An experiment in personality

In general, I don’t give much credence to personality or educational profiling—I have more than one learning style, no perfect career path, and I am less than credulous about Astrology. However, I have long had faith in the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator. In college (in an introductory Psychology course) I took a formal, multi-hour evaluation of my personality type. I was shocked by how accurate the results were (and a little bit alarmed to learn that I fit such a well-defined archetype). I was an INFJ, which stands for Introversion, Intuition, Feeling, & Judgment. If you know me, you know the linked description is dead on (if you have only just met me, I might not seem “highly private” given the incessant tomfoolery, but I do keep quite a bit of myself to myself).

This week, for a seminar course, I was given a fascinating assignment: we were handed a list of behaviors and attitudes which correlate with each of the eight personality characteristics, and we were then asked to behave opposite to our natural tendencies and see what happened. So, here’s what happened:

Extroversion (v Introversion)

People wouldn’t necessarily guess that I’m an introvert, but I used to be incredibly shy (I didn’t talk for the first month of kindergarten) and, more recently, I spent four months in the woods. Still, it’s true that I didn’t have a lot of trouble with this aspect of the assignment.

As an extroverted act, I recently rejoined facebook. I’m remembering now while I left. While it’s a useful networking and organizational tool, the social interactions are fundamentally unfulfilling (what a cool looking word, “unfulfilling”! I think because the u’s and the f’s are both separated by two letters…) to me as an introvert. I prefer focused, substantial interactions—dinner with a small group of friends, a walk in the woods—while extroverts tend to prefer facebook-like interactions—frequent and broad.

Thinking (v Feeling)

These traits have to do with decision making—as a Feeler, I tend to make decisions empathically or based on a set of values, considering the needs of whoever will be effected. Thinkers decide based logically or based on a set of rules, striving for consistency and clarity.

For my assignment, I applied a Thinker's decision making patterns to a task at work. I work at Syracuse Library’s Special Collections Research Center, organizing William Safire’s research files for his column, "On Language". The files are inconsistently labeled, so there are a number of decisions to be made when re-foldering and re-labeling—I’ll focus on punctuation (fun!).

As a Feeler, I would usually decide how to punctuate the folders by considering the experience of the end user. When browsing through the database of Safire’s notes, what will be the most intuitive and attractive punctuation? But while wearing my Thinking hat (see what I did there?) I forced myself to create a set of punctuation rules and stick to them:

• A backslash separates two or more related or synonymous words, e.g. Agon/agony, Assure/ensure/insure
• An em dash is used in lieu of the word "and", e.g. Antifreeze—coolant, or in lieu of a colon, e.g. Age and experience—internet terms
• A comma is only used in proper names, e.g. Auden, W.H. (you may be noting a pattern, I just finished filing the A’s) or when a comma was used in the title of Safire’s column, e.g. attaboy, attosecond

These rules felt arbitrary, and didn’t always feel appropriate (see Antifreeze—coolant), my natural tendency would be to punctuate on a case-by-case basis. But, of course, that is bad practice. The final database should be consistent in every detail. In this case, the task called for a Thinker, not a Feeler.

Perception (v Judgment)

As a Judger, I love to make schedules and timetables, to organize my time into discreet blocks. Correspondingly, I prioritize work, and hate leaving things unfinished. I would not be surprised if every MSLIS graduate in the history of forever has been a Judger.

Perceivers are essentially the opposite of Judgers, loose with schedules, flaky, a mess (the formal type descriptions are all value-neutral, Judgmental (again! I am on fire) tone is my own). I gave it a shot.

Every night, I lull myself to sleep by planning the next day, something like up at 6:30, out by 7:20, coffee, bagel (no small bills, have to break a 20), work 8:00-1:00, lunch… it’s a blast. But on Sunday night I didn’t let myself plan anything. If you have any experience with Buddhist meditation, it was a bit like trying to practice mindfulness—every time a schedule arose in my mind, I had to let it slip away. It was pretty rough, I kept myself up trying not to think too much, refusing to plan breakfast—my mind was in revolt against itself. The next day was a disaster too, I missed breakfast because the coffee shop opened at 8:00 (normally I would have checked online) and I almost didn’t make it to the gym since I hadn’t decided on a start time. Never again, Judgment for life.

Sensing (v Intuition)

Often described as learning preferences, Sensing and Intuition relate to how we prefer to handle and process information (pretty relevant to LIS). Intuitives like me often prefer abstract ideas, insights, the big picture, while Sensers prefer data, physical realities, and practical applications (Scientists are often Intuitive, while Engineers are Sensate).

Two of my textbooks exemplify these two different learning preferences. So far, I love the Intuitive Atlas of New Librarianship. It is packed with big ideas, moral imperatives and broad definitions. It’s also beautifully written—very much my kind of book.

Reference and Information Services in the 21st Century, on the other hand, is pretty firmly Sensate. The core chapters describe various reference sources, one after another, in factual, practical detail. I find myself having to go back and reread paragraphs constantly. I realize the information is useful, even necessary, but it just doesn’t captivate me.

So, what are the results of this personality experiment? Sure, I tend to behave in a certain way, but I’m capable of acting antithetically. The toughest changes were behaviors which had no benefit (e.g. refusing to plan) while the easiest were changes which were vital to success at my chosen task (e.g. punctuating). Over the course of my career, I will constantly be required to act as a Senser, a Perceiver, a Thinker and an Extrovert, and I’m fine with that. However, as I test out career options and start to figure out what I want To Do With My Life, maybe I’ll shy away from cataloging or marketing and move towards (is there an opposite to shy away? assert towards?) bigger ideas, structured time, empathetic management, and the peace of the stacks.