My Personal Typology

Last edit: 29 Oct. 2012 (sensitivity added)

My personal typology includes not only socionics, but bits and pieces of other systems and observations that I have found to be important in my interactions with other people. My typology is not systematized, but here's what it includes:

1. Socionic type captures key aspects of how a person interacts with his environment. It is able to answer perhaps 50% of the question, "who is this person?"
2. Gender encompasses the overarching biological program of the individual and broad communication styles and expectations that can create both attraction and problems between the sexes, regardless of socionic type. Within the genders, varying levels of male and female hormones add additional variety.
3. Striking characteristics or experience, if any, play a critical role in the lives of people who possess them. Examples include: someone who spends most of their time traveling around different countries, an Albanian immigrant living in the U.S., a WWII-era former spy, a concentration camp survivor, a professional basketball player, a grotesquely obese person, a dwarf or midget, someone with a serious stutter, a CEO, a person who makes a living off selling his own art, etc. In such cases, you can understand a great deal about a person simply by recognizing their striking characteristics, which may override or enhance type-related inborn personality traits.
4. Somatotype, e.g. levels of endomorphy, mesomorphy, and ectomorphy, help to explain things like why one ILE is physically adventurous while another is mentally adventurous, why one SEI is more comforting and nurturing and another SEI more ascetic and austere, or why one ILI is distant and another chummy. Physical constitution also may carry over into the sexual sphere, influencing the types of movements and touching that people find sexual.
5. Intellect or IQ, particularly closer to the extremes, adds a confounding factor to intertype relations, helping to explain why people who "should" get along according to socionics and common sense sometimes don't, and vice versa. For people close to the mean, this factor plays a smaller role in their lives.
6. Sensitivity, particularly whether a person is highly sensitive (HSP) or not.
7. Sexual attractiveness, including all relevant factors (looks, financial success, status), helps to capture hidden layers of competition and mating behavior (attraction and rejection) occuring between people regardless of their other characteristics.
8. Activity level, including hyperactivity and speed of speech, sometimes plays a role in interpersonal interaction, helping to explain, for instance, why one SEE tires you and another doesn't.

Points 5, 6, 7, and sometimes 4 often don't play much of a role unless they are striking, which means they could conceivably be included in point 3 -- "striking characteristics or experience."