Inductive and Deductive Approaches to Understanding Enneatypes
Stereotyping the Enneagram types can be understood in terms of inductive and deductive reasoning. The inductive approach goes from details to generalizations while the deductive approach starts with generalizations and moves to details. Although using one or the other approach exclusively can easily lead to stereotyping, it seems to me that the deductive approach to typing leads to stereotyping more often (especially with people just learning the Enneatypes).
Let's assume that a person's type has already been determined (this blog post is not about determining type, it's about how stereotyping occurs).
The deductive approach takes what's known about the Enneagram type and assumes it must be true of all people identified as that type (e.g., type ones are defined as perfectionists, therefore all people who are identified as type ones must be perfectionists). There are two obvious problems with this approach - an underlying assumption that you understand the type or trait completely and the assumption that the type definition or trait assignment is correct.
It's easy to think you understand something because you've read it in a book and have understood the material you've read. The problem is, until you've had actual real-life experience with the material, all you have are concepts that can easily get confused with reality (i.e., confusing the map with the territory).
The assumption that because it's in a book, the author of that book is a so-called expert on the subject, the book is very popular, or any similar assumption, doesn't prove that the material is accurate or that you didn't somehow misinterpret it. There's a reason that many authors disagree on the types of famous people, they all have a different understanding of the Enneatype system. While each author may offer up valuable and unique insights, no single author has it exactly right. Taken together, the various authors give a more complete picture of the Enneatypes, but that picture won't ever be fully complete.
If the deductive approach has these stereotyping tendencies, what about the inductive approach?
The inductive approach tends to start with observable reality and make generalizations from one or many observations. Basing a generalization on just one example or observation easily leads to stereotyping as well (e.g., my friend is a type 1 and he is a very religious and morally-responsible person, I guess all type 1's are this way).
If both inductive and deductive approaches may lead to stereotyping, how do you avoid it?
When you're new to the Enneatypes, all you may really have to start with is what you read or what you're taught. You apply the generalizations in the books to real people in the world. Just remember that personality by definition is unique for every individual in the world - there are no two people alike. The Enneatype generalizations offer you possibilities that you may or may not see in someone of a particular type. Don't assume it's anything more absolute than that.
When you've identified someone's Enneatype, the inductive approach let's you begin to see the tendencies for a given type (e.g., I've noticed that most type 1's are very critical of themselves). You're starting with the details and creating the generalizations. Just remember the generalizations you've created may only be tendencies of type and everyone is different. If you forget that, you're opening up the potential for stereotyping. Also, there's no guarantee that the person typed was correctly typed or that your observations and interpretations are accurate.
While this back and forth between the details and generalities can help in understanding yourself and others better, I've found the ambiguities of the Enneatypes limiting and confusing. In respecting the individuality of personality, my solution is to look beneath the expression of personality to find something more specific at the core of all this externalized behavior.
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