Questions about Socionics

[universal]

Questions about socionics which make me rather carefull and remote to the subject.

1) How can either 'E' or 'I' be defined reliably in socionics when it's estimation is allowed to be derived from having both 'I' parameters as well as 'E'? The E/I always seems a compromise of having the most 'E' or 'I' which in turn ignore all lesser but still existing parameters in a character. It seems domination and binary based. I really would like to hear INTj's asnwers that one and hear them justifying socionics being able to be a good model while being based on very estimative or dominating datasets. (note that the same applies to E/I N/S T/F J/P). Being 49% introverted or something would not translate into an absolute ENTj in my oppionion. Same goes for the N/S. If this leads to crosstypes, then shouldn't socionics be less absolute in type defenitions and doesn't that make it's branches too binary or it's 'datasets' too estimative?

2) If socionics is an estimative observation, who then decides what are the absolutes everything is derived from?

3) How would you describe the limitations of socionics if it claims capable of describing my type when I'm borderline E/I S/N?

[wym123]

I am going to try to answer all your questions at the same time by giving you my understanding of Socionics (more like CG Jung's original work on typing). I do not admit that any of this information is accurate. In fact, I pretty much made all of this up. However, my personal history has shown me that my ability to make up things that turn out to be accurate is pretty good so it is very likely that most (if not all of this) is accurate.

My ordering of the functions are different from the ones in this website. However, I am certain that this ordering is the correct one and many websites including all MBTI sites and Seigei Ganin's site use this ordering.

The personality exam are meant to test the relatively manifestations of your functions. If you test more T than F for example, that means you use either Ti/Te more than you use either Fi/Fe. Furthermore, if you test I more than E, that means that taking into account all your functions, you tend to overall use the introverted functions more than the extraverted functions.

There is more to it though. As one gets older, use of teritary and inferior function increases. I believe good mastery of the teritary function happens during adulthood, and middle age for inferior function. Therefore if you find yourself being borderline between S and N, that means that S and N are your auxiliary and teritary functions (not necessarily in that order).

Given this information, it is up to you to figure out what your type is because for a given string of letters and the relative weights of each letter, there can be a few possible types (in terms of Functional Analysis) corresponding to it.

Let's look at your case. You probably tested more T than F but overall, equal S and N. This means that your dominant function is T and your inferior function is F. This also means that your auxiliary function is S or N but we don't have enough information to know which is actually your "true" auxiliary, though it doesn't matter. You tested equal E and I, which means that your dominant function and your auxiliary functions are probably on equal footing but we don't whether your dominant is Extraverted or Introverted. Taking all of this into consideration, this means your possible types are (in socionics notation):

TiNe INTj
TiSe ISTj
TeNi ENTj
TeSi ESTj

However, only two of these types actually fit it. Specifically, we don't know whether your dominant function is Introverted or Extraverted but only one can be the case, not both. Therefore, your types are either

INTj and ISTj

OR

ENTj and ESTj

The "and" means that you probably exhibit the characteristics of both types because the projection of your functions are same as those two types.

[Rick]

Socionics assumes that each person has a correct type that may or may not be reflected in their test results. This 'correct' type becomes apparent over time in one's interaction with others. The idea of borderline types arises from test results, not from real-life observation and interaction, as these supposedly 'borderline' individuals in no way stick out as being different from the rest. Thus, the 'limitations of socionics' you speak of are actually limitations of testing methods. If you were to forget about socionics and come back in five years and take the same test, the likelihood of you getting the same type would be less than 50%.

[Cone]

1) How can either 'E' or 'I' be defined reliably in socionics when it's estimation is allowed to be derived from having both 'I' parameters as well as 'E'? The E/I always seems a compromise of having the most 'E' or 'I' which in turn ignore all lesser but still existing parameters in a character. It seems domination and binary based. I really would like to hear INTj's asnwers that one and hear them justifying socionics being able to be a good model while being based on very estimative or dominating datasets. (note that the same applies to E/I N/S T/F J/P). Being 49% introverted or something would not translate into an absolute ENTj in my oppionion. Same goes for the N/S. If this leads to crosstypes, then shouldn't socionics be less absolute in type defenitions and doesn't that make it's branches too binary or it's 'datasets' too estimative?

I should be able to answer this question since I've been actively researching this topic.

Outside of Socionics, I/E is measured on a continuous scale where degrees of extraversion are always taken into account for experiments relative to the differentiation of I/E. So in this case, there are no clear-cut types. However, it is difficult to say whether this disproves the concrete stratifications of Socionics types. But even still, somewhat of a stratification is still made among those outside theories.

For example, in the correlation made by J. A. Gray between our Western theories of I/E and Ivan Pavlov's typology of dogs based on the "strength of the nervous system", I/E is measured basically on the "arousability" of the nervous system. The types of nervous systems are usually classified into "strong" and "weak" types, where strong=extraversion and weak=introversion. Many different diagnostic tests mostly about the properties of conditioning exercises are performed in order to determine the typology of said dog/person. However, my reading has left me still in an ambiguous situation as to the EXACT correlation between these two theories.

However, it is interesting to note that in the early work of Pavlov with dogs, there have often been FOUR different types differentiated from exactly one complex variable, that is, the strength of the nervous system. These types were defined depending on their position on this continuous scale, with two extreme strong and extreme weak types and two equilibrium types which differed only slightly as to the strong/weak classification. So instead of defining a dichotomy, four different types were classified based on one single variable.

I have often thought of the implications of this theory. Perhaps there are really 32 types with four different preferences allowable on the I/E scale. However I would rather assume that the 16 types are interpolated along perhaps two four-class variables or something related to that, where one of the variables is the I/E preference. However, this is only speculation.

2) If socionics is an estimative observation, who then decides what are the absolutes everything is derived from?

Hopefully we will eventually have biological means of which to determine type. But until then, Socionics is mostly proof-by-argument, where the idea is to get everyone to agree with you.

[Olga]

This is an interesting discussion. I think all this questions arise because the author does not know yet socionics that well. If you do not see clearly what your type is it is even more difficult to see the types of others. However, when you come to see the types in real life situations there will be no need for the scientific proof as it willn so obvious. It may in the first few minutes you talk to the person or may take days of observations and still doubts if you don't do the testing. If we would have a school of socionics and would be trained with real types then test typing would be irrelevant. I know that in Russia it is a pracice for a long time already in some places to train psyhiatrists. You learn theory and then all you need is practice before it becoumes outomatic with an experience. You seem to interested in scientific justifications and ask INTJ to defend the theoretic basis. May be it will come may be not...how far can we estimate/understand the world of irrational like psyche? Shall we learn to read each other thoughts one day?

[Creepy-]

Perhaps one should note that some use the terms "intratim" and "extratim" instead of "introvert" and "extrovert". (tim = type of information metabolism)