Personality Types for Library Organizations: Part 3- Sensing vs. Intuition

post by Dan Chaney, Humanities and Social Sciences Division

Sensing vs. Intuition

Sensing versus Intuition is a measure of how we take in information about the world around us.

Sensors absorb information via their five senses. That is, they take in what their senses reveal to them – sight, hearing, touch, smell and taste. They tend to trust whatever can be measured or documented and focus on what is real and concrete. Sensors trust their five senses to give them accurate information about their environment, and they trust what their previous experience has taught them.  They tend to be focused on the here and now. A sensor will look at a given situation and try to figure out exactly what is going on.

Intuitors, on the other hand, are folks who seek out meanings, relationships and possibilities based on gut hunches, rather than the facts themselves. You could say intuitors trust their “sixth sense” more than what their five senses tell them. Intuitors naturally read between the lines and look for meanings between those lines. Unlike sensors, intuitors trust their inspirations and hunches. Intuitors are adept at anticipating the future and generally try to make things different rather than maintaining the status quo. An intuitor will look at a situation and want to know what it means and what the consequences are.

In terms of their value to the organization, sensors and intuitors work well together. Sensors are the folks who are really good at reading the evidence on the surface of any situation, and they are pretty good at pointing to what is causing a problem. Intuitors are really good at getting below the surface and determining what is really influencing that situation. Intuitors are people who trust their gut hunches, so they sometimes lack the patience or habit to evaluate their sensory data. Intuitors need to be surrounded by sensors in organizations to give as complete a picture of a situation as possible. The flip side of the equation is that sensors working without intuitors to balance their information input will occasionally get it wrong.

Sensors and intuitors are easy to pick out of a crowd if you know what to look for. In meetings, sensors are taking notes because that is how they absorb information. Intuitors are the folks listening, and who might be perceived as being unengaged. That is not the case, they are engaged looking (listening) below the surface and drawing connections between the lines. A sensor and an intuitor will experience a situation and if you ask them to recount it, will often give very different interpretations. Have you ever talked to a friend after a presentation or meeting and when they said something about the meeting, it makes you say “Wow, what meeting were you at?” It’s probably because one of you is a sensor and the other is an intuitor.

I come in on the intuitor side of this dimension, which shouldn’t surprise anyone who knows me. I am really good at reading people and acting on my gut hunches, which more often than not are right. If you are, like me, an introverted intuitive, that is a fun combination in terms of personality type. Introverts generally are deep thinkers, and when you combine it with introversion, that means we can get to the bottom of what is really going on in most cases, meaning we are really good at coming up with solutions.

So, how do you align with others in the Sensor/Intuitor dimension?

	Sensing	Intuition
Librarians (N=1600)	41%	59%
Library Assistants (N=84)	65.48%	34.52%
University Faculty (N=2282)	36.06%	63.94%
University Students (N=4035)	55.39%	44.61%
Females (N=32731)	56.38%	43.62%
Males (N=23240)	54.77%	45.23%

Comments:

·         It should not be a surprise that librarians tend to be intuitors – the nature of research and reference work is one of following your gut hunches to find the correct or best answer.

·         Library staff tend to be the exact opposite of librarians in this dimension. That’s the strength of the organization, though. Remember, sensors are really good at seeing what is going on the surface and the intuitors are strong in making connections to what is really going on below the surface.

·         Faculty tend to be even more so intuitors than librarians. That does not surprise me.

·         Interesting juxtaposition between faculty and students. And that is largely because students in college have not necessarily learned critical thinking skills. We see this every day at the reference desk, when we help students with a research question and they expect there to be a “magic article” – one article that tells them exactly what the answer to the question is. Unfortunately, there are seldom magic articles in research.

·         Males and females are very similar in terms of sensing7/intuition.

Personality Types for Library Organizations: Part 2- Breakdown

post by Dan Chaney, Humanities and Social Sciences Division

Okay, let’s talk about what that all means.

The MBTI and PAP break personalities down along four dimensions:

1.       Introvert/Extravert

2.       Sensing/Intuition

3.       Thinking/Feeling

4.       Judging/Perceiving

These personality dimensions are opposites of one another – introvert is the opposite of extravert, sensing is the opposite of intuition, and so on. The scores we see when we take it can best be represented within the distribution model of the bell curve:

On the left side we would have one side of the dimension, for example, Introversion, while on the other end we would have Extraversion. In terms of scores or strength of our connection to that attribute, the bell curve tells us that most of us are generally close to the center between the two. What I mean by that is that personality types are tendencies or preferences, not absolutes. They aren’t a matter of us ALWAYS behaving in an introverted way, for example. No one does that. We all demonstrate preferences to one side over the other, but by necessity we operate in both sides. It’s just that one side comes more naturally to us.

Another difference between the MBTI and the PAP is the strength of your scores in any given attribute. As I mentioned, with the PAP, it’s not uncommon that some scores you have will be tied – that means you are close to the middle in that dimension, so there will be pieces of both sides which are going to reflect your personality, because you act in both ways. If you take the MBTI, you will receive a preference as well as a strength. The MBTI strength scores range from 0 to 40, so they will be much more accurate. In general, most people, when they take the MBTI find their scores within about 10 of the center, meaning most people are close to the middle between both sides of the dimension.

There have been many personality studies of various population groups. This is what psychologists do – they study people. They study people and attempt to determine characteristics or tendencies of that group of people. Both librarians and library staff have been studied in terms of their personalities. We also have personality studies of other groups of people, and I will be incorporating some of these studies to give you a glimpse of where your personality aligns along the studies of your peers, as well as how it aligns along some of our constituent groups – faculty, students, men and women.

Introvert vs. Extravert

Introvert vs. Extravert as a dimension of personality is a measure of how we are energized, or how we draw our energy. When people hear the terms “introvert” and “extravert” they tend to equate the meaning of the term with the behavior stereotype of each, with introverts being quiet and extraverts being outgoing. In terms of Myers-Briggs, this is not how we use the terms. This dichotomy is really about how people are energized. Introverts draw their energy by being alone. Extraverts draw their energy by being surrounded by people.

Introverts focus their attention and energy on the world inside of themselves. They enjoy spending time alone and need alone time to recharge their batteries, particularly when they have been operating in an environment with lots of people. Introverts try to understand the world before they experience it, which means a lot of their activity is mental. They prefer social interaction on a small scale – one on one or in small groups. Introverts avoid being the center of attention and are generally more reserved. Introverts prefer to get to know people more slowly. Being surrounded by people drains an introvert of energy, leaving them feeling tired and exhausted.

Extraverts, on the other hand, focus their attention and energy on the world outside of themselves. They seek out other people and enjoy a lot of interaction, whether one on one or in groups. They are constantly (and naturally) pulled to the outer world of people and things because being by themselves drains their energy. They seek people out to recharge their batteries.

If you don’t know what an extravert is thinking, you haven’t been paying attention, because they will tell you. If you don’t know what an introvert is thinking, it’s because you haven’t asked the right question or haven’t waited long enough for an answer. If you ask a question of an extravert, they will usually start talking, because extraverts need to talk in order to think (remember, extraverts are drawn to the outside world). Extraverts may not have an answer to the question at hand, but they start talking to work out their thoughts. Introverts, on the other hand, will answer a question with a long pause, because they are doing their thinking internally, and they don’t like to draw attention to themselves by giving the wrong answer in public.

The gift of extraversion is breadth, and the gift of introversion is depth. What I mean by that is extraverts can converse with people on just about any topic, however, their knowledge of that discussion topic generally isn’t very deep. Introverts, on the other hand, won’t be willing to converse with people unless it is in a topic they know and love, and certainly they won’t have the ability to carry on a conversation on a topic they are not versed in (hence, the introverts are quiet stereotype). Sometimes it’s easier to ask the introvert what they are interested in and start a conversation that way, but many introverts are reticent to share their passions with strangers.

I will tell you that I fall on the introvert side of the dimension, I am most definitely introverted. In fact, personality studies tell us that most librarians are introverts. I don’t think this is particularly surprising – consider the librarian stereotype of running around “shhhhing” people making noise in the library J ). There’s a reason why you generally don’t see me in the middle of the activity in group events. These are very taxing environments for an introvert. For about my first ten years at OSU as a librarian, I would go home at the end of the day physically exhausted. I’d talk to my father when I visit and I’d remark to him that my job made me exhausted at the end of the day. He’d ask me why it made me tired. I didn’t understand my personality type at that time and I’d tell him that I must expend vast amounts of mental energy at my job. I was close, I was expending vast amounts of energy, but rather than mental energy, I was an introvert working at a busy reference desk every day. That social interaction costs an introvert energy. Once I understood that working with people was going to cost me energy, I got a little more careful about protecting my energy reserves. For example now, when I teach a class or work the reference desk, I try to have an hour of alone time at my desk, often with the headphones on), recharging my batteries so I can continue to function in an extraverted way when needed. When I go home at the end of the day, I’m generally not tired, because I’ve figured out how to manage my energy reserves.

Understanding personality characteristics as well as I do, I can pretty accurately predict people’s personality type just from talking to them and watching them interact with one another. For example, the people raising their hand to talk in class or people talking before class begins – extraverts trying to recharge their batteries after having to sit still and listen for 30 minutes. The people sitting in the back of class who don’t raise their hands – introverts, taking it all in and trying to understand what is going on, recharging their batteries. When I teach, I always stop and ask questions of the class, so that the extraverts have that chance to recharge their energy briefly. Conversely, I never call upon the introverts, unless they have raised their hand. Introverts will be the students who come up to talk to me after class, and those are some of the best conversations I have.

If you are curious as to your score on the Introvert/Extravert dimension and how you compare to others, here is a chart with some popular population groups and how they align along the introvert/extravert dimension.

	Extraversion	Introversion
Librarians (N=1600)	37%	63%
Library Assistants (N=84)	50%	50%
University Faculty (N=2282)	45.79%	54.21%
University Students (N=4035)	59.16%	40.84%
Females (N=32731)	55.71%	44.29%
Males (N=23240)	51.39%	48.61%

In terms of the chart above, some observations:

·         It should surprise no one that librarians tend to be introverts. We love being surrounded by knowledge and the quiet of the library.

·         Library assistants? The best type table I could come up with was one that resulted from research on the staff at one library. 84 respondents is hardly a significant sample size, but it can give us a rough idea of where library staff align along personality types.

·         University faculty are given simply because these are our customers, along with university students.

·         University students? They tend to be extraverts. No surprise there.

·         Finally, I listed men and women as groups, so you can see how you align by gender.

Personality Types for Library Organizations: Part 1- Background/Assessment

post by Dan Chaney, Humanities and Social Sciences Division

Let me start by saying I am not a licensed psychologist, but I’ve been known to play one in the Library.

One of the topics I talk to student groups about is understanding their personality, recognizing the strengths of their personality type as well as being aware of their shortcomings. The more I talked to my students about personality types, the more interesting it became to me. Perhaps it is because I am the psychology liaison and this is just a little osmosis in action, perhaps it is just because the more I came to understand personality types, the better I came to understand my own interpersonal and professional interactions.

My Reference colleagues have heard me speak on personalities at least twice over the last few years, and I have presented conference sessions on personality types in libraries on several occasions. I am convinced that by understanding personality types we can begin to understand what motivates us as well as what drives those we work with, our strengths and how we work together.

This piece on personalities can be divided into 5 parts:

1.       Background/the Assessment

2.       Introvert/Extravert

3.       Sensing/Intuition

4.       Thinking/Feeling

5.       Perceiving/Judging

Some background on personality studies: Carl Jung was a psychologist, a rather big name at that. In 1921, Jung suggested that human behavior is not random, that it follows patterns, and these patterns are caused by differences in the way people use their minds. By 1942, Isabel Myers-Briggs and her mother Katherine Briggs put Jung’s work into practice by developing the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). Today, the MBTI is the most widely used instrument for studying personality.

When I talk about personality types, it is in the framework of the MBTI. There are other personality assessments such as Colors and the Five Factor Model. I prefer the Myers-Briggs framework because it is a very positive personality model – that is, there is nothing negative in any personality type, they all have their merits. I’m not going to have you take the MBTI to see what your personality type is (the MBTI costs $$$ - if you are a student at OSU, you can take it for $10 at OSU Career Services, 308 Student Union). If you’re not an OSU student and you want to know what your personality type is, I have that covered. I am including here a copy of the Personality Assessment Profile (PAP), which is by Dr. Robert Sherfield and is the assessment I give my freshman. (I talked to Dr. Sherfield and got his permission to use his measurement for sessions I do at conference and in settings like this J)

What the PAP does is give you a sense of what your personality type is. If you have taken the MBTI, you can compare results to what you discover taking the PAP.  I’ll warn you of a weakness in the PAP – it’s not the same as the MBTI. The MBTI is 126 questions, which goes far more in depth in assessing your personality type. The PAP is about 30 questions. It’s going to give you a basic score in four personality dimensions, but because it’s so brief, it can’t be exact. Some of you will take the PAP and after scoring it discover in one dimension, your scores are tied. That is going to happen. But, it should give you some basic framework to understand your personality.

One more thing: as you fill the assessment out, be honest. Realize, personality assessments only work for us if we answer questions honestly, without concern for how others would feel about us if they knew how we are answering.

The Personality Assessment Profile                                                            

© Robert M. Sherfield, Ph.D., 1999, 2002, 2005                              

Directions: Read each statement carefully and thoroughly. After reading the statement, rate your response using the scale below. There are no right or wrong answers. This is not a timed

survey. The PAP is based, in part, on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator^® (MBTI) by Katharine Briggs and Isabel Briggs-Myers.

3 = Often Applies

2 = Sometimes Applies

1 = Never or Almost Never Applies

___ 1a. I am a very talkative person.

___ 1b. I am a more reflective person than a verbal person.

___ 2a. I am a very factual and literal person.

___ 2b. I look to the future and can see possibilities.

___ 3a. I value truth and justice over tact and emotion.

___ 3b. I find it easy to empathize with other people.

___ 4a. I am very ordered and efficient.

___ 4b. I enjoy having freedom and control.

___ 5a. I am a very friendly and social person.

___ 5b. I enjoy listening to others more than talking.

___ 6a. I enjoy being around and working with people who have a             great deal of common sense.

___ 6b. I enjoy being around and working with people who are dreamers and have a great deal

            of imagination.

___ 7a. One of my motivating forces is to do a job very well.

___ 7b. I like to be recognized for, and I am motivated by, my accomplishments and awards.

___ 8a. I like to plan out my day before I go to bed.

___ 8b. When I get up on a non-work day, I just like to let the day “plan itself.”

___ 9a. I like to express my feelings and thoughts.

___ 9b. I enjoy a great deal of tranquility and quiet time to myself.

___ 10a. I am a very pragmatic and realistic person.

___ 10b. I like to create new ideas, methods, or ways of doing things.

___ 11a. I make decisions with my brain.

___ 11b. I make decisions with my heart.

___ 12a. I am a very disciplined and orderly person.

___ 12b. I don’t make a lot of plans.

___ 13a. I like to work with a group of people.

___ 13b. I would rather work independently.

___ 14a. I learn best if I can see it, touch it, smell it, taste it, or hear it.

___ 14b. I learn best by relying on my gut feelings or intuition.

___ 15a. I am quick to criticize others.

___ 15b. I complement others very easily and quickly.

___ 16a. My life is systematic and orderly.

___ 16b. I don’t really pay attention to deadlines.

___ 17a. I can be myself when I am around others.

___ 17b. I can be myself when I am alone.

___ 18a. I live in the here and now, in the present.

___ 18b. I live in the future, planning and dreaming.

___ 19a. I think that if someone breaks the rules, the person should be punished.

___ 19b. I think that if someone breaks the rules, we should look at the person who broke the

            rules, examine the rules, and             look at the situation at hand before a decision is made.

___ 20a. I do my work, then I play.

___ 20b. I play, then do my work.

Refer to your score on each individual question. Place that score beside the appropriate question number below. Then tally each line at the side.

                                                                    TOTAL

SCORE____________________________ ACROSS__CODE____

1a ___ 5a ___  9a ___  13a ___ 17a ___    _____     E Extrovert

1b ___ 5b ___  9b ___  13b ___ 17b ___    _____     I Introvert

2a ___ 6a ___ 10a ___ 14a ___ 18a ___    _____     S Sensing

2b ___ 6b ___ 10b ___ 14b ___ 18b ___    _____     N INtuition

3a ___ 7a ___ 11a ___ 15a ___ 19a ___    _____     T Thinking

3b ___ 7b ___ 11b ___ 15b ___ 19b ___    _____     F Feeling

4a ___ 8a ___ 12a ___ 16a ___ 20a ___    _____     J Judging

4b ___ 8b ___ 12b ___ 16b ___ 20b ___    _____     P Perceiving

Personality indicator

Look at the scores on your PAP. Is your score higher in the E or I line? Is your score higher in the S or N line? Is your score higher in the T or F line? Is your score higher in the J or P line? Write the code to the side of each section below.

Is your higher score E or I       Code ______

Is your higher score S or N     Code ______

Is your higher score T or F      Code ______

Is your higher score J or P      Code ______