characterologyn.
/ˌkarᵻktəˈrɒlədʒi/, U.S. /ˌkɛr(ə)ktəˈrɑlədʒi/ Chiefly Psychology and Linguistics.
1. A systematic description of distinguishing or essential features; the aggregate of these.
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1839 Analyst 9 351 Mr. Martin exhibited an ‘insectivorous animal’ to the society: he established a new genus... [His] characterology seems comprehensive and accurate.
1897 Amer. Jrnl. Psychol. 8 483 The more complex and immediately interesting questions of emotion, psychogenesis, pedagogic and individual psychology, or in Wundt's phrase, ‘individual characterology’.
1933 Mind 42 413 Schiller's classification of men into idealists and realists expresses an ultimate difference, to which all the types of even the latest characterologies can be reduced.
1953 W. J. Entwistle Aspects of Lang. ix. 276 The sum of such characteristics should offer the ‘characterology’ of a language.
1976 J. Firbas in J. Vachek in Sel. Writings Eng. & Gen. Linguistics 8 The linguistic characterology of the English and Czech phonological systems.
2007 H. Kellerman & A. Burry Handbk. Psychodiagnostic Testing (ed. 4) xiii. 134 Does the specific characterology act to control emotion or to release emotion?
2. The study of personal character, esp. its development, types, and individual differences (cf. ethology n. 3); a branch of knowledge concerned with this. Also: the study of the distinguishing or essential features of individual languages.
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the mind > mental capacity > psychology > psychology of personality > [noun]
psychodynamics1874
characterology1895
ego-psychology1923
personology1926
personality1930
personalistics1935
1895 Science 30 Aug. 249/2 For the branch of anthropology which has for its field the investigation of these general mental traits, the Germans have proposed the name ‘Characterology’ (Karakterologie).
1903 Amer. Jrnl. Psychol. 14 356 An iconoclastic attitude towards all attempts at practical characterology.
1920 L. H. McCormick (title) Characterology; an exact science.
1930 V. Mathesius in Actes du Premier Congrès Internat. de Linguistes à la Haye, 1928 56 To the problems of linguistic characterology there have been several ways of approach in the history of linguistic research work.
1963 J. Hoenig & M. W. Hamilton tr. K. T. Jaspers Gen. Psychopathol. viii. 429 Characterology ends at the lower levels of psychic life, where the self-aware personality also ends.
2005 Amer. Literary Realism 38 59 Stein's..early ideas about character fed on the general fascination in America of the 1890s with Social Darwinist sociology and characterology.
Derivatives
ˌcharacteroˈlogical adj. [compare German charakterologisch (1879)] of or relating to characterology.
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the mind > mental capacity > psychology > psychology of personality > [adjective]
characterological1903
personalistic1904
personological1943
1903 Elem. School Teacher 3 357 Some studies..have been psychological, dealing with mental process, rather than characterological (or ethological), dealing with conduct.
1948 C. Berg Clin. Psychol. xvii. 219 Normal persons, characterological cases and psychotics.
1980 R. Jakobson in Sel. Writings (1985) VII. 175 The significance of these individual characterological studies is beyond any doubt.
2012 Lewiston (Idaho) Morning Tribune (Nexis) 5 Aug. Gaffes can reveal candidates' characterological failures as well.
ˌcharacteroˈlogically adv. as regards characterology.
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the mind > mental capacity > psychology > psychology of personality > [adverb]
characterologically1921
psychodynamically1946
1921 L. H. McCormick Student's Course in Characterology vii. 38 Under what headings are the teeth considered characterologically?
1963 Arch. Gen. Psychiatry 8 320/1 Sometimes envy erupted in a person not characterologically envious.
2006 AJS Rev. 30 298 Eisner traffics in Jewish stereotype, both visually and characterologically.
ˌcharacteˈrologist n. a student of or specialist in characterology.
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the mind > mental capacity > psychology > psychology of personality > [noun] > student of
characterologist1917
personologist1938
ego-psychologist1969
1917 Psychol. Bull. 14 195 The whole field awaits the characterologist who shall describe the field.
1958 Listener 12 June 976/1 Characterologists like Freud, La Bruyère, and Theophrastus.
2002 Art Inst. Chicago Museum Stud. 28 48/2 The subjects are carefully posed and photographed in the frontal or profile views favored by characterologists like Peters.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2014; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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