He was born in Ekeberg as a son of wholesaler Christian Emil Schreiner and Bethy Gerhardine Bødtker.

He became a research fellow at the Royal Frederick University in 1904, and was promoted to prosector in 1906 and professor in 1908.

In 1929 he released the work Die Somatologie der Norweger nach Untersuchungen an Rekruten together with Halfdan Bryn.

He was fired by the Nazi occupants of Norway,[1] and was also imprisoned in Grini concentration camp from September 12, 1941 to July 3, 1942, because of "resistance to a German decree".

[4] After the end of the occupation, Schreiner rounded off his career as professor from spring to autumn 1945.