I don't know what type I am, however, IEE seems to make the most sense based on dynamics of interpersonal relationships.
"Pattern recognition" is indeed related to "intuition", though not per sé in the Socionics sense. My free-floating thoughts on pattern recognition:
- Ne: pattern recognition based on genus/differentia attributes of two or more phenomena
- Ni: pattern recognition based on cause/effect relationships between two or more phenomena
So yeah, Ni imo is one of the attitudes that perceives reality in terms of pattern recognition, more in particular cause/effect patterns. And as such, does not require knowledge of all facts in order to come to conclusions.
I got this idea from a program on Discovery or Nat Geo channel, or something like that. It investigated certain metal attitudes, and investigated what it was that made grandmaster chess players so good at chess. A lot of people think grand masters are very good thinkers, being able to come up with a strategy. But research has shown that this is not the case, and that many grand masters decide upon their strategies because they perceive almost instantly that a pattern unfolds in front of them. So the thing that makes grand masters good at chess, is not logical thinking, but intuition.
ETA: in the past I have been pondering the question if not every information Element in Socionics is a form of pattern recognition, but I have not been able to answer that question satisfactory.