By Eva Gregersen
“It is chiefly extraverts who resent being called extraverts, as if it were a derogatory designation. I even know of a case where a famous extravert, having been called an extravert, challenged his opponent to a duel!” – C.G. Jung in a personal letter to R.L. Kroon
While it is a fairly common phenomenon that people who are extroverted consider themselves to be introverted, the opposite phenomenon of introverts claiming to be extroverted is less common. Indeed, in our own work of observing famous people in order to determine their types we have run upon several famous extroverts who mistakenly identify themselves as introverts, but hardly a single famous introvert who identifies himself as an extrovert. In this article we will explore why extroverts tend to mistake themselves for introverts.
First, we will quickly recap some general psychometric points regarding extroversion that we have already explored on the site. Then we will look at a more subtle reason for why many extroverts don’t think of themselves as extroverts.
1: General Recap of Why People Misunderstand ‘Extroversion’
First, the term ‘extrovert’ is generally meaningless to people who don’t know anything about psychology or typology. When people hear the term ‘extrovert,’ they tend to think of loud and talkative people who dance on the tables and never need time alone. What these people appear to mean when they say ‘extrovert,’ the psychologist would rather call ‘hypomanic’.
In the same way, when people hear the term ‘introvert’ they tend to think that being introverted means being deep and reflective, reading books and having academic or cultural interests. What these people appear to mean when they say ‘introvert,’ the psychologist would rather call ‘introspective’.
Indeed, we are not the first to have remarked on this confusion:
“[Within Jung’s typology] introversion is often confused with introspection.” – E.A. Bennet: What Jung Really Said, 1967
“[In typology, there is an] error of confusing … introversion (I) with introspection (N).” – David Keirsey, Please Understand Me II, 1998
Of course, S types also have introspection, but, like the Feeling of the Thinking types, or like the Sensation of the Intuitive types, their intuition will normally be episodic (if tertiary) or fall in drops (if inferior).
Thus we have now recapped some basic points regarding why people over-identify as introverts. Now we will turn to a more covert reason that this is so.
2: Skewed Samples
An important cause of why extroverts tend to mistakenly identify themselves as introverts is that when typing ourselves, we all tend to compare ourselves to other people and then to measure ourselves according to the standard that our immediate environment presents to us. All other things being equal, introverts tend to be less “out and about” than extroverts and, furthermore, they also tend to draw less attention to themselves when they are out and about. This relative seclusion of the introverted types means that, on average, fewer people will get to know each introvert and that more people will get to know each extrovert. Thus, jointly, the net effect of these two tendencies is that extroverts will get to know and associate with other extroverts far more than introverts will get to know and associate with other introverts.
As a consequence of these dispositions (the extrovert’s towards knowing more people and the introvert’s towards knowing fewer people) the introverts tend to be confronted with a norm where people are, on average, much more extroverted that they themselves are, and so, when making the comparison between themselves and others, they correctly identify themselves as introverted. By contrast, the average extrovert will tend to be aware of far fewer genuine introverts because introverts that do not interact with the extrovert in a social setting do not necessarily manifest the properties of introversion (simply keeping one’s mouth shut is, after all, not enough to get pegged as an introvert by an intelligent observer). So the introverts who do not speak may be unconsciously discarded from the sample comparisons when the extrovert is gauging himself against his broader social milieu.
On the other hand, people who are medium to medium-high in extroversion will nevertheless tend to notice the people about them that are way more extroverted than they themselves are. (The top 10% of the Extroversion scale will make themselves known to everyone in their vicinity, whereas the bottom 10% will live fairly isolated lives.) So even if a person is more extroverted than 75% of the general population, that person will still be relatively introverted when he compares himself to a skewed sample.
So if this type of analysis is unconsciously what lies at the heart of the extrovert mistakenly identifying himself as an introvert, that means that it is unfair to ridicule the extrovert for thinking that he is introverted, as the genuine introverts are sometimes wont to do. For in such a case, it is not just a lack of self-knowledge that has led the person to believe he is an introvert: It is also the case that the nature of extroversion itself distorts the data.
An example of an extrovert who mistakenly believed himself to be an introvert is John F. Kennedy. Where Keirsey thinks he is an ESTP (and we think so too), the overall assessment of JFK as an ESP type seems uncontroversial; indeed Kennedy is frequently mentioned as a clear-cut example of an extrovert.
In terms of Big Five Extroversion (which is not the same thing as Jungian extroversion) Kennedy is also uncontroversially considered to be extremely extroverted. For example, by the assessments of Rubenzer and Faschingbauer’s expert personality raters, the analysis of Kennedy’s personality puts him in the 100th percentile of Extroversion compared with the general population. That is to say that only 0.4% of the population can be considered to be more extroverted than JFK.
However, Kennedy himself was convinced that he was an introvert! Here is an exchange he had in 1960:
JFK: … I have a particular type of personality which, I don’t look like a politician, and all the rest, which helps me. Everybody isn’t an extrovert in politics. I would say that a lot of the Senate certainly are not extroverts …
B. BRADLEE: But Jack, I mean, you are! No?
JFK: No, I don’t think I am, actually.
B. BRADLEE: But you like it. And you live on it.
JFK: All these things may be true. Listen, I’m just saying, what I would be doing, you know I don’t go out to dinner.
B. BRADLEE: I know, I’m not trying to provoke you.
As you can see, the interviewer reacted to his claim of introversion with incredulity. No one except Kennedy himself seems to find it plausible to think of him as an introvert. As such, Kennedy can be considered the poster boy for the phenomenon of extroverts mistakenly identifying themselves as introverts because they are comparing themselves to a skewed sample. Kennedy clearly states elsewhere in the interview that he is comparing himself with a single individual (his grandfather) who was probably extremely extroverted. But as we have seen, it is a mistake to let the question of extroversion hinge on whether one knows anyone who is more extroverted than oneself.