The program “Family Profile” developed by the Israeli institute “Am haZikaron” with the help of statistical analysis determines the dominant type of “family personality”. In other words, it allows to define a conditional “family personality”, the traits of which are steadily transmitted to the descendants and manifested in a number of aptitudes or talents, which ultimately leads a person to achievements and successes in this or that field.
Usually it is possible to identify certain patterns of a given Jewish family to which a person belongs for at least two hundred years. Thus, with one or another probability, we can not only delve into the history of the family and build its profile, but also assume the main general characteristics of its members.
Family Profile, using statistical data and based on the theory of John L. Holland, considers the dominant personality type as a combination of several basic personality types. This makes it possible to use Family Profile to determine a number of typical basic personality parameters, from professional and social to psychological and intellectual.
According to the generally accepted theory developed by John L. Holland, profession is one of the most vivid manifestations of personality type. Based on this, it is logical that personality type determines profession to a large extent. According to this statement, knowing a person’s profession we can assume to what type of personality he or she belongs. Within the framework of this theory, personality type is described as a combination of six basic types: Realistic, Intellectual, Artistic, Social, Enterprising and Conventional.
Personality types in this case can be characterized by the following parameters: preferred field of activity, social relations and professional environment, psychological aspect of personality, personality abilities and properties, type of thinking, type of intelligence, preferred environment and possible places of work, and sometimes typical hobbies.
The Israeli Institute “Am haZikaron” conducted a number of interesting statistical studies, the conclusions of which later (based on the theory of John L. Holland) and led to the creation of the program Family Profile.
The first of these studies , “Occupational structure of bearers of Jewish rabbinical, occupational and generic surnames “, a statistical study of the occupational structure of certain family clusters, set out to find out whether the difference in occupational skills of ancestors is reflected in their descendants. If a person’s ancestor was a rabbi or a craftsman, how would that affect that person’s occupational proclivities? Some or other correlations of the occupations of ancestors and descendants must, of course, be present simply by virtue of the very notion of heredity. But how strong are these correlations after hundreds of years and what is their structure? If we look at a thousand descendants of rabbis and a thousand descendants of artisans who lived hundreds of years ago – will they, after so many years, be no different from each other in their occupational preferences? In turn, will they be no different from Jews whose ancestors did not belong to these two categories?
The task was in the field of statistics, and as a result, the answer was quite definite. It turned out to be the conclusion that the professional preferences of the descendants of rabbis, craftsmen and Jews who do not belong to any of these categories differ in a very specific, statistically significant way.
This statistical study [1] was conducted on 9,386 individuals. A database consisting of 858 and 1057 members of the first two groups (rabbinic and professional surnames, respectively) and 7471 common Jewish surnames was used. The statistics of the database matched the statistics of randomly selected individuals from the groups under consideration.
The definition of occupation types was harmonized with the International Standard Classification of Occupations. It turned out that there is a statistically significant difference in the occupational structure of the three groups (which is not explained by statistical error). The magnitude of this difference was quantified. Implications for intergenerational mobility were considered.
The second study conducted is “Statistics of clan component of intergenerational professional proactivity, unpublished “.
It was pointed out that in one family, when considering the complete genealogical tree, more than fifty percent of the current generation of its members are entrepreneurs rather than employees. By comparison, in Israel, “the land of start-ups”, with an extremely high business activity of the population, entrepreneurs make up only about seven percent, according to the Ministry of National Insurance. It was decided to investigate the history of this family to see if this trait is hereditary and characteristic of other generations of the family, or if it is just a coincidence in this generation.
It was found that the clan, beginning with a single family living a little over two hundred years ago, had grown comparatively rapidly. Beginning in the late nineteenth century, each generation numbered hundreds of people. By this time, many of these people had lost any connection between themselves and often lived in different countries. One might have thought that these people had different character traits. However, the reality turned out to be somewhat different. We found that the different, unrelated branches of this lineage produce extremely enterprising people, so that in each branch the percentage of entrepreneurs or strongly enterprising people who have their own business in one area or another is about the same.
Five generations of the family were studied, the number of members in which numbered hundreds of people, which allowed using rigorous statistical methods to prove such characterological similarity between generations. It turned out that such a quality as initiative and entrepreneurship is largely persistently transmitted in families over many generations [2].
The third study – “Statistical analysis of differentiation of information array of family data by field of activity, unpublished ” – “Statistical analysis of differentiation of information array of family data by field of activity”.
Opening any Jewish encyclopedia, one can see that the bearers of frequently occurring surnames differ greatly from each other. For example, among the bearers of one surname (for convenience, called below as representatives of one family, although among them there are also possible namesakes, which, however, does not happen so often in Jewish families due to the specific conditions of assigning surnames to Jews) we see many musicians and few writers, and among the bearers of another – vice versa. Since we are talking about tens-hundreds of representatives of these surnames, this observation looks not accidental, telling us that different genera manifest themselves in society in different ways. Some genera are dominant in the arts, others in science, others in technology, etc. (we are only comparing the relative numbers of people involved in the arts and sciences in these genera). However, while it is possible to make such an observation with the naked eye, “Am haZikaron” set itself the task – can we prove on the basis of these observations that the bearers of different surnames are objectively different from each other, and thus, on the basis of the above, we can speak about the aptitudes or talents of this or that clan?
Once again we turned to statistics, where we have already considered this kind of problems. If, as is often thought, a surname is nothing more than a surname, then in any two genera scientists, people of art and other spheres of activity should be present with more or less equal probability. This so-called in such studies null hypothesis can be consistently tested with the help of empirical data, which in our case are the number of the most manifested representatives of different genera in six encyclopedias in four languages (Hebrew, English, German, Russian).
By testing the null hypothesis with the help of appropriate tests known as Kolmogorov-Smirnov tests, we were able to prove that the difference in talents of representatives of different surnames is objective and the difference in proportions of representatives of different genera in encyclopedias cannot be written off due to random coincidence. In other words, we made sure that the surnames, which usually appear to us as random coincidences, reflect the abilities of the representatives of the given genera. [3]
Finally, the fourth study conducted by the Institute is “On the theory of meta-clans”.
In this study, conducted over an eight-year period, the following patterns were established:
In spite of the length of time space of families up to nine hundred and fifty years; in spite of geographical remoteness between family branches (i.e. their isolated residence for at least 100-150 years, not only in different countries, but also on different continents with complete absence of communication between them); in spite of kinship remoteness between family members for 10, 25, 38 generations and complete absence of any information about other family members – dominant traits of the genus (metaclan) are steadily transmitted.
In the course of research, a number of dominant traits of the genus (Metaclanus) were identified, which have not undergone changes for at least almost 10 last studied centuries of existence of these families and are observed in all studied genera without exception. [4]
Thus, summarizing the above, we can assume that:
- The occupational preferences (skills, broadly defined) of ancestors correlate with their descendants’ choice of field of endeavor, up to 8-10 generations or more.
- There are generationally transmitted occupational aptitudes united by clusters of different surnames (genera).
- There are stable dominant clan traits regardless of time and kinship distance of clan members.
- There is an ancestral stable pattern of behavior and prevailing characteristic features of representatives of a particular clan.
So, relying on this method of studying the manifestation of regularities in the history of the family and determining the dominant ancestral qualities in its representatives, conditionally called Geneasophy (from Greek genos, genea – family, clan and sophia – wisdom) it is possible to proceed to the following results of these studies.
With the information available to us about a family or surname (which, as shown above, are often analogous concepts), specifically, the time of its origin and duration of existence, events in the places of residence, and professional activities, we can construct a Family Profile of this or that family and its representatives.
Summarizing all the above and proceeding (according to John L. Holland) from the professional aptitudes of a person (and in this case a whole group of mostly related individuals) we can, as it was mentioned above, determine his personality type. That, in its turn, gives us the possibility of some modeling or conditional prediction of his aptitudes, abilities and predilections.
A brief bibliography:
John Lewis Holland
Holland, J. L. (1996). Exploring careers with a typology: What we have learned and some new directions. American Psychologist, 51
Holland, J. L. (1997). Making vocational choices: A theory of vocational personalities and work environments (3rd ed.). Odessa, FL: Psychological Assessment Resources, Inc.
Holland, J. L. (1958). A personality inventory employing occupational titles. Journal of Applied Psychology, 42, 336-332.
Holland, J. L. (1959). A theory of vocational choice. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 6, 35-45.
Holland, J. L. (1974). Vocational guidance for everyone. Educational Researcher, 3 (1), 9-15.
Holland, J. L., Holland, J. (1999). Why interest inventories are also personality inventories. In M. Savickas, A. Spokane (Eds.), Vocational interests: Meaning,measurement, and counseling use (pp. 87-102). Palo Alto, CA: Davies-Black.
Edward de Bono
De Bono, Edward. The use of lateral thinking. Penguin, 1971.
De Bono, Edward, and Efrem Zimbalist. Lateral thinking. London: Penguin, 1970.
Bruner, Jerome Seymour, and George Allen Austin.
Bruner, Jerome Seymour, and George Allen Austin. A study of thinking. Transaction publishers, 1986.
Joy Paul Guilford
Guilford, J. P. (1950) Creativity, American Psychologist, Volume 5
Guilford, J. P. (1967). The Nature of Human Intelligence.
Guilford, J. P. Hoepfner, R. (1971). The Analysis of Intelligence.
Ellis Paul Torrance
Torrance, Ellis Paul. Thinking creatively in action and movement: Administration, scoring, and norms manual. Department of Educational Psychology, the University of Georgia, 1975.
Rubenson, Daniel L., and Mark A. Runco.
“The psychoeconomic approach to creativity.” New ideas in Psychology 10.2 (1992).
Howard Gardner
Gardner, Howard. Multiple intelligences. Vol. 5. Minnesota Center for Arts Education, 1992.
Gardner, Howard E. Intelligence reframed: Multiple intelligences for the 21st century. Hachette UK, 2000.
Mayer, J. D., Salovey, P.
Mayer, J.D., Salovey, P. (1997). What is emotional intelligence? In P. Salovey, D. Sluyter (Eds.), Emotional development and emotional intelligence: Implications for educators (pp. 3-31). New York: Basic Books.
Matthews, Gerald, Moshe Zeidner, and Richard D. Roberts.
Matthews, Gerald, Moshe Zeidner, and Richard D. Roberts. Emotional intelligence: Science and myth. MIT press, 2004.
Reuven Bar-On
The development of a concept of psychological well-being. / Doctoral dissertation.
The bar-on model of emotional-social intelligence (esi) Reuven Bar-On University of Texas Medical Branch
Luria, Alexander Romanovich
Luria, Alexander Romanovich. The Nature of Human Conflicts – or Emotion, Conflict, and Will: An Objective Study of Disorganization and Control of Human Behavior. New York: Liveright Publishers, 1932.
Rudolf Arnheim
1954/1974: Art and Visual Perception: A Psychology of the Creative Eye. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.
1969: Visual Thinking. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Bloom, Benjamin S
Bloom, Benjamin S. Taxonomy of Educational Objectives (1956). Published by Allyn and Bacon, Boston, MA. Copyright (c) 1984 by Pearson Education.
Anderson L. W. and Krathwohl D. R
Anderson L.W. and Krathwohl D.R., et al (Eds.) A Taxonomy for Learning, Teaching, and Assessing: A Revision of Bloom’s Taxonomy of Educational Objectives. New York: Longman, 2001.
Sobchik, L. N.
Sobchik, L. N. “Psychology of individuality.” Theory and practice of psychodiagnostics. St. Petersburg: Speech 624 (2003).
Leonhard Karl
Leonhard Karl Akzentuierte Persönlichkeiten. – Berlin, 1976
[1] Vidgop, A. J., Norton, N., Rosenberg, N., Haguel-Spitzberg, M., and Fouxon, I., 2020.
Occupational structure of bearers of Jewish rabbinical, occupational, and generic surnames. F1000Research, 9.
[2] Vidgop, A. J., Norton, N., Haguel-Spitzberg, M., and Fouxon, I., 2022.
Statistics of clan component of intergenerational professional proactivity, unpublished.
[3] Vidgop, A. J., Norton, N., Rosenberg, N., Haguel-Spitzberg, M. and Fouxon, I.,2022.
Statistical analysis of differentiation of information array of family data by field of activity, unpublished.
[4] Vidgop, A. J. and Haguel-Spitzberg, M.
On the theory of meta-clans: A multidisciplinary study, Szondiana 37, Journal of Fate Analysis and Contributions to Depth Psychology, Zurich, 12 (2018).