM help us? How do they explain the interaction of functions within a TIM, how do they help explain the content of socionic dichotomies, the «Reinin dichotomies», and how do they explain intertype relations? Let us examine these questions in order.

Interaction of Functions Within a TIM

Both formula (1) and formula (2) make it equally clear that the first and second functions mutually stimulate one another through their excitatory channels: the settings of their excitatory channels are identical, while the outgoing signals generated by each function are predominantly of the same intensity as the setting of the excitatory channel. Therefore, the program and creative functions prove to be interconnected through the excitation channel and enter into mutual positive resonance through this channel. As for the inhibitory channel, its setting differs between the first and second functions. The program function can inhibit the second, creative function with its outgoing signal, which, let us recall, is equal in intensity to the setting of the input filter, whereas the creative function cannot inhibit the program function with its outgoing signal. What does this lead to? First, the program function operates and is occupied for a greater proportion of the individual’s time than the creative function. Second, the program function becomes the commissioning and controlling element in relation to the creative function, while the latter is merely an obedient and subordinate, easily controlled element.

Relations within the pair comprising the third, contact, and fourth, mobilizing, functions are analogous. The mobilizing function is unbalanced and capable of controlling the contact function, whereas the latter cannot exercise reciprocal control over it. At the same time, both the contact and mobilizing functions are capable, through their outgoing signals, of inhibiting the program function. Therefore, when the pair of mobilizing and contact functions begins to «speak», the program function falls silent for a time. The creative function, however, is not inhibited and can continue its work. Similarly, during operation of the pair of program and creative functions, the fourth and last in the numbering, the mobilizing function, is inhibited. The filter at its inhibitory input corresponds to the setting of the filters at the excitatory inputs of the program and creative functions and therefore passes the outgoing signals they generate, which in response causes inhibition of the mobilizing function.

Which pair operates more often? The first, that is, the pair of program and creative functions. In the case of the ILE, its high-signal input thresholds correspond to the individual’s high-signal general input filter, which is obligatory for extraverts. General rather than partial input filters will be considered in greater detail in the section on the full Model «T». The low-signal passband of the input filters of the functions of the second pair, the mobilizing and contact functions, conflicts with the high-signal setting of the general input filter in the excitation channel of the extraverted individual. This reduces the probability of a response by the corresponding functions, so in response to external signals they are, on average over time, activated less often and operate less.

Once again: how are roles distributed within each pair of functions? In the first pair, the program function is much more unbalanced in terms of its excitatory and inhibitory thresholds, and in the ILE this is intuition. Its unbalance is manifested in the fact that with its own signals, predominantly high-intensity ones, it cannot effectively inhibit itself, because its inhibitory input requires low-intensity signals. Therefore, for any program function, switching to another topic, displacing what is no longer relevant, and so forth is problematic. In general, it has difficulty stopping its work. Its role is therefore to remain constantly concerned, stubbornly insist on its own position, return without reason to what has already been covered, and control the creative function in a very demanding and capricious manner, essentially making it «run back and forth» depending on the whims of the program function. Why is the creative function so obedient and flexible? Because both of its inputs, excitatory and inhibitory, have the same filter setting. In the case of Don Quixote, the setting is for high-intensity signals. Therefore, first, the creative function is well and easily controllable «within itself»: with its own signals it is capable of inhibiting itself, easily changing its direction and the topic of its work. Second, both of its inputs, excitatory and inhibitory, are easily accessible to the high-intensity signals from the output of the ILE’s program function. For this reason, the program function, itself inert and rigid because of its unbalance, gains access to operational control over the creative function, including its excitation, inhibition, direction, redirection, and so forth. The creative function, by contrast, can act with its signals only on the excitatory input of the program function, thereby constantly providing additional stimulation and thus supporting its dominant role.

Generally speaking, exactly the same picture arises in the pair of mobilizing and contact functions, where the unbalanced mobilizing function likewise plays the role of the one that «sets the tone». However, operation of this second functional pair begins much less often in response to external stimulation because it does not correspond to the individual’s general excitation input threshold. In addition, its activation requires special adaptive tension and therefore rapidly causes fatigue.

Let us also consider possible cases of competitive interaction between functions of the same nality, that is, either within the pair of intuition and sensing or within the pair of logic and ethics. Suppose that, against the background of the LII’s active creative intuition, the activity of mobilizing sensing suddenly «flares up», for example in response to an external signal. In the competition between the two signals, from the creative and mobilizing functions, the signal of the creative function invariably wins because it freely passes through the filter of the mobilizing function’s inhibitory channel. Suppression does not occur in the reverse direction, and therefore the accidental «flare» of the mobilizing function is quickly inhibited by the intensively operating creative function and dies away. Matters are different in competition between signals from the program and contact functions. Here, despite the dominant position of the program function, the signal of the sporadically «flaring» contact function will prevail, because it is capable of inhibiting and temporarily switching off the program function. See their thresholds. The general rule is therefore as follows: in competition between two functions of the same house of nality, the signal of the more balanced function, that is, the contact or creative function, prevails. Apparently, this is a very important circumstance. Owing to it, activation can shift from time to time from the first pair of functions, first to the third, contact function, and then through it to the mobilizing function. Thus, in the case of the LII, the paired operation of logic and intuition usually dominates, with intuition providing solutions to tasks formulated by logic. However, ethical considerations and events may activate the pair of ethics and sensing, which can give rise in the LII to rather prolonged episodes of concentration on sensory resistance and counteraction, initially motivated ethically.

Operation of the contact-mobilizing pair, once begun, cannot continue for long, however. First, their activity is rapidly exhausting. Second, any subsequent «flare» of the creative function in turn inhibits the mobilizing function, then reactivates the program function and returns information metabolism «to its usual course», that is, to the dominant and interconnected paired activity of the program and creative functions.

Thus, according to Model «T», the set of four functions is divided mainly into two pairs. When the pair of program and creative functions operates, the mobilizing function is inhibited, while the contact function is able to function but mainly perceives external, third-party information. When the interconnected pair of mobilizing and contact functions operates, the program function is inhibited, while the creative function retains the ability to process «third-party» signals, for example, in the case of the LII, to perceive products of other people’s imagination. The contact function is the link through which excitation of the program function can be inhibited and temporarily replaced by excitation of the mobilizing function. Through the creative function, this excitation can subsequently return to the program function, restoring its dominant role.

Does the analysis just carried out on the basis of Model «T» provide new information about the interaction of psychic functions? Some of the conclusions drawn above are already known in socionics as well-tested empirical facts; some are undoubtedly new and may seem unexpected and in need of reflection and additional empirical testing. What is essential, however, is that all the described regularities of functional interaction are derived purely theoretically from the physiological Model «T», thereby demonstrating its scientific predictive capacity, whereas neither the regularities described here nor any others are derived from Model «A», which possesses merely demonstrative properties. Thus, even the generally accepted «pairing» of the program and creative functions is not demonstrated by Model «A» but postulated, and the placement of these functions in the same horizontal block in Model «A», together with the attribution of some special meaning to horizontal and vertical blocks, merely illustrates this postulate crudely, without detail and without predictive consequences, and nothing more.

The «Democrats-Aristocrats» Dichotomy

An important conclusion to be drawn from the foregoing analysis is that in every person the functions are represented not separately but as tightly coupled pairs of functions, with each pair corresponding to one of the opposing socionic clubs. Thus, both the ILE and the LII have a dominant pair of functions from the Researchers club and, as a subdominant pair, functions from the Socials club. By contrast, function pairs from the Practitioners and Humanitarians clubs are difficult for these TIMs to access and can be realized only through substantial energy-consuming adaptive tension directed toward an artificial and temporary restructuring of threshold levels.

This paired representation of functions brings together all TIMs of one quadra and also brings together the first and third quadras and the second and fourth, forming the basis for the «Democrats-Aristocrats» dichotomy. Democrats are those TIMs in which functions, by degree of resonant connectedness, split into logic-intuition and ethics-sensing pairs. Aristocrats are those TIMs in which the functions are grouped differently in operation, forming ethics-intuition and logic-sensing pairs. What, incidentally, might cause the difference in the substantive properties of the poles of this dichotomy? It is known that TIMs at the Democrat pole are more individualistic, while «Aristocrats» are more committed to group values, and this is also confirmed by the author’s own data. One possible explanation lies in assigning the four Jungian functions to different signal systems, the first and second. Sensing and ethics are functions of the first signal system, more closely connected with the right cerebral hemisphere. Logic and intuition are evolutionarily younger functions of the second signal system and are more closely tied to the left hemisphere. In «Democrats», over fairly long periods of time the focus of activation is confined to only one hemisphere, either paired operation of logic with intuition in the left hemisphere or paired operation of ethics with sensing predominantly in the right hemisphere. At the same time, the focus of activity can shift «in a jump» from one hemisphere to the other when paired operation of the program and creative functions is temporarily replaced by paired operation of the mobilizing and contact functions. Among Aristocrats, everything is different: their «diagonal» mode of operation is stable, making use of interhemispheric collaterals, for example, paired operation of logic in the left hemisphere and sensing predominantly in the right hemisphere, or ethics predominantly in the right hemisphere and intuition predominantly in the left. As a «bold» hypothesis, one may suppose that the pattern of nervous excitation characteristic of «Democrats» is, as it were, more self-sufficient for solving a broad range of tasks of any kind. Because of the characteristics of their neural activation pattern, Aristocrats have a greater need for helpers, servants, a group, and a division of labor, functions, and duties within it, since in «Aristocrats» those periods when all the functions of one signal system work comprehensively and jointly are extremely difficult to achieve.

It must be admitted, however, that such a motivation of the content of the «Democrats-Aristocrats» dichotomy is only an unstudied hypothesis. By contrast, in everything concerning explanation of the content of the dichotomies «Careless-Farsighted», «Yielding-Obstinate», «Constructivists-Emotivists», «Tacticians-Strategists», «Statics-Dynamics», as well as the dichotomies of the Jungian basis, Model «T» yields completely unambiguous conclusions in terms of predicting and explaining the content of the poles of these dichotomies.

Explanation of the Content of the Reinin Dichotomies on the Basis of Model «T»

Let us consider Table 1.

Table 1. Formulas of Model «T» for all TIMs of the socion

The table shows that all TIMs at the «Careless» pole, marked with plus signs, are united by one common property: their sensing has low partial excitation thresholds, whereas their intuition has high partial excitation thresholds. By contrast, in all «Farsighted» types, sensing is tuned to high-intensity signals and intuition to low-intensity signals. How should this manifest itself in practice? The weak-signal intuition of «Farsighted» types prompts them to react to the weakest internal intuitive impulses, hence the somewhat painful fantasizing of TIMs in this group, especially intuitive ones, with a tinge of easily flaring anxiety. Among «Careless» types, imagination must overcome high starting thresholds; their fantasy requires strong, intensely excitatory signals. Hence their common love, across different TIMs of the pole, for ventures, exciting adventures, and high-risk situations that stimulate the imagination. In the sphere of sensing everything is reversed: «Careless» types prove to be specialists in weak signals, while «Farsighted» types are specialists in strong, high-intensity ones. Hence among «Careless» types there is observantness, increased sensitivity to unpleasant painful sensations and generally to weak internal bodily signals, the «princess and the pea» complex, high discriminative sensitivity of speech hearing, sensitive olfaction, and a preference for professions in which sensitivity to small sensory shifts and nuances is important but abrupt sensory changes in the environment occur rarely, and so forth. Among «Farsighted» types, everything is reversed with respect to sensing: control over small sensory shifts is difficult, and therefore control over handwriting is also difficult; resistance to pain is high; tolerance for sensorily monotonous work and a sensorily monotonous information environment is low; there is a preference for bright colors and abrupt, sudden sensory shifts in perception, and so forth. What has been said about the content of the poles of the dichotomy is confirmed by experimental results. The appropriateness of the names Aušra gave to the poles of the dichotomy also becomes understandable, but with one qualification: «Careless» types are careless only in the intuitive sphere, in the sphere of what may happen but has not yet happened, while in the sensory sphere they are, on the contrary, petty, capricious, and fastidious.

With «Yielding-Obstinate», everything is analogous, but within the oppositional sensitivity of the other two functions, logic and ethics. Yielding types have sensitive, weak-signal ethics. There are many examples of this; here we shall only indicate that «Yielding» types tolerate short psychological and physical interpersonal distance, with its high-intensity ethical signals, very poorly: they dislike crowds, dislike someone looking over their shoulder into a book, cannot tolerate being grabbed by the button during a conversation, and so forth. Their logic, by contrast, is strong-signal; it prefers the whole rather than the part. For example, it prefers organizing document flow at a large enterprise to delving into small logical links and details. Obstinate types, by contrast, have weak-signal logic oriented toward details, particulars, and precise logical connections in small matters, while the whole and the large-scale are avoided or ignored in consideration. At the same time, in ethical-emotional terms they are strong-signal: they like loud laughter in company, become more animated the more intense the emotional stimulation, and are easily aroused by emotion-provoking events. Thus, the LII and LSI become tribunes and orators in an atmosphere of emotional arousal, and so forth.

«Constructivists» have logic balanced in its excitation and inhibition thresholds and unbalanced ethics; for Emotivists the reverse is true. The balance and controllability of the logic-motor sphere among Constructivists is expressed in their relatively better adaptation to professions such as dancer or professional athlete. Their handwriting is more graphologically consistent, again because of motor balance, since motor activity and logic are closely related spheres. On the other hand, they are poorly adapted to situations requiring emotional restraint and flexible ethical manipulation. Professions such as diplomat, journalist, and public politician are preferred much more often by Emotivists. In the ethical sphere, Constructivists are more characteristically irritable, hot-tempered, and conflict-prone, whereas in the logical sphere they display good controllability, inhibition, and manageability. Emotivists display the same good controllability, inhibition, and manageability precisely in the ethical-emotional sphere. In the logical sphere they are much less restrained and correctable; in particular, they are characterized by striving to achieve a goal by any means and by the slogan «the end justifies the means».

«Tacticians» have balanced sensing and poorly controlled and weakly manageable intuition; the intuition of Strategists is well manageable, but the sensory sphere, including the sphere of biological needs associated with it, is not. The unbalance of Strategists’ sensing sometimes manifests itself in their lack of restraint regarding biological needs: eating, drinking, sex, smoking, and so forth. In these matters they find it difficult to control themselves. On the other hand, they have well-developed voluntary control of imagination. In particular, Strategists more easily evoke arbitrary visual, auditory, or olfactory «mental images» in the imagination on demand. Tacticians, by contrast, are characterized by irrepressibility and poor controllability in the sphere of fantasies, difficulty in actualizing «specified» images through imagination, less criticality in their fantasies, and a tendency to speak of their assumptions as accomplished facts, and so forth. They also display a cluster of «automatic» operation of imagination in the background mode, without conscious control and management. On the other hand, in the sensory sphere they find it difficult to be «irrepressible» and inflexibly goal-directed, stubborn, and rigid, because their sensing is too flexible for this. Probably for this reason Aušra rather aptly called them Tacticians rather than Strategists.

Only a brief overview of the properties of the poles of the dichotomies under discussion has been given here, but in our studies they also received more detailed experimental confirmation, which reveals their meaning largely as predicted by the physiological model.

More interesting and less trivial from the physiological standpoint is the interpretation of the «Statics-Dynamics» dichotomy. In all Statics, the rational, judging functions are strong-signal with respect to inhibition, whereas the irrational, perceiving functions are weak-signal with respect to inhibition. In Dynamics, by contrast, inhibition of the perceiving functions arises only with strong signals, while weak signals effectively inhibit the judging functions.

What should these psychophysiological characteristics lead to?

Let us consider the operation of the perceiving functions in Dynamics. Their operation will be interrupted, shifting into evaluation by the judging functions, in response to any strong signals. What do strong signals mean within the perceptual sphere? They are by no means only loud and bright signals, at least with respect to intuition, where brightness and loudness lose their meaning altogether. The perceptual sphere, both sensory and intuitive, tracks changes taking place in the environment of real or imagined images. The magnitude of a signal for the perceptual sphere is primarily the magnitude of the change that has occurred. If the change occurs abruptly and in a jump, it is a strong signal. If the change occurs smoothly and gradually, in small steps and small quanta, it is a weak signal. Thus, in Dynamics, the operation of any perceiving function continues and is prolonged continuously as long as the perceiving function tracks small changes in the structure of images, doing so in slow and gradual stages, small steps, and small quanta. Any abrupt change in what is mentally or actually seen, any sharp dissonance in what is heard, any excessively abrupt change in pitch in the auditory analyzer, any abrupt shift of an image interrupts the continuous act of perception, either bringing one of the evaluating functions into operation or simply changing the topic and direction of perception. Therefore, perception in Dynamics proceeds by small shifts, small steps, and small quanta of increment, smoothly and almost continuously, because it cannot proceed otherwise for them. By contrast, in Statics, continuous perception is possible only if it is either entirely unchanged and statically motionless or proceeds through abrupt jumps and large shifts of the «picture». Any small and minor changes in the actually visible or mentally represented picture of the environment quickly produce inhibition and interruption of the perceptual process in Statics. Therefore Statics CANNOT follow smoothly and gradually occurring changes in the surrounding picture; attempting to follow such processes inhibits and interrupts their perceiving function, both sensing and intuition. Somewhat exaggerating, one could say that Dynamics see the surrounding world as though it were filmed at 64 frames per second, with one frame differing almost imperceptibly from another, whereas Statics perceive the surrounding world as film shot at 8 frames per second, where differences between adjacent frames are much more pronounced and obvious.

In the sphere of the dynamic judging functions, black logic and black ethics, matters are, however, precisely the reverse. The operation of these functions remains continuous in Dynamics while they are dealing with large-scale, intense signals. An attempt to burden the black logic of a Dynamic with analysis of small logical details, small and particular connections, gradual quantitative increments, or weak probabilistic differences should quickly lead to inhibition and interruption of the logical process. At the same time, work with large-scale structures, global ideas, major shifts in weight, and contrasting facts will maintain continuity of the logical process in Dynamics.

Thus, the widespread conception, and as we see, broadly correct conception, of smoothness and continuous fluidity of the perceptual process in Dynamics is true only with respect to the sensing and intuitive functions. For logic and ethics to maintain continuity in Dynamics, they require, on the contrary, large jumps, large numbers, heavy loads, intense values, and abrupt shifts. The same applies in part to physical work and motor coordination, because their sphere is close to logic. If work requires only small precise movements, a Dynamic will begin to become distracted and bored. If the work requires rapid and well-coordinated throwing of watermelons or sacks of potatoes, a Static will begin to become distracted and bored sooner.

How correct is the idea that Dynamics supposedly depict movement more often in projective tests, while Statics depict motionless objects? The author has not succeeded in obtaining such a correlation experimentally. In fact, no such correlation follows from what has been said above. Movement differs from movement; different meanings can be invested in it. It can proceed in small steps or in large jumps. We believe that if the movement depicted in drawings is very intense, this may correspond more to Statics than to Dynamics. Complete immobility of the drawing may, again, be more characteristic of Statics. In motion pictures, Dynamics may very well, although this has not been experimentally tested, prefer long and unhurried shots, while Statics prefer short shots with frequent cuts, races, sudden pyrotechnic effects, abrupt changes in screen brightness, and so forth. At least, this supposition is supported by comparison of two pairs of film directors: the Dynamics A. German and A. Sokurov, both ILI, and the Statics N. Mikhalkov and S. Govorukhin, both LSI. Whose films are more mobile and dynamic in the ordinary sense of the word? Certainly those of the Static directors just named.

As a hypothesis, one may also suppose that the analogy mentioned above with film on which the surrounding world is recorded at different frame rates simultaneously has a real practical meaning. It would be interesting to test at what maximum «quantum» of displacement between adjacent images of a moving animated figure, or an oscillating pendulum, the illusion of continuous motion «breaks down» in Statics and Dynamics and is replaced by perceived stepwise displacement of the object. One may suppose that in Dynamics the «breakdown» in the sensation of continuous motion should occur at a smaller displacement quantum. If so, this would constitute independent experimental confirmation of Model «T».

How Model «T» Predicts and Explains Intertype Relations

All intertype relations, without exception, are predicted and explained very clearly by the physiological model. The quality of the prediction can be judged by comparing the model’s conclusions with the regularities of intertype relations known in socionics. The author has found no contradictions with the known regularities; a more detailed comparative analysis can be carried out by other authors.

We shall examine the model’s theoretical conclusions only for several of the most interesting cases of intertype relations, using the relations of the intuitive-logical extravert as an example.

The following rule will be key to the analysis: if different functions interact easily with one another «inside» the individual, then in situations of external communication the functions of each individual interact directly mainly with the same-named functions of other people, logic with logic, sensing with sensing, and so forth. If there is one partner, each function communicates with the same-named function of that partner. This rule follows from the fact that in information metabolism among differently named functions within an individual, the functions have a certain common language of communication in the form of transmitted neural excitation and inhibition. In interindividual communication there is no such language; there is only a symbolic language specific to each functional sphere, and the rule applies that like is perceived only by like. For another person’s logical argument to be perceived, it must act on logic. For another person’s strong but silent emotion to be perceived specifically as a strong emotion rather than as very weak sensory noise, it must first find a specific emotional resonance in the individual, and so forth. We shall proceed from this rule. In the analysis we shall also take into account whether the characteristics of signals outgoing from functions correspond or do not correspond to the passband of the communication partner’s relevant input filters.

Relations with the dual

The dual of the ILE (^hI_l ^hL_h ^lS_l ^lE_h) is the SEI (^lS_h ^lE_l ^hI_h ^hL_l). The ILE’s program intuition, with its high-intensity signals, readily acts on both the excitation and inhibition channels of the SEI’s contact intuition, entering into resonance with it through the excitation channel. As a result, the SEI’s intuition is controllably stimulated, coming under subordinate control by the intuition of Don Quixote. The reverse influence from the SEI’s intuition on the ILE’s intuition can only excite the ILE’s intuition but cannot inhibit it, because its inhibitory threshold filter requires weak, low-intensity signals that cannot be supplied by the SEI’s «strong-signal» intuition. The same occurs in the direction from the SEI toward Don Quixote’s sensing: both its excitatory and inhibitory inputs fully correspond to the low intensity of signals from the SEI’s program sensing, which therefore takes control over the ILE’s contact sensing. The reverse action on the SEI from the ILE’s contact sensing is only stimulating, not inhibitory, so sensory control and sensory manipulation are exercised in only one direction, from the SEI to the ILE.

What happens to the creative and mobilizing functions of the duals? By the value of its excitatory threshold filter, the SEI’s creative ethics enters into resonance with the ILE’s mobilizing ethics. At the same time, the SEI’s ethics, with its low-intensity outgoing signals, stimulates and excites the ILE’s mobilizing ethics but cannot inhibit or control it. The ILE’s mobilizing ethics, however, through its reciprocal influence, is capable of acting on both the excitatory and inhibitory inputs of the SEI’s ethics, thereby regulating its own excitation as well: it reduces it by inhibiting the SEI’s ethics when the latter’s excitatory influence becomes too burdensome and energy-consuming for Don Quixote. The mobilizing ethics of Don Quixote, artificially excited by external stimulation from the SEI, strengthens its controlling influences on the ILE’s own sensing as well. Thus, the ILE’s contact sensing begins to be genuinely controlled not only by the SEI’s program sensing but also by the ILE’s own mobilizing function.

Naturally, an analogous picture is observed in the symmetrically reverse direction, from the ILE to the SEI. In the latter, the mobilizing function, that is, the fourth in Model «T», likewise becomes more active, and its influences on its own contact function and on the dual’s creative function are strengthened.

Let us summarize dual interaction. In each participant in the relation there is a slight activation of the program function. More pronounced is activation of the fourth, mobilizing function, which is gently stimulated by the dual’s creative function. The gentleness of the stimulation is achieved because the dual’s creative function can, in the reverse direction, be controlled and inhibited by the individual’s mobilizing function that it excites. Owing to activation of the mobilizing function and the stimulating-controlling influence both from it and from the dual’s program function, the individual’s third, contact function becomes substantially more active. As for mutual control, the contact function comes into fairly strong dependence on the dual’s program function, whereas the individual’s creative function merely increases its sensitivity to requests from the dual’s weakly active mobilizing function, while remaining mainly under the control of its own program function. The overall result is activation and appreciable equalization in the operation of all functions. At the same time, the flexible creative and contact functions come under something like joint control by the dual pair, with the individual’s own influence continuing to predominate over the creative function and the dual’s influence predominating over the contact function.

Relations with the conflictor

The conflictor of the ILE (^hI_l ^hL_h ^lS_l ^lE_h) is the ESI (^lE_h ^lS_l ^hL_h ^hI_l). The ILE’s mobilizing ethics experiences a sharp excitatory influence from the ESI conflictor’s program ethics. Unlike excitation from the dual’s creative function, excitation of the mobilizing function by the conflictor lacks a feedback loop of reciprocal inhibition. The individual’s excited mobilizing function cannot, through a reciprocal inhibitory influence, moderate the «ardor» of the conflictor’s program function, because the signal from the mobilizing function, owing to the mismatch in threshold levels, does not pass through the inhibitory input filter of the other person’s program function. The more strongly the mobilizing function «flares up», the more strongly it excites the conflictor’s program function, while exerting no inhibitory action on it. But whereas the conflictor’s program function can operate continuously without exhaustion, continuous activation of the individual’s mobilizing function requires very great adaptive tension and expenditure of psychic energy, which causes rapid fatigue.

The individual’s creative and contact functions nevertheless find complete mutual understanding with, respectively, the conflictor’s contact and creative functions because their thresholds are identical. At the same time, the individual’s creative function retains very mild dominance over the conflictor’s contact function, and the conflictor’s creative function over the individual’s contact function.

The creative and contact functions are a flexible manipulative pair traditionally used in situations of so-called «salon flirtation», that is, in superficial contacts with new people. Therefore, the deep «syntony» of these functions with the conflictor, clearly revealed in superficial contacts and resembling relations with an identical, can for a time be very compelling by creating an illusion of good interaction and mutual understanding. But this illusion is possible only in situations of «salon flirtation», play, while the program functions are silent, and it immediately ends with further rapprochement and deepening of the relationship. As soon as the program functions begin to set the tone, they rapidly cause mutual and almost «physical» exhaustion of the mobilizing functions. Irritation first appears from awareness of the insurmountable gulf between value systems. When an SEE son begins to extract money from an LII father, the latter begins quietly to hate him: «Have you read even one book this year? Only greedy extortionists can make a career as gangsters.» In turn, the SEE cannot conceal sincere contempt for the LII’s fussing with his beloved calculations and papers: «And where is the money from all that, Dad?»

Thus, in communication between conflictors, the program function is stimulated, while the mobilizing, painful function enters into uncontrollable and painfully exhausting resonance. The creative and contact functions work jointly and syntonically with the conflictor’s contact and creative functions, which in superficial communication, when the program function is masked, for example during light «salon flirtation», can create an illusion of comfortable interaction and mutual understanding. It should also be remembered that «inside the individual» the creative and contact functions interact with one another only with difficulty and considerable tension because their threshold levels do not match. Therefore, activation of this pair of functions in the course of superficial «salon» communication, including communication with a conflictor, is maintained primarily by constant external stimulation and is not creatively productive in terms of internal information metabolism.

Relations with a beneficiary

The beneficiary for the ILE acting as the «benefactor» (^hI_l ^hL_h ^lS_l ^lE_h) is the EIE (^hE_l ^hI_h ^lL_l ^lS_h). It is important that this relation is asymmetric. Let us see how the asymmetry of this relation arises from our psychophysiological model. The ILE’s program function, intuition in this particular case, controls the beneficiary’s creative function through both the excitation and inhibition channels. In the reverse direction, the benefactor’s program function is only excited and strengthened. The benefactor’s creative function does not interact with the beneficiary’s same-named contact function because their thresholds differ substantially. The benefactor’s contact function strengthens, but does not inhibit, the beneficiary’s mobilizing function; however, the beneficiary’s mobilizing function is capable in the reverse direction of controlling both the excitatory and inhibitory inputs of the benefactor’s contact function. Therefore, stimulation of the mobilizing function is not burdensome for the beneficiary. The benefactor’s mobilizing function inhibits, but does not excite, the beneficiary’s program function. The same, and to an even greater degree, occurs in the reverse direction: the beneficiary’s dominant program function inhibits and suppresses the benefactor’s mobilizing function.

The asymmetry of the relation consists in the benefactor using its dominant program function to place the beneficiary’s creative function under tight controlling supervision, while simultaneously using its mobilizing function to slightly inhibit the beneficiary’s program function. At the same time, the benefactor’s own program function is only stimulated and strengthened, while its creative function does not interact at all with the beneficiary’s same-named contact function. For reciprocal influence on the benefactor, the beneficiary can and is forced to use only its energy-consuming mobilizing function. With its program function it does, however, actively suppress the benefactor’s mobilizing function, but because the benefactor’s mobilizing function is «pushed back» into a distant hierarchical corner, the benefactor most likely does not notice this at all.

The beneficiary becomes dependent on the benefactor, but this dependence concerns only the beneficiary’s creative function and is not excessively energy-consuming or burdensome, as it would be in the case of the supervisee, because the beneficiary’s mobilizing function does not experience hyperexcitation, while its almost equally rapidly exhausted contact function does not interact with the benefactor’s functions at all.

Relations with a supervisee

The supervisee of the ILE (^hI_l ^hL_h ^lS_l ^lE_h) is the LSI (^lL_h ^lS_l ^hE_h ^hI_l).

In this case, with respect to intuition, program for the supervisor and mobilizing for the supervisee, mutual resonant amplification occurs. It is easily tolerated and unnoticed by the supervisor but quite painful for the supervisee, who is forced in communication with the supervisor to strain the «sprinter» and energy-consuming mobilizing function in a «stayer» mode. In this respect the situation resembles close communication with a conflictor, except that in this case the relation is asymmetric: only the supervisee’s mobilizing function suffers.

The ILE’s creative logic completely suppresses the LSI supervisee’s program logic by acting on its inhibitory channel. The reverse influence does not occur at all, because the LSI’s low-signal logic is incapable of acting on either the excitatory or inhibitory input of Don Quixote’s logic. Thus, the supervisor does not notice the supervisee’s program function at all, while the supervisee’s program function is inhibited and suppressed because of interaction with the supervisor’s creative function.

With respect to sensing, contact for the ILE supervisor and creative for the LSI supervisee, mutual syntonic fusion occurs with reciprocal excitation and inhibition because all thresholds are identical, that is, with joint control of this function. In essence, this is the only function through which the supervisee has a chance to realize itself in relations with its supervisor, and even then only on equal terms.

As for the last remaining function, ethics, mobilizing for the supervisor and contact for the supervisee, the supervisee’s contact function inhibits and suppresses the supervisor’s mobilizing function, see the thresholds, while it itself seems not to notice the presence of this suppressed function in the partner at all. Even if the supervisor’s mobilizing function were not suppressed, because of the threshold mismatch it still could not act on either the excitatory or inhibitory inputs of the supervisee’s contact function. Thus, the supervisee’s relatively rarely and episodically used contact function prevails over the supervisor’s even more rarely used mobilizing function, which is obviously very weak consolation for the supervisee. The asymmetry of the relation is evident. The more strongly the general vertness of the supervisor and supervisee is expressed, the stronger the dominance of each person’s own program function and the subdominance of the mobilizing function, and the more pronounced the asymmetry of their relation. The supervisor’s pressure on the supervisee may be so great and unpleasant that even TIMs of the first quadra, «Judicious Democrats», often experience toward their TIM supervisors something resembling xenophobia. One may suppose that LSIs perceive «supervisors» with the ILE TIM in their environment just as painfully.

Business relations

For the ILE (^hI_l ^hL_h ^lS_l ^lE_h), they arise with the SLE (^hS_l ^hL_h ^lI_l ^lE_h). From the threshold values it is easy to see that each partner’s program function is inhibited and weakened by the other partner’s contact function. The contact functions, however, experience no influence from the partners’ same-named functions because the thresholds do not fit together. Each partner’s creative function completely coincides, both in name and in all thresholds, with the other partner’s creative function, producing syntonic resonant interaction with fine mutual controllability. One may suppose that this is why the relations received the name «business». The mobilizing functions likewise coincide both in their names and in all thresholds. However, because the inhibitory and excitatory thresholds are unequal, mutual syntonic control, as well as inhibition of these functions in general, does not occur. There is only resonant amplification, which is not excessively burdensome for either participant because subdominant functions enter into resonance on both sides. Indirectly, owing to mild activation of the mobilizing function, the contact function controlled by it is activated even more mildly. Since business relations activate both functions of the subdominant nality, within business relations the nality traits of either partner are, as it were, leveled out. Rationals become more irrational, and irrationals more rational. In effect, business relations initiate in their participants something like an induced initial accentuation.

Kindred relations

For the ILE (^hI_l ^hL_h ^lS_l ^lE_h), they arise with the IEE (^hI_l ^hE_h ^lS_l ^lL_h). The partners’ program and contact functions are identical and coincide in detail, both in name and in thresholds. The program functions enter into resonance through the excitation channels and are strengthened. The contact functions, whose thresholds coincide in every respect, both excitation and inhibition, enter a mode of resonant-syntonic interwoven «co-control». However, their stimulation and control by the corresponding mobilizing functions weakens because the mobilizing functions themselves weaken: they are inhibited by the partners’ creative functions. The creative functions experience no influences from the partners’ same-named functions.

The overall picture appears as resonant amplification of the program functions, an unchanged state of the creative functions, syntonic fusion of the partners’ contact functions with weakening of their dependence on their own mobilizing functions, and suppression of the mobilizing functions. Overall, the picture partly resembles a provoked, induced terminal accentuation.

Mirage relations

For the ILE (^hI_l ^hL_h ^lS_l ^lE_h), they arise with the IEI (^lI_h ^lE_l ^hS_h ^hL_l).

The partners’ same-named program functions suppress each other. Because the thresholds of the excitatory inputs do not coincide, amplification does not occur, whereas mutual inhibition occurs fully: the signal intensity at the output of each function fully corresponds to the passband of the partner function’s inhibitory input. One partner’s mobilizing function interacts with the other partner’s creative function. As a result, the mobilizing function is moderately strengthened and also gains control over the partner’s creative function. The partners’ contact functions have the same name, but because of mismatched thresholds they stimulate each other only very weakly.

As a final consequence, in each participant in mirage relations the role of the program function is sharply weakened, and it is replaced by a gently increasing role of the mobilizing function. The connection of the creative function with the program function partly weakens, but its resonant connection with the partner’s mobilizing function increases. Activation of the mobilizing function does not lead to discomfort because the mobilizing function retains control over the partner’s creative function that activates it.

Productive communication between partners occurs predominantly in the language of their creative and mobilizing functions and, to a much lesser extent, their contact functions. Moreover, «active speech», which acts on the partner, is possible only through the channels of the mobilizing and, to a lesser extent, contact functions.

Identity relations

For the ILE (^hI_l ^hL_h ^lS_l ^lE_h), they arise with another ILE (^hI_l ^hL_h ^lS_l ^lE_h). In such communication, the program functions are resonantly strengthened, increasing their unbalance, because the signal they produce and resonantly amplify does not act on the inhibitory input due to the threshold mismatch. The partners’ creative functions are, as it were, «pooled», forming a tightly interwoven syntonic fusion and exerting reciprocal excitatory and inhibitory influences on one another; the same occurs with the contact functions. The mobilizing functions are resonantly strengthened similarly to the program functions, although the degree of this strengthening is substantially lower because of the initial suppression and subdominance of the mobilizing functions. The relations are fairly comfortable and make use of all the partners’ functions. Communication between partners can proceed in the language of any functions, although the easily controlled, and in this case co-controlled, balanced functions, creative and contact, are naturally the ones best adapted to dialogue.

Quasi-identity relations

For the ILE (^hI_l ^hL_h ^lS_l ^lE_h), they arise with the LIE (^hL_l ^hI_h ^lE_l ^lS_h). Through the excitation channel, the program function enters into resonance with the partner’s creative function, owing to which both functions are strengthened, and the creative function, in addition, begins to respond flexibly to the requests of the partner’s program function, being controlled by it through both its excitation channel and its inhibition channel. The same occurs with the contact and mobilizing functions. They too are mutually strengthened by resonance, while the contact function of each partner begins to be partially controlled not only by its own mobilizing function but also by the communication partner’s mobilizing function. As in identity relations, all four functions are effectively used in communication between the partners. The difference in quasi-identity relations, judging from the psychophysiological picture of functional interaction, is that the «command-administrative» role of the partners’ program and, to some extent, mobilizing functions is strengthened, with the partners’ creative and contact functions also becoming subordinate to them. The independent creative role of the creative and contact functions, by contrast, weakens. In particular, «pairing» of the creative and contact functions within each individual subject should become even more difficult. In a certain sense, all this should be partly equivalent to the effect of induced terminal accentuation.

In identity relations, by contrast, the picture was the reverse: there the creative and contact functions, in the course of communication between the partners, in a certain sense «broke away» from their usual «masters-managers», the program and mobilizing functions, and began to live a more independent life, although not a creative one so much as a communicative one, engaging in close communication with the analogous function of the partner. At the same time, in identity relations, the normally difficult internal «pairing» of the creative and contact functions, unlike in quasi-identity relations, became somewhat easier.

What has been described here is fully confirmed in practice, in particular with respect to situations of «salon flirtation» that require paired operation of the creative and contact functions, that is, the two middle functions. In his own observations, the author has often noticed that in communication between conflictors or identicals, superficial, joking, playful relations characteristic of active use of the two middle functions arise and are maintained easily. By contrast, in communication with a quasi-identical, «light entertaining superficiality» never gets going; the sense of support from the partner is quickly lost, communication slides into something more businesslike and serious, and remains stuck in maintaining that style.

Relations of complete opposition

For the ILE (^hI_l ^hL_h ^lS_l ^lE_h), they arise with the ILI (^lI_h ^lL_l ^hS_h ^hE_l). All the partners’ functions coincide in name but fundamentally do not coincide in thresholds. Some very moderate mutual stimulation is possible between the partners’ creative and contact functions despite the mismatch of their thresholds. This is because, according to Table 2, the creative and contact functions have a somewhat smaller threshold amplitude than the program and mobilizing functions, and therefore it is still somewhat easier for the creative and contact functions than for the program and mobilizing functions to overcome these thresholds when they are mismatched.

The partners’ program functions energetically suppress one another, because the outputs of these functions do not correspond to the threshold filters of excitation of the partners’ same-named functions but do correspond to the threshold filters of inhibition of these functions. The same occurs with the mobilizing functions.

Communication tends toward use of the creative and contact functions and therefore tends to shift into the language of their club, in the example given, the language of the «Practitioners» club. However, because of the mismatch of their thresholds, the partners may experience irritation and a feeling that they do not hear and understand each other very well. Communication may also produce an unpleasant sensation of a «vacuum of life goals» because the program and mobilizing functions are suppressed.

Table 2. Empirical values of excitation thresholds in arbitrary units, normalized relative to the population mean, calculated from questionnaires using 8 clusters of the «Careless-Farsighted» and «Yielding-Obstinate» dichotomies for functions in different positions. To equate introverts with extraverts, the thresholds of introverts were taken with the opposite sign in the calculations.

Super-Ego relations

For the ILE (^hI_l ^hL_h ^lS_l ^lE_h), they arise with the SEE (^hS_l ^hE_h ^lI_l ^lL_h). One partner’s program function interacts with the other partner’s contact function. At the same time, the contact function inhibits and suppresses the program function while itself experiencing no influence. One partner’s creative function suppresses the other partner’s mobilizing function, again without experiencing reciprocal influence itself. Thus, in Super-Ego relations, each participant’s unbalanced functions, program and mobilizing, are suppressed, while operation of the balanced functions, creative and contact, remains unchanged, neither stimulated nor impeded. Apart from the unidirectional inhibition of the unbalanced functions, no other information exchange occurs between the participants’ functions. Because of the inhibition of the unbalanced functions and the absence of feedback with the partner’s functions through any of the four functions, the participants in the communication should develop a feeling of superficiality of contact, as well as an inability to penetrate «to the essence» of the partner, a kind of invisible wall that interferes with listening to, hearing, and understanding one another. In terms of the final effect produced, Super-Ego relations should resemble the sensations arising from relations of complete opposition. The difference perhaps lies in the absence of disappointment. In relations of complete opposition, some disappointment may arise as a result of communication because of the partners’ initial commonality of interests, as they belong to the same socionic club. In Super-Ego relations, however, the clubs are different from the outset, there is no initial commonality of interests, and communication merely confirms the impossibility of deep, mutually interested contact. The second difference is that information exchange between partners is even more difficult in Super-Ego relations. In relations of complete opposition, it does occur, albeit in a difficult form, within the common club of the central functions, creative and contact.

Semi-dual relations

For the ILE (^hI_l ^hL_h ^lS_l ^lE_h), they arise with the SLI (^lS_h ^lL_l ^hI_h ^hE_l). The program function interacts with the partner’s contact function, controlling it through both excitation and inhibition, that is, effectively manipulating the other’s contact function. In the reverse direction, the other person’s contact function stimulates the subject’s program function. The creative function has the same name as the partner’s creative function, but contact between them is difficult because the thresholds do not coincide. Nevertheless, because of their central position, and therefore the small absolute amplitude of their threshold values, the creative functions still interact weakly, slightly stimulating each other.

The mobilizing functions also coincide in name, but because of the opposite polarity of their excitatory and inhibitory filters they do not excite but only inhibit and suppress each other. The final result of communication is manifested in strengthening of the program function, which begins to control not only its own creative function but also the partner’s contact function, making it speak or remain silent at will. The creative functions attempt to exchange information and slightly stimulate one another, but with difficulty and mutual «hardness of hearing».

The contact function operates at the partner’s request and, to a certain extent, under the partner’s control. The mobilizing function is moderately suppressed during communication and therefore rarely makes itself felt. When it does «speak», it thereby suppresses the partner’s corresponding mobilizing function, so nobody hears it anyway.

Real interaction takes place through the partners’ program, contact, and creative functions. Each participant’s program function is easily heard by the partner because its «voice» is projected onto the partner’s contact function, forcing it to submit and yield.

If we take another semi-dual pair, the LII and EIE, as an example, the LII unceremoniously interrogates or abruptly cuts off the contact logic of its EIE semi-dual, and the EIE obediently complies. In return, the EIE is just as unceremonious with the LII in matters of emotional display, and the LII obediently complies and makes a great effort to «show emotion» to Hamlet. Sensory topics practically never arise in conversation between the LII and EIE, because the mobilizing functions are suppressed and in general hear each other poorly due to mismatch of excitation thresholds. The creative intuition of each of these communicating types «works through cotton wool»: the partner listens to the other’s creative function, but with effort and not for very long. Therefore the other person’s intuitive speech, expressed, for example, as heuristic fantasies spoken aloud, does not go unheard, but neither is it picked up on the fly. Real information exchange occurs only in the language of the program and contact functions, in this case logic and ethics. Because functions of the other nality do not participate, almost no full-fledged exchange of useful information takes place in such communication overall, except perhaps that each person’s program function may take note of some useful incidental fact or emotional impression. At the same time, relations of this kind are not tiring.

For reasons of space, we have not analyzed every example of intertype relations here. However, the remaining relations receive an equally clear and detailed interpretation on the basis of the physiological TIM model, which anyone can verify independently by repeating the reasoning algorithm we used on the basis of Model «T».

What has been said in this section about the characteristics of intertype relations follows directly from the Model «T» formulas of the interacting TIMs. Not one of the properties given was borrowed from empirical descriptions of intertype relations. If the resulting portraits of intertype relations correspond to what is observed in practice, this should be regarded as a convincing argument in favor of the advantages of Model «T». In our opinion, explanation of intertype relations on the basis of the old socionic Model «A» is achieved, in comparison with Model «T», with much greater difficulty and forcing; it is also less detailed and less unambiguous with respect to the characteristics of the relations predicted.

How Model «T» Makes It Possible to Take a New View of Long-Standing Problems of Differential Psychophysiology

Having illustrated the effectiveness of the model using socionics as an example, it is time to turn to its second source, the physiology of higher nervous activity and research within differential psychology, and see how Model «T» suggests answers to long-standing questions and puzzles in these fields that were posed in the last century and remain unresolved to this day.

One of the old and painful questions is the problem of correlation between a person’s psychophysiological and psychological personality characteristics.

In the 1960s, a debate arose between L. Marton and Ya. Urban (1966), on the one hand, and D. A. Gray (1968), on the other. D. A. Gray associated introversion with a nervous system weak with respect to excitation, that is, a highly sensitive nervous system. He based this on theoretical propositions put forward by I. P. Pavlov and C. Jung, as well as on a number of experimental data. By contrast, L. Marton and Ya. Urban believed that introverts have a strong nervous system with excitation predominating over inhibition, whereas extraverts have a weak nervous system with inhibition predominating. The position of L. Marton and Ya. Urban would seem also to have agreed with the opinion of H. Eysenck (1957), who likewise believed that excitation predominates over inhibition in introverts and the reverse in extraverts. It is known that I. P. Pavlov associated hysteria with a predominance of excitation and neurasthenia with a predominance of inhibition. Apparently it was from this that H. Eysenck drew his conclusion. As we see, Eysenck did not connect extraversion-introversion with the strength-weakness property of the nervous system, that is, with its specialization for perception of strong or weak signals, but reasoned only in terms of some speculative balance between excitation and inhibition processes, that is, the sign of unbalance. One empirical basis for such conclusions for H. Eysenck, as well as for L. Marton and Ya. Urban, was evidence that introverts, in response to a drop of lemon juice placed on the tongue, secrete several times more saliva than extraverts. Hence followed the conclusion about some vague «predominance of excitation over inhibition». It is true, however, that from the same or similar experiments, Oxford psychologist D. A. Gray concluded that the introversion pole is associated with increased analyzer sensitivity and therefore with weakness of the nervous system.

Rather than arguing «on theoretical fingers», would it not be better and simpler to perform a direct experimental test? By the beginning of the 1970s, there were both extraversion questionnaires, such as Eysenck’s, and reference, time-tested psychophysiological methods for measuring strength-weakness of the nervous system. Attempts at such testing were undertaken repeatedly in laboratories of Soviet physiologists studying the physiology of higher nervous activity. K. M. Gurevich (1970) found commonality between introverts and a weak nervous system. His student V. F. Matveev found commonality between introverts and a strong nervous system (!). P. A. Zhorov and L. B. Ermolaeva-Tomina (1971) likewise established an association between introversion and a strong nervous system. In V. S. Merlin’s laboratory, however, a correlation between introversion and a weak nervous system was established (!!!). By the end of the 1970s everyone had confused one another without ever unambiguously establishing the connection between characteristics at the psychological level and characteristics at the psychophysiological level. In the end, these attempts discredited physiological science itself, and after the tragic death in 1972 of V. D. Nebylitsyn, who at that time was the «driving force» of Soviet physiology of higher nervous activity and psychophysiology, research in differential psychophysiology rapidly came to nothing. The mystery of the potential connection between vertness and properties of the nervous system remained unsolved.

Now, from the standpoint of Model «T», we can both propose a possible solution and explain the methodological errors in the studies listed above.

First, thresholds for excitation and inhibition are apparently independent and isolated from one another. Therefore, what should have been considered was not balances between excitation and inhibition, but these processes separately. Second, Eysenck, Urban, and Gray alike seem not to have had a very clear idea of what exactly was at issue, thresholds or some vague «degree of expression» of excitatory and inhibitory processes. In Model «T», relying on thresholds, we speak of selective tuning of the corresponding input filters of the excitatory and inhibitory channels to ranges of low- or high-intensity signals. Since Model «T» works, it would therefore appear that precisely these characteristics are important for both the excitation and inhibition channels. Third, in instrumental experiments determining strength-weakness, what is measured is not general properties of the nervous system but partial ones, for example in the auditory analyzer, that is, in the sensory sphere. When the extraversion-introversion balance is determined by questionnaire, however, vertness in general is determined, in a mixture of psychological functions. Therefore, in comparison it should correspond to strength-weakness as a general rather than a partial property of the nervous system.

If we methodologically take these important remarks into account, then on the basis of Model «T» we obtain the following picture:

1. The property of extraversion-introversion measured by the Eysenck questionnaire is physiologically heterogeneous. At the pole of so-called «extraversion» it reflects, on the one hand, high excitation thresholds and the corresponding predisposition toward a strong-signal environment and, on the other hand, low inhibition thresholds and the corresponding avoidance of a weak-signal environment that puts the given individual to sleep. The first tendency is apparently associated with physiological ergotropic dominance, the second is not. In reality these two tendencies are separated not only at the physiological level, because the corresponding threshold filters of the excitatory and inhibitory channels are independent of one another. They can also be separated at the level of the diagnostic questionnaire. High excitation thresholds will manifest themselves in the individual’s own strong-signal output and in a corresponding energy-consuming behavioral strategy. This is extraversion proper. The property of low inhibition thresholds, which is not connected with extraversion, may be called extratimity, following the tradition established in socionics, because «black» socionic functions are conventionally called extratimal, and it is precisely they that are characterized by low inhibition thresholds. Extratimity manifests itself not in energy expenditure or in the individual’s own strong-signal output, but only in a tendency to avoid a weak-signal monotonous environment. It does not matter to an extravert whether the television is on, whether people around are working, whether «the world is turning». What matters is that the extravert’s own voice in this world be loud. To an extratim it does not matter whether «his voice is loud»; what matters is precisely that the television be on, coworkers be working, and the world be turning. The extratim may pay attention to the world only episodically, but when attention is directed toward it, the world must have a sufficiently loud voice. There is also another important difference. An extravert, unlike an introvert, is not afraid of superstrong stimuli; this is a generic trait, readiness for extreme loads and struggle, activity of the pituitary stress-readiness system. For an extratim this trait is not generic. Medium-signal saturation of the environment is entirely sufficient.

Four combinations are actually possible: extravert extratim, introvert introtim, extravert introtim, and introvert extratim. The first two combinations are unbalanced with respect to the balance of the «general» thresholds of the excitatory and inhibitory channels; the last two are balanced. This balance-unbalance will also manifest itself in characteristics of temperament.

Unfortunately, the Eysenck questionnaire measures not pure extraversion but extraversion plus extratimity, although the contribution of extraversion to the total scale is nevertheless greater.

In principle, the property of extraversion-introversion, as an expression of ergotropic dominance, may correlate with strength-weakness of the nervous system, but the property of extratimity-introtimity is unlikely to do so.

2. If we turn to the section of this article dealing with interpretation of the Reinin dichotomies on the basis of Model «T», we see that in the sensory sphere high excitation thresholds, strong-signal specialization, are characteristic of the Farsighted pole, whereas the Careless pole is characterized by weak-signal specialization in sensing. Extraversion coincides with high excitation thresholds of the sensing function only among sensing types, whereas among intuitive types high excitation thresholds of the sensing function occur, on the contrary, in introverts.

Therefore, if one searches in a broad homogeneous sample for a correlation between partial strength-weakness of the sensory sphere, measured by instrumental methods, and indicators at the psychological level, this correlation will be found with the «Careless-Farsighted» dichotomy, but not with the «Extraverts-Introverts» dichotomy. In a sample consisting of approximately equal numbers of representatives of all 16 types of information metabolism, the correlation of nervous-system strength-weakness in the sensory sphere with extraversion-introversion, understood as the level of excitation thresholds, must be, and will be, zero. However, it may differ from zero, in either direction, if either sensing or intuitive types predominate in the sample.

To obtain a sharply positive correlation between extraversion and strength of the nervous system in such experiments, assuming that such a correlation can exist at all, the experimental sample must be composed entirely of sensing types. If, however, the sample of participants consists entirely of intuitive types, then, as is easy to understand, the experiment will produce a sharply negative correlation between extraversion and nervous-system «strength». Thus, the confusion in the signs of the correlation between vertness and strength-weakness of nervous processes found in the experiments of K. M. Gurevich, V. F. Matveev, V. S. Merlin, P. A. Zhorov, and L. B. Ermolaeva-Tomina was most likely explained by the structure of their participant samples. If people were recruited for an experiment from the street and paid, the resulting sample had a predominance of sensing types, producing a weakly positive correlation between extraversion and «strength». If participants were recruited from among students, with the usual predominance of intuitive types among them, a weakly negative correlation could be obtained, and a strong nervous system would begin to correspond to the introvert pole.

Thus, all such experiments conducted in the last century were methodologically incorrectly designed. In a mixed sample reflecting the population distribution of TIMs, the correlation between strength of the nervous system in the sensory sphere and extraversion will be approximately zero, whereas the correlation of «strength» with «Farsightedness» should be positive, ideally tending toward +1. If a sample is composed entirely of sensing types, there will be a strongly positive correlation between «strength» and extraversion, tending toward +1. If, however, an experimental sample is composed only of intuitive types, there should be a sharply negative correlation between «strength» and extraversion, ideally tending toward -1. Of course, all this is true if extraversion and the ergotropic-system dominance that apparently underlies it are genuinely associated with reference indicators of nervous-system strength. In the present work this is assumed as an explanation of the psychophysiological basis of Model «T», but it should be kept in mind that the model may also be workable without a connection to nervous-system strength if the role of the two filters at its excitatory and inhibitory inputs is performed not by thresholds of absolute sensitivity but by some other physiological characteristics, indicators of hemispheric asymmetry, opposition of different transmitter systems, and the like.

The Full Model «T», or What Follows from Additionally Specifying the General Properties of the Nervous System

Up to this point, all our analyses have used the simple Model «T», which reflects only the partial thresholds, or threshold filters, of C. Jung’s four functions. But besides the partial properties of nervous-system strength-weakness for each of the four functional spheres and separately for each input channel, excitation or inhibition, there also exist so-called «general» properties of the nervous system identified in the work of the Teplov-Nebylitsyn physiological school.

The general property of nervous-system strength-weakness with respect to excitation extends identically to all four Jungian functions. It is, as it were, a higher-level input filter for signals, a universal filter independent of the choice of a particular functional sphere. For present purposes, what matters is only that the «general» and «partial» properties are most likely associated with different physiological mechanisms operating at different levels.

What happens when two input filters are superimposed, one a higher-level universal filter associated with a general property of the nervous system and the other a partial filter associated with strength-weakness and selective sensitivity to strong and weak signals only for the particular function in question?

If both filters are tuned to signals of the same intensity, passage of those signals is facilitated, while passage of signals of the opposite intensity becomes still more difficult. Most likely, this should be interpreted not in terms of an increase or decrease in the intensity of the response, but in terms of an increase or decrease in the probability of the response, without substantial influence on its intensity.

If the passbands of the two filters operating at different levels do not coincide, the probability of responding to any signals decreases, while the resulting passband of such a compound filter shifts somewhat away from the setting of the partial filter toward the setting of the general higher-level filter.

It is possible that these probable regularities hold both for the excitation channel and for the inhibition channel of any function.

The full Model «T» for the ILE will look as follows:

(3) (h/h) ^hI_l ^hL_h ^lS_l ^lE_h - for the introtimal subtype of Don Quixote, a tendency toward high-signal general inhibition;

(4) (h/l) ^hI_l ^hL_h ^lS_l ^lE_h - for the extratimal subtype of Don Quixote, a tendency toward low-signal general inhibition.

(5) (h/m) ^hI_l ^hL_h ^lS_l ^lE_h - for an «average» Don Quixote, an «average» general inhibition threshold whose influence on the partial inhibition thresholds of the functions can be ignored.

In these formulas, compared with the simple formulas of Model «T», the only innovation is the thresholds in parentheses, low, high, or average, indicated in the form of a fraction. The index in its numerator shows the setting of the «general» higher-level filter for the excitation channel of all functions; the index in the denominator shows the setting of the general higher-level filter for the inhibition channels. The «strength» pole in the general property of nervous-system strength-weakness corresponds to setting the higher-level filter of the excitation channel to high-intensity signals, index «h», while the «weakness» pole corresponds to setting it to low-intensity signals, index «l». The same applies to the inhibition channel. The remaining notation is the same as in the description of the «simple» Model «T».

Unlike the specific, partial properties of the nervous system, expressed by indices attached to functions and pertaining separately to each function, the general threshold properties influence all of the individual’s functions equally. At the same time, operation is facilitated in those partial functional channels whose threshold level coincides with the corresponding threshold of the general nervous-system property. When they do not coincide, the response is impeded in the sense of a reduced probability of responding; in addition, when they do not coincide, there is also some shift of the partial thresholds toward the general ones. This is precisely why specifying the general property of nervous-system strength-weakness with respect to excitation by the index in the numerator of the fraction determines which of Don Quixote’s two unbalanced functions will be the program function, namely the one whose excitation-threshold index coincides with the general property of excitation strength indicated in parentheses in the numerator. When the general and partial excitation thresholds do not coincide, the response is impeded and its probability is reduced; this occurs in the mobilizing and contact functions.

In essence, specifying the upper-left index in parentheses is equivalent to specifying the order of the four functions, that is, specifying the program function, while the order of the remaining three functions is then generated automatically. Indeed, if the upper index in parentheses were not «h» but «l», the program function would be ^lE_h, and the overall order of functions in the formula would also change in mirror fashion and would correspond to the conflictor ESI. Thus, when the order of functions is specified in the formula, as is done in Model «A», the upper index in parentheses need not be specified because it is generated automatically, coinciding with the upper indices of the first two functions. The index in the numerator of the fraction therefore does not add additional degrees of freedom to the model: there were four, and after specifying this index there are still four. It merely explains the physiological mechanism by which the first, program function in the model is determined, a circumstance that in Model «A» remained entirely «offstage» from consideration.

The index in the denominator of the fraction, the lower index in parentheses characterizing the individual’s general nervous-system strength-weakness with respect to inhibition, is a fundamental innovation of this model compared with Model «A». In Aušra’s model neither it nor its consequences, which generate TIM accentuations, are taken into account at all. The index in the denominator adds an additional, fifth degree of freedom to the model. Its introduction divides each TIM into two accentuations, so that bipolar accentuation of each TIM yields 32 subtypes instead of 16 types.

If we ignore the TIM accentuations generated by the index in the denominator of the fraction in parentheses, we return to the usual socionic scheme of 16 TIMs specified by four degrees of freedom. This is precisely the case corresponding to the «simple» Model «T», which we have already considered in detail in the preceding sections of the article.

In the present work we shall not analyze in detail the accentuations generated by the index of general inhibition thresholds in the denominator of the fraction enclosed in parentheses in formulas (3) and (4). This is material for a separate article. Here we shall limit ourselves to the statement that although the general property of strength-weakness with respect to inhibition is hypothetical, and therefore the accentuations it generates are likewise hypothetical from a theoretical standpoint, we incline to the view that these accentuations «do exist». The additional parameter does not affect either the structure of the socion, consisting of 16 types, or intertype relations. In essence, it does not lead to the formation of 32 TIMs but merely generates a bipolar accentuation within each type, dividing the type into two parts, each of which nevertheless retains most of its common properties.

Comparison of Model «T» and Model «A»

Compared with Model «A», Model «T» has, first, the advantages already discussed above: it provides a higher-quality and more transparent prediction of intertype relations and makes it possible to predict a number of aspects of these relations that have either not been discussed at all in the socionic literature or have been discussed only rarely, more often merely at the level of experimental observation, without connecting them to explanation or prediction of these properties.

Model «T» makes it possible to additively sum influences on the excitatory and inhibitory inputs of each function not only from one communication partner but from several at once. This substantially facilitates, methodologically, socionic analysis not merely of pairwise but of triple and larger interactions among TIMs in small groups, providing a more suitable apparatus for theoretical analysis and prediction of relations of this kind. The introduction of threshold operators also produces a much more adequate mathematical apparatus for analyzing the emergence and functioning of integral TIMs of large collectives.

Unlike Model «A», Model «T» unambiguously substantiates the substantive, psychophysiologically motivated content of a number of Reinin dichotomies whose independent substantive existence did not previously follow from Model «A» and was therefore questioned. This applies especially to such dichotomies as «Tacticians-Strategists», «Constructivists-Emotivists», «Careless-Farsighted», and «Yielding-Obstinate». The sphere of application of the socionic paradigm in psychology and psychophysiology is thereby substantially broadened, and its scientific-predictive role is increased.

Model «T» casts new light on the application of factor analysis in psychology. Its apparatus makes it clear that purely linear factor modeling is not adequate to the tasks of psychology, and that within linear factor models of personality there simultaneously coexist «hidden» factors that cannot be isolated by factor-analytic methods and are generated by nonlinear interaction of the basic factor axes, such as «Yielding-Obstinate», «Constructivism-Emotivism», and so forth.

Model «A» still uses four degrees of freedom to encode a TIM. In this sense it does not differ from C. Jung’s legacy or from the concepts of the Briggs-Myers scientific school. Model «T» uses the same four degrees of freedom in its simplified version and five degrees of freedom in its full version, owing to which it also predicts fundamental extratimal-introtimal bipolar accentuations of the TIM.

In Model «A», the concepts of extraversion-introversion and extratimity-introtimity are mixed into a single poorly differentiated whole, which has long caused dissatisfaction among many socionists. In Model «A», however, the nonidentity of these concepts at least already appears fairly clearly, something that cannot be said of the concepts of the American Briggs-Myers psychological school or of H. Eysenck’s school. Model «T» finally separates the concept of extraversion from the concept of extratimity, giving each concept its own physiological interpretation.

Compared with Model «A», the psychophysiological model considered in the article opens for socionics the prospect of a more decisive transition onto experimental rails. First, it makes more competent construction and use of diagnostic questionnaires possible and, for this purpose, allows meaningful use within them of socionic dichotomies outside the Jungian basis and reveals the difference between extraversion-introversion and extratimity-introtimity. Second, it opens the way to direct psychophysiological measurements and experiments.

Model «A» does not provide for accentuations. Even if one wished to add such accentuations, there is nowhere to «insert» them, because Model «A», by virtue of its construction, is compelled to rely not on parameters, which could if desired be converted from qualitative into quantitative form, but on the ordinal arrangement of functions. Model «T» relies on qualitative parameters characterizing threshold levels and is therefore, by its properties, a typical parametric model. Any qualitative parameters of this kind, however, are easily converted into quantitative form. Without changing the arrangement of functions and while preserving assignment of an unchanged TIM to an individual, this provides within the TIM some «play» for arbitrary accentuations. A second possibility for explaining accentuations in Model «T» lies in the general properties of the nervous system superimposed on the partial ones. Thus, the assumption of a general property of nervous-system strength-weakness with respect to inhibition generates a division of the TIM into two accentuations.

Model «T» offers many possibilities for further development, not only experimental but also theoretical, both in a purely socionic direction and in a psychophysiological direction. Its development is almost self-evidently suggested. Thus, one may consider hypothetical partially general thresholds separating the pair of functions of the first signal system, sensing and ethics, from the pair of functions of the second signal system, intuition and logic, and this may perhaps cast additional light on the content of the dichotomies «Democrats-Aristocrats», «Questims-Declatims», «Rightists-Leftists», and «Positivists-Negativists». The periodic system of the socion, G. A. Shulman, also requires detailed explanation and interpretation. Taking into account the smaller amplitude of threshold variation in the central functions, Table 2, and replacing thresholds with quantitative values makes it possible to refine models of inter-TIM interaction and opens the way to research and calculation of accentuations. The model may also develop by taking into account and explaining a number of known and indisputable psychophysiological regularities not discussed in the present publication, for example, the partial correlation between weak-signal specialization, «weakness» of the nervous system, and its balance with respect to excitation-inhibition. Attention should also be paid to the circumstance that the concept of filters used by the model does not, generally speaking, require their obligatory interpretation in terms of high or low intensity of incoming signals. Hypothetically, the filters may have a fundamentally different nature, for example separating influences on the ergotropic and trophotropic systems, on the mechanisms of the left and right cerebral hemispheres, and the like.

In the socionic literature, a convenient representation of socionic functions by symbols using a special socionic font has become established for Model «A». In principle, Model «T» permits retention of such notation, but each symbol would then have to be divided in half and colored in two colors, because in Model «T» a function is characterized not by one but by two degrees of freedom, two parameters. Unfortunately, in the author’s opinion, some of the visual clarity of the threshold filters is lost in such a representation, and understanding them requires additional and fairly effortful mental recoding. Therefore, while recognizing the possibility of representing functions by symbols in Model «T» as well, since symbols are good for visual clarity and have contributed substantially to the popularization of socionics, the author himself for now prefers letter notation for functions, using their Russian initial letters, with two indices attached to each. This is convenient both typographically and for understanding, including by nonspecialists in socionics or specialists in adjacent disciplines.

The psychophysiological Model «T» is an exclusively socionic model. It gradually grew out of Model «A», the Reinin dichotomies, and intertype relations. Its continuity with the work of Aušra Augustinavičiūtė is obvious and is many times greater than its continuity with the work of Carl Jung or, still more, with the work of his American followers. The psychophysiological model takes a step back toward Jung in only one sense: it restores to socionics the conception of the integrity of the four Jungian functions, but at the same time it also details and clarifies the picture of all the numerous possible states of each function, aspects in the language of Model «A».

On the other hand, the model is continuous with the Soviet school of the physiology of higher nervous activity and differential psychophysiology and is indebted to the work of the leading figures of that twentieth-century school, I. P. Pavlov, B. M. Teplov, V. D. Nebylitsyn, and their numerous Russian and Ukrainian students. Until its full experimental testing, the model remains hypothetical, although no more so than Model «A». At least at the level of its theoretical construction, it is a synthesis of psychology and physiology. What arises at the junction of sciences can sometimes prove more correct and more general than the old. Whether this is so is for readers and experimenters testing the model to judge.

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The work was publicly presented by the author at the XXII International Conference on Socionics «Psychoinformation Technologies, Personnel Management and Personality Psychology», Kyiv, September 16-23, 2006. Published on the Internet in October 2006. Minor stylistic edits were made to the text in February 2007.

Copyleft: Talanov V. L., 2006

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