Psychological type, religion, and culture: further theoretical and empirical perspectives (Part V)

Abstract

This Special Issue of Mental Health, Religion & Culture marks Part V of a series entitled Psychological Type, Religion, and Culture... (Lewis, 2012a, 2012b, 2015a, 2015b, 2018, 2021a, 2021b, 2021c, 2021d). This series has been a somewhat occasional fixture in Mental Health, Religion & Culture. However, recently, there has been a concerted effort to make this series more frequent (Lewis, 2021a, 2021b, 2021c, 2021d), and in doing so, becoming a more established resource for researchers and practitioners alike, interested in examining the relationship between psychological type theory and religiosity, with a particular reference to culture. Indeed, the contribution and success of these previous collections on psychological type has served as the impetus for extending that work further. In addition to this Editorial, this Special Issue comprises of one theoretical article and eight empirical articles. Of these empirical articles, six measure psychological type with the 40-item Francis Psychological Type Scales (FPTS; Francis, 2005) and one with the SIFT method. The FPTS is nowwell established in the literature in the psychology of religion for measuring psychological type (for example see Francis, 2009; Lewis, 2012a, 2012b, 2015a, 2015b, 2018, 2021a, 2021b, 2021c, 2021d; Village, 2011). First, Lloyd (2022) provides a review that examines and evaluates the long-running conflict in personality psychology: that between advocates of the Five-factor Trait-based (McCrea & Costa, 1989) model and those of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (Myers & Myers, 1980) approach. Lloyd (2022) notes “Given the many similarities of the two present paradigms, a unified approach would have a good claim to be the best current portrayal of personality” (p. 817). Second, four papers report on the examination of the psychometric properties of the FPTS (Chaim, 2022; Francis & Village, 2022; Village & Francis, 2022a, 2022b). Francis and Village (2022) report on two samples (N = 185 and 392) of adults participating in short courses relevant for Christian ministry, the satisfactory psychometric properties of the FPTS including the factor structure, internal consistency reliability, and concurrent validity with the 126item Form G (Anglicised) version of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (Myers & McCaulley, 1985). Village and Francis (2022a) report on 209 adults enrolled in a university ministry training course on the satisfactory psychometric properties of the FPTS. Moreover, they also report on the concurrent validity of the FPTS with the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire Revised shortened version (Eysenck et al., 1985) on 78 of the original sample. Village and Francis (2022b) report on 2,769 clergy and churchgoing participants, the concurrent validity of the FPTS with the abbreviated Eysenck Personality Questionnaire Revised (Francis et al., 1992). Chaim (2022) reports on a variety of samples of Polish adults a review of recent research on the Polish adaptation of the FPTS.