Raymond Cattell
Measuring the structure of character
A psychologist who used statistics to chart the underlying factors of personality.
techniques
Personality is that which permits a prediction of what a person will do in a given situation.
Who they were
Raymond Cattell brought rigorous mathematics to the study of personality, using factor analysis to distill human character into measurable dimensions. From this work came his sixteen personality factors and a lasting test for assessing them. He also drew the influential distinction between fluid intelligence, our raw reasoning power, and crystallized intelligence, the knowledge we accumulate over a lifetime. His statistical approach helped make personality something that could be quantified and compared.
Famous books
What they left on the shelf
Terms they cared about
Ideas worth knowing
Their techniques
How the work was done
Their big idea
Factor-Analytic Trait Theory
Raymond Cattell used statistics to sift the language of personality down to a smaller set of underlying factors, mapping the many words we use into measurable dimensions. He also distinguished the quick, adaptive reasoning of fluid intelligence from the accumulated knowledge of crystallized intelligence.
Questions in their spirit
What they’d ask you
Sit with one. Answer online, or in the app.
Carry the idea forward
Cattell — What they’d ask you
Psipas asks you one small, honest question at a time — and builds the picture from your answers.