When I try to apply socionics, I try to keep in mind what socionics is. (information metabolism; essentially, what people are aware of and focus on.) I then look for anything which might signify key aspects of an element. What does this person focus on? How do their thoughts reflect their focus? How do their actions reflect their focus? I try to get into people's motivations and thoughts and derive where those motivations might have come from. A lot of the time it's unclear as a single action could the result of many different motivations, and motivation from many different awarenesses. I keep in mind that getting into people's heads is not easy, and often impossible unless they're willing to bring you in. I rely on my ability interpret the reasoning of things and people's vibes, but it's a constant battle of building up and then breaking down the conclusions I come to. Over time I've begun to realize the impracticality of trying to do quick typings, and I only give typings weight in situations where I'm able to get really close to a person and be sure I know them at a deep level.
Really the only thing of practical use I get out of socionics on a daily bases is the realization that people just have different ways of thinking about things and a way to try to rationalize it. I might assign a type or traits of a type to a person in order to understand where their coming from and adjust my perspective in order reach a compromise in situations of misunderstanding or general disagreement. But, often these traits I assign to the person are temporary in order to get through the misunderstanding. Assigning a permanent type to someone takes a long time and generally just doesn't happen as it's too impractical to come to any finalized sense of certainty that I have figured out their true type. There are a number who I will give provisional types to, but they're all very subject to change, and I really don't give any weight to the typing making it essentially pointless.
Typing by comparison. (You do need a large database in your mind of people and their behaviour.)
If it walks and talks like a certain type, it is part of that type category.
I have developed a cynical outlook towards typology. Typing rarely seems to be employed in a methodological manner. More often than not typing becomes an exercise of "I hate you" or "You rub me the wrong way," so you are in my opposing quadra. Or "I like you" or "You do not annoy me as much as others," so you must be in my quadra or an adjacent one. And of course the all too frequent, "You're so hawt, I want you in my quadra right now!"
Johari Box"Alpha Quadra subforum. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious." ~Obi-Wan Kenobi
You're so hawt, I want you in my quadra right now!
Mind explaining this in a little more detail? I'm unfamiliar with what you're talking about.
Can't argue with that I'm guessing that you identify through dichotomies to gain context until you can start to spot the IMEs and their positions?
Most of the Jung I've read had to do with his other observations (archetypes such as shadow, anima, etc) rather than his functions. I have obtained his writing on psychological types and plan to read it when I have time. Why do you suggest this in particular, and I guess a more pertinent questions would be, has specifically reading him altered your typing methodology?
Interesting, for me, something usually tips me off when I'm not looking to type them, and it makes me think "Oooh, this seems like such a good example of >insert IME in a function position here<" and then look to see if it reoccurs. I also find that quick typings are less useful, and over time when the person as a whole is really incorporated into your understanding, and what they do is Socionics-related and what isn't, then it starts to... mean something to you. You experience it and then understand, rather than mentally putting it together.
Huh, usually I feel comfortable with typing someone, but it's not completely etched in stone. I keep the typing until it seems like a lot of information conflicts with the typing (I had a typing of NeTi for my best friend, and as I started to realize certain communication differences, I realized the potential for her being TiNe, and then as I mulled this over, I realized she's been TiNe all along) and use it to understand misunderstandings. I would say I benefited by understanding that certain things people said (like my best friend) weren't being rude, malicious, or intentionally difficult, and I apply Socionics to discern this. I also use it to adjust how I explain things as well, and to anticipate certain issues and prepare for them.
My question to you would be how did you get your database, and how did you check your database before it was large enough to be reliable?
I can understand this cynicism when it comes to the forum, but does this affect you as well? Are you unable to control your own urges? I was hoping for a personal methodology rather than the critique of others'.
When I first discovered socionics I read up on the descriptions of the types to get a clear idea in my head of what they were like. I already had some idea, based on MBTI so that part wasnt difficult. After that i immediatly started typing people I knew. As it turned out many of these typings were wrong, some were not. After that I got a better idea of the types and had some common trends in my mind based upon the typings i had made. Now with these common trends I tend to type based on surface impressions i get of people, mainly their behavior and relations with other types.
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This phenomenon affects everyone unequally. Though asking whether or not I am "unable to control [my] own urges" makes it sound as if it was deviant or perverted behavior. I would say that it becomes easier to reflect on the matter of a subject's type through continual self-awareness of this phenomenon. Sometimes I must ask, What preconceptions do I have about the subject? What preconceptions do I have about a type? Do I have an agenda with this subject? What do I know about them, and more importantly, what do I not know? Is the foundation for my conclusion built upon well-reasoned evidence or intuition?
Johari Box"Alpha Quadra subforum. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious." ~Obi-Wan Kenobi
I used to compose a list of actions they performed in what situations and then subjected them to a socionics analysis. This usually involved drawing parallels from their actions to the socionics IEs or descriptions. Aside from being very shady and creepy to have a big database of this, it could take hours if it was complicated enough.
In general; Vibe typing bad. Don't rely on more than one person to type one person.
Objective typing;
I think objective understanding can be achieved to an extent; instead of blowing the IEs out of proportion in order to compare them to people's actions, I try to simplify people's actions until they compare to the fundamental basic functions. This is why I disagree with removing the essential basics from the functions; though a person's actions may not be forceful, once simplified and examined at their most primitive level they could resemble force.
Clearly, using this method, the problem no longer lies in the interpretation of the functions but rather the examination and simplification of another's actions, which leaves much less room for error imo, especially if you understand the person and their motives.
@words; I held your position a couple months ago; that socionics lacks any application and that it may just be imagined. That's why I tried to learn to apply socionics at its very basic level that left no room for interpretation of the functions but still works.
TBH; you'll never be able to get this crap out of your head so best learn to live with it... that's what I told myself anyway.
Yeah I do the same as what you said here except that I purposefully question myself in order to make sure I have the right typing. But, I have problems with the inherent uncertainty of typings, and the general inability to say beyond a doubt that person is a certain type. So when I break down the uncertain parts, in many cases I could throw out the whole typing. What use is a typing you can't be certain of? How could I possibly make a a decision based on it? How can a make a comparison? Hell, I even question my type from time to time. Of what practical use something like that? I'm pretty comfortable forming opinions, but it doesn't go beyond that except in rare instances, and I'm not willing to base anything on that.Huh, usually I feel comfortable with typing someone, but it's not completely etched in stone. I keep the typing until it seems like a lot of information conflicts with the typing (I had a typing of NeTi for my best friend, and as I started to realize certain communication differences, I realized the potential for her being TiNe, and then as I mulled this over, I realized she's been TiNe all along) and use it to understand misunderstandings.
I know that practicality has nothing to do with the topic at hand, but it affects my typing method by scrutinizing it to death so that I might be able to predict how a relationship might turn out or whatever else.
It is similar to what Jarno said: in my mind (mind actually isn't the right word, but I don't know a better one) I have 'knowledge' on various types, and I type someone else by means of the 'feelings' (again: for lack of a better word) they invoke in me. So unlike Jarno, it's not how they look or behave, it's the gut response they invoke in me. This response almost always involves a value judgment of some kind, but it is not something rational (in the non-socionc sense) or cognitive.
ETA: it's not just what feelings other people invoke in me, but also my response to it in terms of action/non-action.
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Last edited by consentingadult; 09-01-2010 at 08:56 PM.
“I have never tried that before, so I think I should definitely be able to do that.” --- Pippi Longstocking
Freaking excellent . To expect anything more than the bold is a waste of effort. The study of human relationships and information metabolism is an always changing study.
I would say I have found it most useful to just keep a basic easily adaptive model in mind for predicting behavior and motivation where I don't go overboard on trying to apply complex logistical systems that attempt to explain everything by putting people into static types. It will never work; it is just not worth the effort.
That said, in the short immediate term, I mostly look for situations where people are displaying leadingFunction-seekingFunction dynamics, as well as where people are utilizing their demonstrative function. In the long term, I look for inter-type relations and PoLR; and if that checks out, then I decide on leading and creative functions. That has been most reliable and rewarding for me in understanding and working with other people because these things tend to be somewhat variable in the short-terms among many people, depending on the situation. Of course, at other times, and usually in the long term, if the inter-type relations and PoLR are there, then I apply an overall type as most efficient in understanding. But basically, the more complex the motivations, the hazier everything becomes so I prefer to keep things situational (even when I have typed them) rather than static, unless the static has been shown to be quite probable. A static type for me would imply that the PoLR of the person typed has been mostly show to be stereotypical or extreme and that the inter-type relations are there to back them up, showing a clear particular leading and creative functional orientation.
I somehow forgot about this thread lol I must have read it before leaving for somewhere and never saw new replies, sorry for disappearing
I was more wanting to understand what you meant by the term rather than question your intentions. I agree with the premise of wanting to find out how to objectively type as possible, and I can't really argue against your method. It's not exactly how I came to finding what is "objective," I also am curious to know how confident you are at guessing at peoples' intentions and motives, as that's something I don't feel comfortable doing because I can see people going so many different ways... Reminds me of another thread, and it seemed to be a vs difference, which I can understand. I don't think I personally would have came to either method you described in your example, I find behaviors and actions to be a hint but not good enough evidence. For me it's teasing out a person's thought processes and see the how and why they came to a reasoning or observation. My poor best friend is subject to many different strange questions as I like to understand how different her thought process is from mine.
I didn't mean it that way, I meant that you always have the lens of certain IMEs on. So if you're -leading, you're naturally going to see things existing in context before you go about identifying certain behavior, especially when something catches you off guard. I don't think you have to be a certain type to conceptualize the type's process (in a basic abstract sense, of course). So I don't think it's impossible, but I think you have to go through an extra step, you have to realize that from the beginning, you've been building your understanding through your type... I only brought it up because I personally felt the method you described would fall prey to that, but I can't say that my method escapes such pitfalls either.
I've heard this from a couple of other people, but I can't seem to do this. I always spot the existence of something rather than the nonexistence. And I tend to piece things together IME by IME.
To add onto this, sometimes knowing a person too well can be a hindrance. I think knowing people well is needed by Skeptic's typing method, because they have to understand a person's motivations as connected to IMEs. I would say I don't need to know the person well because I have an idea how to type someone by what they are actively doing without needing to know (a large amount) of their thoughts that they don't express.
I'm generally like this as well, I'll have a "working" type that I try to have the person "wear", and they wear it until something comes to contradict it, and then I'll switch the type. I think because I don't talk about Socionics too often offline, I never have a person's type as 100% solid, and don't feel pressured to report types.
I'm pretty much the same way, but my opinion of this person and how they are in multiple realms greatly affects how I deal with information coming from them.
I see, the "database" method is rather unintuitive for me, as I see too many nuances with every individual to really have a chunk of them in a category and have them as models. I always start with a gut feeling, like you, but I never end on it.
I'm starting to find that I don't really have a model at all... Just a whole bunch of terms with definitions and combinations that I check against what I've observed. I think if I was (for some reason) had no lead about someone and I couldn't get a gut vibe to guide me initially, I would just through every IA and function combination at them until I see a pattern or get a lead.