Introversion and Extroversion
The Big Five E dimension — but Brian Little treats it as consequential enough to unpack separately, especially because behavior can diverge from trait via free traits.
Stimulation
Extroverts need stimulation — parties, loud environments, social magnetic cores. Introverts often seek to reduce stimulation (quiet upper floors at conferences). Not antisocial — may simply function better with lower input.
Internal stimulants count: caffeine works better for extroverts. Introverts on coffee doing speeded quantitative tasks may look non-quantitative — a misconstrual.
Communication
Extroverts: want social encounter punctuated by closeness; stand close; lots of eye contact; rapid intimacy ("Charles" → "Charlie" → "Chuckles Baby"); prefer black-and-white concrete language.
Introverts: prefer contextually complex, contingent, "weasel-word" sentences — "more or less," "as it were," "not to put too fine a point upon it." Need permission for intimacy; "Charles" stays "Charles" until invited closer.
Little and extrovert colleague Tom heard the same words differently: Little said Michael "has a tendency at times of behaving in a way that some of us might see as perhaps more assertive than is normally called for." Tom: "He's an asshole!"
Performance vs Trait
Little is an extreme introvert who acts extroverted to profess — a free trait serving a core project. Requires restorative solitude afterward.
Connections
- big-five-personality — E dimension in OCEAN
- free-traits — introverts acting extroverted (and vice versa)
- active-listening — introvert communication style may read as reserved, not disengaged