Draft:Tritype

The term Tritype (formed from Latin, [tri meaning three] and type referring to the Enneagram Types) is an advanced theory that expands on Oscar Ichazo's Enneagram of Personality. The Tritype term was created by Katherine Chernick Fauvre, an accredited with distinction Enneagram author, teacher, researcher, and transformational coach based on her 1994-1995 qualitative research conducted on the "internal experience" and "personal image"Self-image of the nine Enneagram personality types.

The research findings revealed that participants identified with the "core fears", "defense strategies," and "idealized image" of three, and not just one Enneagram Type.

Tritype Theory
Tritype theory suggests that while individuals primarily utilize one of the main Enneagram Types as their ‘core type,’ everyone employs three Enneagram Types - the one that is the most dominant within each Center of Intelligence: the Head (5,6,7), Heart (2,3,4) and Gut (8,9,1) centers respectively).

According to Katherine Chernick Fauvre, individuals use their primary Enneagram Type along with two other types in a consistent, cascading, and repetitive hierarchical stacking order to produce a kind of ego intersection among all three types. Therefore, while each Enneagram Type within the Tritype is employed separately, combining all three Enneagram Types gives each Tritype a unique defense strategy (or way of defending against reality) and a specific focus of attention, in other words, an ego type unto itself or "Tritype Archetype" with its own worldview.

It is further proposed that combining the three Enneagram Types, one within each center modifies the characteristics of each Enneagram Type by amplifying some qualities they share in common and minimizing other qualities. The high side and low side interaction between these types further distinguishes each type as having a separate purpose. The high side of the Tritype intersection is that it gives the individual ego direction, focus, and purpose. The low side of the Tritype intersection is that it creates a blind spot that can narrow a person's ability to accurately self-assess and may even prevent a person from achieving a higher level of self-awareness by keeping them stuck in habitual and self-defeating patterns.

Like the Enneagram of Personality, Tritype remains a theory of motivation and not one of behavior.

Tritype itself, is the overarching theory that includes, 3Types, Trigram (symbol), and TriCenter (symbol).

Tritype Archetypes
Like the 27 Enneagram Subtypes introduced by Claudio Naranjo in 1971, there are according to Katherine Chernick Fauvre, 27 Tritype Archetypes.

By combining one Enneagram Type from each Center of Intelligence, 27 permutations are possible. Within each Tritype Archetype, there are six permutations. The following role names were the consolidated agreement of that particular archetype's combinations.

How to find one's Tritype
According to Katherine Chernick Fauvre, there are two main ways to work with the Tritype material. The first is to study the differences within type by looking at the Tritype relationship to those sharing the same dominant Enneagram type, e.g., Type 1 has nine different possible combinations (125, 126, 127, 135, 136, 137, 145, 146, 147). The other is to compare the similarities between people with the same Tritype across different core Enneagram types, i.e. the Tritype Archetypal permutations, e.g., for the Mentor archetype, 125, 152, 251, 215, 512, 521.

Experiencing both positive and negative aspects is common for all types in Tritype, just like your primary Enneagram type.

Research
Tritype theory was born of the results of the qualitative research gathered from Katherine Chernick Fauvre's initial explorations into instinctual subtype, core fears, self-image, language, spirituality, and intimacy, and pair bonding from 1994-1998. After her analysis of the Enneastyle Questionnaire responses from her first research study on Enneastyle – then later in conjunction with the Enneacards Enneagram Test co-created with David Fauvre – she consistently noticed that individuals with the same Enneagram types described themselves similarly. These individuals also used the same or similar lexicon to communicate their internal states, self-image, and motivation strategies.

Katherine Chernick Fauvre’s initial qualitative research included 400 study participants familiar with the Enneagram covering all nine Enneagram types and all three instinctual types: self-preserving, social, and sexual (one-to-one). It showed that each type, subtype, and Tritype has its preferred language or lexicon, even if English was a second language. Further research studies expanded to include a blind study of participants unfamiliar with the Enneagram and involved follow up typing interviews for a year to verify the validity of the original findings.

Testing instruments
To date, the test consists of ten testing instruments: one sentence completion (#1) test, seven hierarchical ranking tests (#2-8), and two interview approaches (#9-10).


 * 1) Enneagram Questionnaire (open-ended answers)
 * 2) Enneacards: Enneagram Type (ranking)
 * 3) Enneacards: Instinctual Subtype (ranking)
 * 4) Enneatypes (paragraphs) at a Glance(ranking)
 * 5) Instinctual Type and Instinctual Subtype Chart Test (numerical data collection)
 * 6) Instinctual Subtypes Test "6" (multiple choice)
 * 7) Enneagram Statements Test (ranking)
 * 8) Enneagram Type Sorter - Idealized Images and Core Fears (ranking)
 * 9) In-Person In-Depth Inquiry Interview with Katherine Chernick Fauvre (validate and clarify online test results), and
 * 10) In-Person follow-up interview where patterns were shared amongst non-related people.

Enneagram and Lexicon
Katherine Fauvre's "Enneastyle" 1994-1995 study revealed that the personal lexicon of research participants strongly indicates the dominant personality style, the instinctual subtype, and the individual's Tritype, regardless if English was the second language.

In 2004, David Fauvre commissioned a software algorithm to detect the complex patterns of language use found in the Enneastyle Questionnaires. The Language Classifier statistically validates that the language responses in the Enneastyle Questionnaire. According to Katherine Chernick Fauvre the findings not only demonstrate that each Enneagram Type speaks in its own lexicon, regardless of age, sex, race, education or culture, but also that individuals use the lexicon of all three dominant types in their Tritype and instinctual subtype.

Enneagram in Pair Bonding
Katherine Fauvre's research in 1998 on the "Enneagram Instinctual Types, Pair Bonding, and Intimacy" focused on pair bonding and how the instinctual types create, develop, and maintain intimate bonds. The conclusion was that individuals utilize supporting instinctual subtypes in a predictable order based on their stacking hierarchy to search for and bond with intimate partners.

Of interest, when those very same instinctual subtype drivers are threatened, challenged or unmet, Tritype although always present is more evident when the defense strategies are triggered.

Mistyping and Mistrityping
According to Katherine Chernick Fauvre, accurately Typing and 'Trityping' occurs only when test-subjects focus on their idealized images, core fears, and defense strategies.

Most personality typologies are based on one’s behaviors. The Enneagram, however, is a personality typology based on the motivations that precede the behaviors. So the Enneagram reveals not “what” we do, but rather “why” we do it. What are the idealized images we have of ourselves? What do we do when we sense there is a threat to our image? Why do we do it?

When faced with the possibility of chaos, or a future threat, and a sense of doom, what do we do and why? Which defense strategy do we use when our image is diminished or negated and our core fears are inflamed? How do we react and defend our reality? Why? What is the deeper more hidden concern that we are protecting?

The natural tendency is identify with an Enneagram type and/or a Tritype archetype which is a good starting point. However, to determine one’s Tritype and core type, one needs to exclude behaviors, identifications, associations, and instead focus on "why you do what you do." To achieve this, proponents of the Tritype suggests "we need to observe what is beneath the behaviors; in essence, the core fears of the Enneagram types in the Tritype".

Tritype vs Trifix
Katherine Chernick Fauvre's 1994-1995 Tritype research found that individuals had the idealized images, core fears, and used the defense strategies of three types, not just one. The participants used the "full defense strategy" of the three Types in their Tritype including the "mental fixations" (mental preoccupations), the "emotional passions" (emotional reactivity), and the "visceral convictions" (physical sensations) of each Type.

On the other hand, Oscar Ichazo's "Trifix" is based on only the “fixations” (mental preoccupations) of the three types in the Trifix. These three types, are one from each Instinctual Triad (Center of Intelligence). In 1996, Katherine Fauvre met a teacher from Arica School who referenced Oscar Ichazo's teachings in a workshop. According to Katherine Chernick Fauvre, what was of note, was that the teacher mentioned that Oscar Ichazo had added the concept of "Trifix", a similar theory to Tritype to his Arica students in 1996. This validated Katherine Chernick Fauvre's findings that individuals use all three centers.

Furthermore, nothing was published on Trifix until January 1997 in the Enneagram Monthly interview with Oscar Ichazo titled "Setting the Record Straight", and nothing further was made available until 2019 when Oscar Ichazo published The Nine Constituents. In it are five general paragraphs without any reference to a head, heart, or gut type.

Because Ichazo added "Trifix" in 1996, it was therefore not part of the original dissemination in 1970 of the Enneagram of Personality, nor was it a part of Claudio Naranjo's Enneagram teachings in his Seekers After Truth groups (SAT Institute) from 1971-1972.

It was in 1997 that Katherine Chernick Fauvre discovered Oscar Ichazo's Integral Philosophy of Trialectics.