Interpersonal compatibility
Encyclopedia
Interpersonal compatibility is a concept that describes the long-term interaction
between two or more individual
s in terms of the ease and comfort of communication.
's Lysis
), no general theory of interpersonal compatibility has been proposed in psychology. Existing concepts are contradictory in many details, beginning with the central point—whether compatibility is caused by matching psychological parameters or by their complementarity. At the same time, the idea of interpersonal compatibility is analyzed in non-scientific fields (see, e.g., Astrological compatibility
).
Among existing psychological tools for studying and/or measuring interpersonal compatibility, the following are noteworthy:
Socionics
has proposed a theory of intertype relationships between psychological types based on a modified version of C.G. Jung's theory of psychological types
. Communication between types is described using the concept of information metabolism
proposed by Antoni Kępiński
. However, socionic theory is somewhat controversial because of a lack of experimental data (although socionic data are much more representative than, e.g., those of Ackoff and Emery).
Alternative hypotheses of intertype relationships were later proposed by adherents of MBTI (D. Keirsey
's hypothesis of compatibility between Keirsey temperaments
, an intertype relationships chart by Joe Butt and Marina Margaret Heiss, LoveTypes by Alexander Avila and some other theories). Neither of these hypotheses are commonly accepted in the Myers–Briggs type theory. MBTI in Russia is often confused with socionics
, although the 16 types in these theories are described differently and do not correlate exactly.
. MHC genes make molecules that enable the immune system to recognize invaders; generally, the more diverse the MHC genes of the parents, the stronger the immune system of the offspring. It would therefore be beneficial to have evolved systems of recognizing individuals with different MHC genes and preferentially selecting them to breed with.
Yamazaki et al. (1976) showed this to be the case for male mice, who show a preference for females of different MHC. Similar results have been obtained with fish.
In 1995, Swiss biologist Claus Wedekind
determined MHC-dissimilar mate-selection tendencies in humans. In the experiment, a group of female college students smelled T-shirts that had been worn by male students for two nights, without deodorant, cologne or scented soaps. Overwhelmingly, the women preferred the odors of men with dissimilar MHCs to their own. However, their preference was reversed if they were taking oral contraceptives. The hypothesis is that MHCs affect mate choice and that oral contraceptives can interfere with this. A study in 2005 on 58 test subjects confirmed the second part—taking oral contraceptives made women prefer men with MHCs similar to their own. However, without oral contraceptives, women had no particular preference, contradicting the earlier finding. However, another study in 2002 showed results consistent with Wedekind's—paternally inherited HLA-associated odors influence odor preference and may serve as social cues.
In 2008, Peter Donnelly
and colleagues proposed that MHC is related to mating choice in some human populations.
Interaction
Interaction is a kind of action that occurs as two or more objects have an effect upon one another. The idea of a two-way effect is essential in the concept of interaction, as opposed to a one-way causal effect...
between two or more individual
Individual
An individual is a person or any specific object or thing in a collection. Individuality is the state or quality of being an individual; a person separate from other persons and possessing his or her own needs, goals, and desires. Being self expressive...
s in terms of the ease and comfort of communication.
Existing concepts
Although various concepts of interpersonal compatibility have existed from ancient times (see, e.g., PlatoPlato
Plato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...
's Lysis
Lysis (dialogue)
Lysis is a dialogue of Plato which discusses the nature of friendship. It is generally classified as an early dialogue.The main characters are Socrates, the boys Lysis and Menexenus who are friends, as well as Hippothales, who is in unrequited love with Lysis and therefore, after the initial...
), no general theory of interpersonal compatibility has been proposed in psychology. Existing concepts are contradictory in many details, beginning with the central point—whether compatibility is caused by matching psychological parameters or by their complementarity. At the same time, the idea of interpersonal compatibility is analyzed in non-scientific fields (see, e.g., Astrological compatibility
Astrological compatibility
Astrological compatibility is the branch of astrology that studies relationships by comparing natal horoscopes. A natal horoscope is a chart, map, or imaginary snapshot of the planets in the Solar System and their positions in the zodiac at the exact time of a person's birth. The signs of the...
).
Among existing psychological tools for studying and/or measuring interpersonal compatibility, the following are noteworthy:
- a test of interpersonal compatibilityInterpersonal CircumplexThe interpersonal circle or interpersonal circumplex is a model for conceptualizing, organizing, and assessing interpersonal behavior, traits, and motives . The interpersonal circumplex is defined by two orthogonal axes: a vertical axis and a horizontal axis...
proposed by Timothy LearyTimothy LearyTimothy Francis Leary was an American psychologist and writer, known for his advocacy of psychedelic drugs. During a time when drugs like LSD and psilocybin were legal, Leary conducted experiments at Harvard University under the Harvard Psilocybin Project, resulting in the Concord Prison... - a three-factor hypothesis (inclusion, control, and affection/openness) by William SchutzWilliam Schutznot to be confused with "Schulz" or "Schultz", see also William Schulz William Schutz was an American psychologist....
(further developed into FIRO-BFundamental Interpersonal Relations OrientationFundamental interpersonal relations orientation is a theory of interpersonal relations, introduced by William Schutz in 1958. This theory mainly explains the interpersonal underworld of a small group...
questionnaire) - Hans Jurgen Eysenck's hypothesis on compatibility between temperamentTemperamentIn psychology, temperament refers to those aspects of an individual's personality, such as introversion or extroversion, that are often regarded as innate rather than learned...
s - Social psychological research on similarity of interests and attitudes
- Compatibility test pamphlets of the 1930s and early computer dating of the 1950s, developed by George W. CraneGeorge W. CraneDr. George W. Crane was a psychologist and physician, best known as a conservative syndicated newspaper columnist for 60 years , and published at least three books. He was the father of Republican U.S...
- hypothesis of compatibility between personality attitudes by Russell Ackoff and Frederick Edmund Emery,
- DMO tool by Lyudmila Sobchik (DMO stands for Interpersonal relations diagnostics, Russian: )
Socionics
Socionics
Socionics , in psychology, is a theory of information processing and personality type, distinguished by its information model of the psyche and a model of interpersonal relations. It incorporates Carl Jung's work on Psychological Types with Antoni Kępiński's theory of information metabolism...
has proposed a theory of intertype relationships between psychological types based on a modified version of C.G. Jung's theory of psychological types
Psychological Types
Psychological Types is the title of the sixth volume in the Princeton / Bollingen edition of the Collected Works of Carl Jung. The original German language edition, "Psychologische Typen", was first published by Rascher Verlag, Zurich in 1921....
. Communication between types is described using the concept of information metabolism
Information metabolism
Information metabolism is a psychological theory of human social interactions based on information processing . It was developed in Eastern Europe by Antoni Kępiński....
proposed by Antoni Kępiński
Antoni Kepinski
Antoni Kępiński was a Polish psychiatrist.He attended the Bartłomiej Nowodworski High School. In 1936 he entered the Medical Faculty of the Jagiellonian University. In 1939, he interrupted his studies before graduation and volunteered for the Polish Army to defend his country from the German...
. However, socionic theory is somewhat controversial because of a lack of experimental data (although socionic data are much more representative than, e.g., those of Ackoff and Emery).
Alternative hypotheses of intertype relationships were later proposed by adherents of MBTI (D. Keirsey
David Keirsey
David West Keirsey , is an internationally renowned psychologist, a professor emeritus at California State University, Fullerton, and the author of several books...
's hypothesis of compatibility between Keirsey temperaments
Keirsey Temperament Sorter
The Keirsey Temperament Sorter is a self-assessed personality questionnaire designed to help people better understand themselves and others. It was first introduced in the book Please Understand Me...
, an intertype relationships chart by Joe Butt and Marina Margaret Heiss, LoveTypes by Alexander Avila and some other theories). Neither of these hypotheses are commonly accepted in the Myers–Briggs type theory. MBTI in Russia is often confused with socionics
Socionics
Socionics , in psychology, is a theory of information processing and personality type, distinguished by its information model of the psyche and a model of interpersonal relations. It incorporates Carl Jung's work on Psychological Types with Antoni Kępiński's theory of information metabolism...
, although the 16 types in these theories are described differently and do not correlate exactly.
Controversy
The following problems may be reasons for the absence of a theory of psychological compatibility:- lack of generally accepted criteria for measuring compatibility ("degrees of compatibility")
- the terms compatibility and matching, although not identical, are often confused in common speech (the first rather comprises complementarity and the second similarity of partners)
- the field's unclear status in social science (the problem may belong to social psychologySocial psychologySocial psychology is the scientific study of how people's thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are influenced by the actual, imagined, or implied presence of others. By this definition, scientific refers to the empirical method of investigation. The terms thoughts, feelings, and behaviors include all...
, sociologySociologySociology is the study of society. It is a social science—a term with which it is sometimes synonymous—which uses various methods of empirical investigation and critical analysis to develop a body of knowledge about human social activity...
, personality psychologyPersonality psychologyPersonality psychology is a branch of psychology that studies personality and individual differences. Its areas of focus include:* Constructing a coherent picture of the individual and his or her major psychological processes...
etc.) - different psychological theories propose different parameters of personality, but only few of them are generally accepted among psychologists (e.g. cognitive styles); still, even generally accepted criteria may be irrelevant to interpersonal compatibility
- some, if not all personality parameters (even genetically determined ones), may change over time and/or due to interpersonal interaction
- the non-traditional view of psychological dependencySubstance dependenceThe section about substance dependence in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders does not use the word addiction at all. It explains:...
, which is not considered drug dependency, but rather a need (unilateral or mutual) for somebody else's psychological support that one cannot or can hardly provide by him/herself.
MHC and sexual mating
It has been suggested that MHC plays a role in the selection of potential mates, via olfactionOlfaction
Olfaction is the sense of smell. This sense is mediated by specialized sensory cells of the nasal cavity of vertebrates, and, by analogy, sensory cells of the antennae of invertebrates...
. MHC genes make molecules that enable the immune system to recognize invaders; generally, the more diverse the MHC genes of the parents, the stronger the immune system of the offspring. It would therefore be beneficial to have evolved systems of recognizing individuals with different MHC genes and preferentially selecting them to breed with.
Yamazaki et al. (1976) showed this to be the case for male mice, who show a preference for females of different MHC. Similar results have been obtained with fish.
In 1995, Swiss biologist Claus Wedekind
Claus Wedekind
Claus Wedekind is a Swiss biological researcher notable for his 1995 study that determined a major histocompatibility complex dependent mate preference in humans....
determined MHC-dissimilar mate-selection tendencies in humans. In the experiment, a group of female college students smelled T-shirts that had been worn by male students for two nights, without deodorant, cologne or scented soaps. Overwhelmingly, the women preferred the odors of men with dissimilar MHCs to their own. However, their preference was reversed if they were taking oral contraceptives. The hypothesis is that MHCs affect mate choice and that oral contraceptives can interfere with this. A study in 2005 on 58 test subjects confirmed the second part—taking oral contraceptives made women prefer men with MHCs similar to their own. However, without oral contraceptives, women had no particular preference, contradicting the earlier finding. However, another study in 2002 showed results consistent with Wedekind's—paternally inherited HLA-associated odors influence odor preference and may serve as social cues.
In 2008, Peter Donnelly
Peter Donnelly
Peter Donnelly, FRS is an Australian mathematician and Professor of Statistical Science at the University of Oxford. He is a specialist in applied probability and has made contributions to coalescent theory...
and colleagues proposed that MHC is related to mating choice in some human populations.
Complementarity
Complementarity in social psychology is defined on the basis of the interpersonal circle (Carson, 1969), according to which interpersonal behaviors fall on a circle with two dimensions, namely dominance (i.e. dominant–submissive) and warmth (i.e. hostile–friendly). It states that each interpersonal behavior invites certain responses of another interactant. The behavior and the response it invites are said to be complementary (Horowitz, Dryer, & Krasnoperova, 1997) when friendly behavior begets friendly behavior, and dominant behavior begets submissive behavior. When people fail to give the invited response, it is said to be a non-complementary interaction. If the first person's behavior invites a reaction from the second person that matches the second person's goals, then the second person is satisfied; otherwise, the second person is frustrated (Dryer & Horowitz, 1997).Factors affecting complementarity
- Setting i.e. in work, at home, in recreation and others
- Social Role Status e.g. supervisors, coworker and supervisee
- Time e.g. strangers, old friends
See also
- Arranged marriageArranged marriageAn arranged marriage is a practice in which someone other than the couple getting married makes the selection of the persons to be wed, meanwhile curtailing or avoiding the process of courtship. Such marriages had deep roots in royal and aristocratic families around the world...
- Emotional conflictEmotional conflict"Emotional conflicts and the intervention of the unconscious are the classical features of...medical psychology" for C. G. Jung. Equally, 'Freud's concept of emotional conflict as amplified by Anna Freud...Erikson and others is central in contemporary theories of mental disorder in children,...
- Conflictology
- Dating
- EndogamyEndogamyEndogamy is the practice of marrying within a specific ethnic group, class, or social group, rejecting others on such basis as being unsuitable for marriage or other close personal relationships. A Greek Orthodox Christian endogamist, for example, would require that a marriage be only with another...
- Family therapyFamily therapyFamily therapy, also referred to as couple and family therapy, family systems therapy, and family counseling, is a branch of psychotherapy that works with families and couples in intimate relationships to nurture change and development. It tends to view change in terms of the systems of...
- FriendshipFriendshipFriendship is a form of interpersonal relationship generally considered to be closer than association, although there is a range of degrees of intimacy in both friendships and associations. Friendship and association are often thought of as spanning across the same continuum...
- Interpersonal attractionInterpersonal attractionInterpersonal attraction is the attraction between people which leads to friendships and romantic relationships. Interpersonal attraction, the process, is distinct from perceptions of physical attractiveness which involves views of what is and is not considered beautiful or attractive.The study of...
- Interpersonal communicationInterpersonal communicationInterpersonal communication is usually defined by communication scholars in numerous ways, usually describing participants who are dependent upon one another. It...
- Interpersonal relations
- Irreconcilable differencesIrreconcilable differencesThe concept of irreconcilable differences provides a possible ground for divorce in a number of jurisdictions.In Australian family law with no-fault divorce it is the sole ground, adequate proof being that the estranged couple have been separated more than 12 months.In the United States it can be...
- LoveLoveLove is an emotion of strong affection and personal attachment. In philosophical context, love is a virtue representing all of human kindness, compassion, and affection. Love is central to many religions, as in the Christian phrase, "God is love" or Agape in the Canonical gospels...
- Selection of a partner
- Social interaction
- SociometrySociometrySociometry is a quantitative method for measuring social relationships. It was developed by psychotherapist Jacob L. Moreno in his studies of the relationship between social structures and psychological well-being....
- SocionicsSocionicsSocionics , in psychology, is a theory of information processing and personality type, distinguished by its information model of the psyche and a model of interpersonal relations. It incorporates Carl Jung's work on Psychological Types with Antoni Kępiński's theory of information metabolism...
- Substance dependenceSubstance dependenceThe section about substance dependence in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders does not use the word addiction at all. It explains:...
Literature
- J Soc Psychol. 1974 Dec; 94 (2nd half): 243–52. Husband-wife compatibility and the management of stress. Burke R.J., Firth J., McGrattan C. PMID: 4444276
- Васильев Вл. Н., Рамазанова А. П., Богомаз С. А. Познай других — найди себя (Лекции о психологических типах и их отношениях). — Томск: 1996. — 185 с.
- Гуленко В. В. Структурно-функциональная соционика: Разработка метода комбинаторики полярностей. — Ч.1 — Киев: «Транспорт України», 1999. — 187 с.
- Обозов Н. Н. Психология межличностных отношений. — К.: Высшая школа, 1990.
- Собчик Л. Н. Диагностика психологической совместимости. — СПб.: «Речь», 2002. — 80 с.
- Филатова Е. С. Соционика личных отношений. — М., «Чёрная белка», 2004. — 76 с.
External links
- R. Landwehr. Sozionik: eine neue Psychoreligion oder eine wissenschaftlich fundierte Lebenshilfe?
- Psychological compatibility of the crew members during outer space travel.
- The Truth about compatibility testing
- Personality Compatibility Analysis
- Психологическая (межличностная) совместимость
- Л.Н.Собчик. Ещё раз про любовь
- Интертипные отношения в Соционике, критерии комфортности