LJ Idol Season Nine: "Net-Assisted Navel-Gazing"

[halfshellvenus]

Net-Assisted Navel-Gazing
lj idol season nine | week nine | 1232 words
Keep Calm And End This Meme

x-x-x-x-x

Who can resist those random online quizzes that come around? Thanks to those, I now know that I write like David Foster Wallace, I am more like John Watson than any of the other BBC Sherlock characters (though my Personality Defect is

Comments

[ariss_tenoh]

I'm an INTJ too and let me tell you that people find me weird^^ and can't believe a woman can be logical. *rolls eyes*

[halfshellvenus]

Yay! For the matchiness, at least. :D

It's an uncommon type (< 2%), and SO rare for women

[ariss_tenoh]

LOL! I agree with her. I have zero sympathy for someone who caused their own problem and won't fix it, or just complains about it and won't fix it. For example, there is a co-worker who keeps complaining about it being cold in the department yet she wears very thin clothing. It drives me crazy to hear her complain it all the time.

At least there seems to be other women from this elusive planet^_~

[jexia]

Hahaha, I'm INTJ as well. And a software developer. And I soooo feel like I'm from another planet from most women.

[icaruslived]

I don't mean to be persnickety, I don't (fwiw, my MBTI tends to be INTJ as well) - but the MBTI has been academically basically discarded; it doesn't appear to measure anything real when you actually have the statistics of a large number of people's tests to analyze. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myers-Briggs_Type_Indicator#Criticism .

The test that academia is currently happy with is the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Five_personality_traits; they're fairly confident that it measures something real because experiment after experiment has pulled out these five factors.

[halfshellvenus]

Are you sure you aren't living up to your personality type? What with the throwing away the popular and embracing what seems to Explain It All? ;)

I'll check it out. The INTJ type description is really, really accurate for much of my personality, in a way that many of the other types aren't. Except for the part about 'feeling,' but again-- it focuses on how much you express, so that's a gray area.

I took another test years ago that had 12-16 personality types, and any three of them were similar facets of each other with some aspect of the personality riding stronger. That one was true as well.

I don't think we're going to find any True Universal Thing regarding personalities, because there are so many little differences and subtleties. But in the popular realm, MBTI still seems to be the bandwagon thing (and I'm years late to it!)

[icaruslived]

Haha, I'm pretty sure :P Of course I'm not saying we've found a True Universal Thing; as you rightly point out, that'd be silly :P

I'm just saying that, well, psychology is a science, these days anyway, and what it means to be a science is that at first you start out believing the earth is flat, and then you believe the earth is round, and then you believe the earth is an oblate spheroid. That the public still believes the earth is flat doesn't really mean much when your field has moved on decades ago :P

[reckless_blues]

I think Myers-Briggs is popular for the same reason astrology is popular - people are fascinated with themselves, they like to describe themselves, they're interested in how to interpret themselves and make their identities whole, they're attracted to the idea of embodying powerful archetypes. (I don't see this as being either positive or negative, myself.)

...I'm an INTP, Leo sun, Leo moon, Scorpio rising, Year of the Dragon.

[kagomeshuko]

I'm an INFP bordering sometimes crossing into INFJ territory.

As for the online quizzes, I find some of them to be completely biased and not true at all.

[xo_kizzy_xo]

You too?

:D

I came out right between E/I the only time I officially took the test, back when I was attending a career seminar how-to-get-a-job program. I remember the person giving the test saying that meant I could go either way depending on my mood. I remember thinking, "Wow, that must mean I'm psychotic or something..."

Which I'm not. But it goes to prove how fluid some of the test results can be.

[halfshellvenus]

It sounds as if you're right on the E/I bubble, which most people aren't-- they're pretty obviously one thing or another.

When things are good or easy, you must be an extrovert. When they're tense or unhappy, I'll bet you withdraw.

And what's funny is that, in previous generations (say the Greatest Generation), that was the GOAL! Spread cheer, but not misery. :)

[xo_kizzy_xo]

Once again you've hit the nail on the head ;)

I soak up other people's moods easily -- scarily, in fact. Ask any of my coworkers. They probably peg me as being mostly withdrawn because I don't talk very much while we're working. Little do they know...

[rayaso]

I enjoyed this very much, in part because I could relate all those test scores to the wonderfulness of the real you!

The fact that one of these tests is obsolete but still floating around the web only adds to your point.

[halfshellvenus]

I think I first took that TV Boyfriend test about 5 years ago, but I took it again a few nights ago and the results were the same.

Also true of the Robot thing, though. :O

At least YOU love the results of who I am. That's what really counts. :)

[grail76]

Or that Myers-Briggs is a meme? Hmmm.

[halfshellvenus]

It basically is-- given that it's a trend that people piled onto, and they've let the results affect their thinking.

Plus, as some are saying above, it is perhaps about as valid as some of the other memes I linked. I'm still reserving judgement... ;)