Many popular science sources give personality types that relate to our daily habits. However, our personality is not so simple to classify, so many psychologists have different theories about it. The formation of human behavior, habits, and fears is very complicated, so generalizing can lead us to make wrong assumptions.
Which psychologists have created works on personality?
The most famous theories about human personality were created by Carl Gustav Jung and Carl Rogers. Sigmund Freud also had his own theory on the emergence and formation of human personality.
In his theories, Jung placed a strong emphasis on human individuality, whereby each person views a situation from their own perspective. For him, individual differences between people were fundamental, which is why he distanced himself from the rather clichéd divisions of personality into types and subtypes. Interestingly, Carl Jung related his research on the human psyche to everyday behaviors, including those related to work.
Carl Rogers, on the other hand, created the phenomenological theory, which emphasizes the subjective experiences of reality that influence our personality. Phenomenology also assumes that people are predestined to be good and creative and are driven by the pursuit of self-fulfillment.
Personality Types and Science
Psychiatry and psychology’s study of our personality states that personality types are highly simplified and do not give us much information about a person. They are also not a reliable source of information. The schemes used to classify personalities into successive groups make it impossible to see the complexity of each human mind. Unfortunately, such categorization is wrong, and many psychologists are moving away from judging people by personality types. Depending on our mood, private situation, but also life experience, we can be a “mixture” of many personality types
Earlier studies by Sigmund Freud and modern psychology indicate that our personality develops most fully until the age of 20. Later, the psyche also changes, but the personality developed at an earlier stage has certain points that are unchangeable. Research done on control groups of different ages shows that personality type tests done at different intervals can have significantly different results.
Such studies were analyzed by Prof. Nick Haslam, among others, who analyzed a total of 177 articles, and the number of study participants was 533,377. Typification is mainly used for personality disorders, but it does not work well for people with undisturbed psyches. The frequency of typing in the study was only 14%, indicating that it is rarely used in psychiatry and psychology. Personality tests are highly variable and therefore do not give equivalent results and are thus unreliable.
What are the main personality types?
Many psychiatrists use three basic personality types to facilitate their study of personality disorders: introvert, extrovert, and ambivert.
- Introvert
A person with the traits of an introvert will focus more on themselves than on others. She prefers to be alone and dislikes crowds. She is quite conscientious, but can also be withdrawn. She often has a lot of anxiety about other people’s evaluation of her own person. People with elements of an introverted personality find it a little more difficult to work in teams, and may not like being with others. People with introverted behavior tend not to reveal their thoughts, and if they do, they are very withdrawn when doing so.
- Extrovert
Ectroverted behavior is characterized by a desire to be with others, ease of communication, and talking about one’s needs. People with these traits are more likely to think optimistically. They also enjoy experiences and new sensations. With extroverted traits, you may also notice some spontaneity in actions and doing things under the influence of emotions and sudden impulse.
- Ambivert
According to personality types, ambiverts have traits that combine an extrovert with an introvert. The traits that make up this personality type are across the extrovert and introvert divide. This personality type manifests its extroverted or introverted traits depending on the situation and mood.
The aforementioned types are a very big simplification that can somewhat help us classify given behaviors and understand them. However, it is important to remember that when classifying personality and understanding another person’s behavior, such simplifications can lead to harmful generalizations, but also cognitive errors
Personality types allow for some understanding of our personality, but they do not provide a whole view of our psyche and its complexity. Depending on the situation, we may have traits of one or more personality types.
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