Can we understand types using evolution?

[giorgaros2]

I mean we know that personality types are mostly genetic , so when a personality type appears now , it means that this bunch of psychological traits were beneficial for the carrier and so passed to the next generation.

Considering that the majority evolution of personality in general was due to social and sexual selection can we create a model that describes each type based on why it evolved and why it was successful? Whats your opinion

 

[Tannhauser]

I personally don't see how type could be something that is selected for on a genetic level. Personality can be influenced by genes, but to say that personality is a gene that is selected for is another thing. The reason I don't think that a type is something that can selected for, is that it doesn't make sense for a individual to select for a specific personality unless he/she can predict all the other personalities of the next generation in his/her "tribe". Since that is in general impossible, it makes much more sense that personality should be something completely flexible and adaptable, shaped by experience.

 

[giorgaros2]

I personally don't see how type could be something that is selected for on a genetic level. Personality can be influenced by genes, but to say that personality is a gene that is selected for is another thing. The reason I don't think that a type is something that can selected for, is that it doesn't make sense for a individual to select for a specific personality unless he/she can predict all the other personalities of the next generation in his/her "tribe". Since that is in general impossible, it makes much more sense that personality should be something completely flexible and adaptable, shaped by experience.

I don't see ether how it has to do with next generation's personalities.Lets say for example that we have mostly sensors and a warrior like tribe with 200 or more people like old Pleistocene tribes.

A child is born that is weaker than others mostly and worse in hunting and fighting,so the child shouldn't survive because that's a warrior society.

Lets say the same child is born also with very good curiosity and imagination and above average social skills as a genetic defect and sudennly while all these warriors bully him for being weak ,he starts interpreting nature and the signs using his symbolical imagination.

The warriors then start to respect him and he becomes something like a shaman or a prophet, so his status is increased . More status= better chance to leave offspring=more likely for this personality to be passed to the next generations

 

[reckful]

The warriors then start to respect him and he becomes something like a shaman or a prophet, so his status is increased . More status= better chance to leave offspring=more likely for this personality to be passed to the next generations

The reason there are men and women isn't that successful men pass on their maleness and successful women pass on their femaleness.

S parents often have N children and N parents often have S children. If there are reasons that it's advantageous for a human group to be, say, 30% N and 70% S, then what may be encoded in the gene pool is a 30% chance that any given child will be an N, regardless of the type of either parent.

And I'm not saying that an N parent may not be somewhat more likely to have an N child than an S parent. I don't know if that's true or not. But it wouldn't have to be true for evolution to select for a certain percentage of N's in the population — and in any case, we know that it's a complicated situation from an evolutionary/genetic standpoint because there are so many children who don't match either parent on one or more dimensions.

As I understand it, if an identical twin is an N, it's pretty likely their twin will also be an N, but both parents could well be S's.

 

[reckful]

I personally don't see how type could be something that is selected for on a genetic level. Personality can be influenced by genes, but to say that personality is a gene that is selected for is another thing. The reason I don't think that a type is something that can selected for, is that it doesn't make sense for a individual to select for a specific personality unless he/she can predict all the other personalities of the next generation in his/her "tribe". Since that is in general impossible, it makes much more sense that personality should be something completely flexible and adaptable, shaped by experience.

Decades of twin studies strongly suggest that genes account for around half (or more) of the kinds of relatively stable temperament dimensions measured by the MBTI and Big Five. Note, however, that the genetic side of things is complicated: an introvert's identical twin brother would probably be an introvert, but they might have two extraverted parents. There's more Big Five data than MBTI data, but here's a study by Bouchard that found significant twin/MBTI correlations on all four dimensions.

The most counterintuitive conclusion that's been drawn from the cumulative data is that how your parents raise you has almost no influence on your basic temperament — e.g., whether you'll end up an INTJ. Identical twins raised in the same household are not significantly more alike (in terms of temperament) than identical twins raised in separate households.

Now, at this point you may well be thinking to yourself that, if non-genetic factors account for a third to a half of temperament, it seems awfully strange that how your parents raise you — not to mention all the other "environmental" influences that will be more or less similar for two twins growing up together — has virtually no effect on your temperament. How could that be?

If you want my personal view, I'm inclined to think that the lion's share of the explanation is probably that the data substantially understates the genetic component of temperament, and here's why:

Anytime you're doing studies where the results take the form of correlations, most sources of error are going to introduce noise into the data that has the effect of reducing the magnitude of the reported correlations. And personality typing involves multiple sources of significant error, starting with the fact that they haven't even figured out exactly what the nature of the temperament dimensions they should be measuring are, and also including multiple forms of human error in any self-assessment test that can cause the taker to answer a question "incorrectly." What's more, the more you assume (as Jung did, and as various studies suggest) that a relatively large percentage of the population is in or near the middle on one or more of the dimensions, the more mistyped people you should expect as a result of relatively small testing errors.

Assuming that the four MBTI dimensions aren't just arbitrary theoretical constructs and really do correspond to something real that could theoretically be accurately measured (by, say, directly measuring biological markers of some kind), I strongly suspect that, if every subject was accurately typed, the data would show that a substantially greater proportion of temperament is genetic. And the fact that twins raised in the same household aren't any more alike than twins raised separately would obviously seem a lot less strange if the proportion of temperament that results from "environmental" factors turned out to be very small.

 

[giorgaros2]

The reason there are men and women isn't that successful men pass on their maleness and successful women pass on their femaleness.

S parents often have N children and N parents often have S children. If there are reasons that it's advantageous for a human group to be, say, 30% N and 70% S, then what may be encoded in the gene pool is a 30% chance that any given child will be an N, regardless of the type of either parent.

And I'm not saying that an N parent may not be somewhat more likely to have an N child than an S parent. I don't know if that's true or not. But it wouldn't have to be true for evolution to select for a certain percentage of N's in the population — and in any case, we know that it's a complicated situation from an evolutionary/genetic standpoint because there are so many children who don't match either parent on one or more dimensions.

As I understand it, if an identical twin is an N, it's pretty likely their twin will also be an N, but both parents could well be S's.

Yes but I talk long -term here , I mean if the INFJs leave many offspring ,after many generations you will find that the chance for a child to be INFJ has increased.That is how evolution works after all

After all the personalities are too 'perfect' to be random , I mean every personality is good at something I'm sure evolution has played a role here.

 

[giorgaros2]

Anyway I don't know why theorists haven't considered an evolutionary model to explain MBTI.
I posted this in another forum and only one person replied , it seems that people dismiss the link between evolution and mbti theory and I don't understand why, to me it makes perfect sense.

 

[Tannhauser]

Anytime you're doing studies where the results take the form of correlations, most sources of error are going to introduce noise into the data that has the effect of reducing the magnitude of the reported correlations.

I believe this is wrong. The volatility of the errors doesn't create this bias you are describing here. In fact, measuring correlation between x and y is essentially the same as measuring the linear relationship y = bx + e where e is the error. An OLS estimation of b is unbiased no matter how volatile e is.

And personality typing involves multiple sources of significant error, starting with the fact that they haven't even figured out exactly what the nature of the temperament dimensions they should be measuring are [...]

That may be true, but the bias would be in the opposite direction. When you are for example measuring the linear relationship between x and y, while you should actually be me measuring the relationship between x and z, and z and y are positively correlated, you will overestimate the correlation between x ans y. This is known as Omitted-variable bias.

 

[Cherry Cola]

Decades of twin studies strongly suggest that genes account for around half (or more) of the kinds of relatively stable temperament dimensions measured by the MBTI and Big Five. Note, however, that the genetic side of things is complicated: an introvert's identical twin brother would probably be an introvert, but they might have two extraverted parents. There's more Big Five data than MBTI data, but here's a study by Bouchard that found significant twin/MBTI correlations on all four dimensions.

The most counterintuitive conclusion that's been drawn from the cumulative data is that how your parents raise you has almost no influence on your basic temperament — e.g., whether you'll end up an INTJ. Identical twins raised in the same household are not significantly more alike (in terms of temperament) than identical twins raised in separate households.

Now, at this point you may well be thinking to yourself that, if non-genetic factors account for a third to a half of temperament, it seems awfully strange that how your parents raise you — not to mention all the other "environmental" influences that will be more or less similar for two twins growing up together — has virtually no effect on your temperament. How could that be?

If you want my personal view, I'm inclined to think that the lion's share of the explanation is probably that the data substantially understates the genetic component of temperament, and here's why:

Anytime you're doing studies where the results take the form of correlations, most sources of error are going to introduce noise into the data that has the effect of reducing the magnitude of the reported correlations. And personality typing involves multiple sources of significant error, starting with the fact that they haven't even figured out exactly what the nature of the temperament dimensions they should be measuring are, and also including multiple forms of human error in any self-assessment test that can cause the taker to answer a question "incorrectly." What's more, the more you assume (as Jung did, and as various studies suggest) that a relatively large percentage of the population is in or near the middle on one or more of the dimensions, the more mistyped people you should expect as a result of relatively small testing errors.

Assuming that the four MBTI dimensions aren't just arbitrary theoretical constructs and really do correspond to something real that could theoretically be accurately measured (by, say, directly measuring biological markers of some kind), I strongly suspect that, if every subject was accurately typed, the data would show that a substantially greater proportion of temperament is genetic. And the fact that twins raised in the same household aren't any more alike than twins raised separately would obviously seem a lot less strange if the proportion of temperament that results from "environmental" factors turned out to be very small.

the study doesnt consider epigenetics, thats what youre looking for I think

 

[reckful]

I believe this is wrong. The volatility of the errors doesn't create this bias you are describing here. In fact, measuring correlation between x and y is essentially the same as measuring the linear relationship y = bx + e where e is the error. An OLS estimation of b is unbiased no matter how volatile e is.

That may be true, but the bias would be in the opposite direction. When you are for example measuring the linear relationship between x and y, while you should actually be me measuring the relationship between x and z, and z and y are positively correlated, you will overestimate the correlation between x ans y. This is known as Omitted-variable bias.

Imma try to make this easy for you.

Suppose that, in reality, all men have an X chromosome and a Y chromosome, and all women have two X chromosomes.

And suppose somebody's doing a study where they correlate men and women (in terms of external physical features) with XY and XX.

And suppose the XY and XX determinations are done from blood samples, and they're perfect (error-free).

But suppose there are 100 men and 100 women in the sample, and 50 of each are typed externally male or female based on a doctor examining their private parts, and the other 50 of each are typed externally male or female based on the determination of an untrained observer who sees only their faces, with their hair hidden from view.

Assume (if you wouldn't otherwise) that sex determination by way of professional genital examination has a lower rate of error than sex determination by way of that kind of untrained facial view.

Would you expect the XX determinations to have a higher correlation with (A) the "female" judgments resulting from the professional examinations, or (B) the amateur face-only "female" judgments?

I hope you said A.

And personality typing is no different. If 100 pairs of identical twins all have a combination of genes that, let's say, to make things simple, correlates 100% (woo hoo!) with introversion — so, in other words, they're all really introverts — and they all take two personality indicators, one of which determines E/I with a 10% error rate, and one of which determines E/I with a 20% error rate, which test is going to find a higher correlation between genes and E/I?

As I said in my previous post, the higher error rate of the second test introduces more noise into the data (in the form of mistypes), and that reduces the reported correlation, making it appear that the twins' genes have less influence on whether they're E or I than the genes actually do.

 

[Tannhauser]

Imma try to make this easy for you.

No need to make it easier, just make it more precise. Especially when you are talking about mathematical concepts.

Suppose that, in reality, all men have an X chromosome and a Y chromosome, and all women have two X chromosomes.

And suppose somebody's doing a study where they correlate men and women (in terms of external physical features) with XY and XX.

And suppose the XY and XX determinations are done from blood samples, and they're perfect (error-free).

But suppose there are 100 men and 100 women in the sample, and 50 of each are typed externally male or female based on a doctor examining their private parts, and the other 50 of each are typed externally male or female based on the determination of an untrained observer who sees only their faces, with their hair hidden from view.

Assume (if you wouldn't otherwise) that sex determination by way of professional genital examination has a lower rate of error than sex determination by way of that kind of untrained facial view.

Would you expect the XX determinations to have a higher correlation with (A) the "female" judgments resulting from the professional examinations, or (B) the amateur face-only "female" judgments?

I hope you said A.

And personality typing is no different. If 100 pairs of identical twins all have a combination of genes that, let's say, to make things simple, correlates 100% (woo hoo!) with introversion — so, in other words, they're all really introverts — and they all take two personality indicators, one of which determines E/I with a 10% error rate, and one of which determines E/I with a 20% error rate, which test is going to find a higher correlation between genes and E/I?

As I said in my previous post, the higher error rate of the second test introduces more noise into the data (in the form of mistypes), and that reduces the reported correlation, making it appear that the twins' genes have less influence on whether they're E or I than the genes actually do.

It is clearer what you mean by "noise in the data" though. You actually mean noise in the measurement. In that case we agree.

It actually stems from the fact that when you measure a random variable with error of measurement, the estimator of the variance will be biased upward. The covariance remains unbiased but since the correlation coefficient is the covariance divided by the standard deviations, the correlation estimation will be biased downward.

 

[ENTP lurker]

You can not process every functional attitudes fully at once. There are indications that analysis shut down empathy and vice versa. Ti vs Fi. So there is something close to binary level. Humans are social animal makes sense that there is a need for diversity and there has been benefits of having very diverse thinking styles. Taking into account development of societies it is towards Idiocrazy. Too much brains to support meat heads.

I'm not so sure of my hypothesis of periodical IQ time intervals having local maximas and minimas between peaks.

 

[Brontosaurie]

Ridic obv :S

Hunters, scouts, nurturers, prophets, workers, leaders, memorists... All generalizable tribal occupations..?

Evolution would have to work in some kinda 8bit emulation of the universe to fail to implement those genetic niches for talking labor dividing monkeys...

 

[ZenRaiden]

To compare something to evolution you first have to know how evolution works. So how would INTP work in enviroment in terms of evolution? One can only speculate. Your study would simply create comfirmation bias. INTP is architect ergo INTP built pyramids. INTJ is mastermind ergo INTJ ends up being the planning an attack. ENFJ is giver so they will be the ones take care of the offspring etc. It makes no sense to really assume anything given we dont know how people adapt.

We could speculate about intelligence as factor well saying that I think its obvious that those people that are weak would have to find a job that can be performed by weak like being a priest and strong ones would be warriors, but this has more to do with physical attributes not mental ones.

 

[scorpiomover]

I mean we know that personality types are mostly genetic , so when a personality type appears now , it means that this bunch of psychological traits were beneficial for the carrier and so passed to the next generation.

Considering that the majority evolution of personality in general was due to social and sexual selection can we create a model that describes each type based on why it evolved and why it was successful? Whats your opinion

Nature is influenced by random changes in our biology, where some are preferred by environmental effects, and thus is influenced by evolution. Nurture is also largely received from our parents and our society, and thus is significantly inheritable, as well as receiving random changes where some are more advantageous than others, and so are also affected by evolution. Thus, everything that might cause personality types, is affected and driven by evolutionary changes.

We can see that Sensors are the majority. From an evolutionary standpoint, this makes sense. Over the last 600 years, we've been advancing society's knowledge with science, and before then, with simple learning of what works and what doesn't. Those who stick to what they know, will be at more of an advantage if they know more or possess better knowledge. So as human society advanced its knowledge, in turn, those who were Sensors did better. We've reached the point at which our society mostly relies on science, i.e. what is already known. So realistically, those who rely on that knowledge, are in a much better position to succeed.

You can see this by the evidence, such as the stats on income and MBTI type. INTJs earn about $72,000, have a very high IQ, and are 1-2% of the population. ISTJs, their Sensor equivalent, and are 17% of the population. With such a massive share of the population, they can't be all very high IQ people. So the average IQ of ISTJs has to be much, much quite closer to the average IQ. ISTJs have the highest portion of the population of any MBTI type. So they must be the closest to the average IQ. So clearly, the average ISTJ has a much, much lower IQ than an INTJ. IQ is highly correlated with income. So ISTJs should earn much, much less, closer to the average of MBTI types. But ISTJs earn $71,000, only $1,000 less than INTJs. So they must have a significant advantage over INTJs, to overcome the disadvantage of their much lower IQ. Thus, if we were to compare INTJs and ISTJs of the same IQ, we can expect to find that the ISTJs earn significantly more than their INTJ peers who have the same IQ.

So logically, and the evidence backs this up, Sensors have a significant advantage over Intuitives, due to the massive amount of science and technology that has already been developed.

The types of the other dimensions are roughly equal in number overall. So clearly, each side of the other dimensions confer no greater advantage than the other. Fs as as successful as Ts, and vice versa. Extroverts are as successful as Introverts, and vice versa. Ps are as successful as Js, and vice versa. If they weren't, then there would be an unequal distribution of them.

 

[Aviator8]

YESSSSSSS!

I just didn't want to create this thread myself.....


Okay, definitely. We are often (mis)taken for having aspergers, but we also notice all sorts of things others miss. It's our job, evolutionary, as those who quietly point out bad ideas, predators, and other threats. It's part of why we are so defensive. J's are supposed to get things done. My two friends ate INTP and INTJ, the J leads, and is at the top of the hierarchy, no matter how uncomfortable it makes her, because without her nothing would we do. I's are also for caution, and planning rather than just doing it. They/we also are the ones who tell the tribe "that's enough to for one day, let's stop here where it's safe instead of chasing the danger." F is supposed to bond us together, and as in Enders game shape society to be mutually beneficial to human survival based on sex. T are the ones who plan before running into a stampede, so that they all balance each other. S and N are for the same fought reasons as I and E, but more environmentally attuned towards their function. INFJ's are supposed to serve as the group's care so that no one is ostracized. INTJ's are the leaders along with ENTJ's-warmongers-the more common a type is, the more they care about themselves.
The diplomats keep the group together. The analysts find it shelter and safety. The sentinels are medics. The explorers are hunters and scouts generally, but all the types work together to perform all of the tasks.

Also, it is out of the debate wether or not personality is genetic. Sometime before 2300bc, there was an entirely INTJ city. They had double walls(that were unnecicary), obsessive cleanliness, and the first city planning. They were the harappan civilization. They debatably only went to war once(debatably quod it looks almost like an accidental fire rather than a razing to the ground.), and their existence in total was one in a million.

 

[Harshil2772thinker]

One possible method would be the introns in DNA would somehow store memories and the memories control splicing and this could also point to the hypothesis the child type could be determined by the father's MBTI type during conception , mother's MBTI type during conception and external memories that the mother makes when she is carrying the child

 

[Intolerable]

To summarize why types evolve let's assume X exists where it must. That is we aren't necessarily looking for X but we're looking at Y.

Y is the origin of X. Y is the set of conditions appropriate for X to rise up. Ex: A group lacking a hunter will happen upon a hunter purely out of necessity. If that's all they need.

I think necessity is the best explanation for evolution.

 

[Intolerable]

So logically, and the evidence backs this up, Sensors have a significant advantage over Intuitives, due to the massive amount of science and technology that has already been developed.

It's a social world. Intitutives are only valued for their ideas because that's all people see from us.

I liken it to the difference between me and the girl in the office. She smiles, says hello, makes your coffee, rubs your back on a bad day. Probably gives you a little extra when nobody else is around.

Me? I just say hello once in a blue moon. You know I bring a lot of quality to the team but you can't put your finger on any of it. It's all intellectual and it either bores you or intimidates you.

Neither of which is going to make you want to pay me more money.

 

[EyeSeeCold]

First we have to develop a more precise and tangible understanding of functions (see Auburn, Dario Nardi) and map them to cognitive-sensory processing and physiology, then we can propose their biological origins under evolution.

I don't think evo-psych is the right direction, though I'm not really qualified to make that conclusion.