Is Jung Cognitive Functions Wrong?

[Doctorjuice]

I got stuck in a TiSi function loop for a very long summer in which I had little to no human contact and never added ANYTHING new to my life. Basically just doing the same things over and over again, never venturing out of my comfort zone, stuck in a land with far too much certainty. One of the most miserable times of my life, glad I dragged myself out of it!

 

[garbage]

It's not about "owing me an explanation" it's about making your ideas clearly understood. For example, if you gave a detailed argument, you might convince me that your perspective was right, partly right, or at least I could see why you feel that way, even if I don't agree with you.

I think you're looking at this with Fe and I'm looking at it with Te, because this isn't about "personally owing" me anything, but about making yourself rationally clear on your position.

My point was that people might think that JCF is bullshit because it's often misapplied. I gave two examples of misapplication. One was that people tend to use some particular criteria (e.g. a function loop) to type a person into some type, then blindly using the type to make faulty assumptions about that person. The other was that people use JCF to explain behavior-level traits, which it's not intended to do.

I'm not sure how I could have made myself much more rationally clear. I didn't make any claims about function loops; that much was read into what I had to say. I was asked for an explanation for a claim that I didn't even make.

Does that help? I'm not sure how much clearer I can make this.

 

[Istbkleta]

I got stuck in a TiSi function loop for a very long summer in which I had little to no human contact and never added ANYTHING new to my life. Basically just doing the same things over and over again, never venturing out of my comfort zone, stuck in a land with far too much certainty. One of the most miserable times of my life, glad I dragged myself out of it!

I think these loops might be beneficial if it goes 2nd+4th.

The results would ofc never be satisfactory as one would have to engage a less developed function.

Look at the positive of the experience.

 

[527468]

A sure sign of a secondary and tertiary function is when you're forced to chose one or the other, and that balancing the preferences is a day-by-day struggle. I frequent between Ni+Te and Ni+Fi loops. I'll be an NF for a while then go back to my more familiar phase. ST? Never really...

 

[skylights]

Personally, I prefer cognitive function theory because it gives a deeper reason behind splitting dichotomies.

Essentially, it suggests there are 8 major thinking patterns humans engage – which can be broken down into two groups (perceiving and judging) of two functions (sensing/intuiting; feeling/thinking) and two directions (inward or outward) - which is why we end up with a 4-letter code (and that could really be reduced to a 3-letter code, but regardless -)

I used to struggle with the why behind the theory not allowing something like high Ni and Ti, but theoretically, it's not about strength of function, but also role of function. So even if your Ti is second-strongest, it might not necessarily be playing the auxiliary role to your Ni. And those roles are described according to balance, which is a fundamental principle to the mechanisms of the human body.

The primary function informs your main outlook on life and provides a certain degree of motivation; the auxiliary function "guides" the first in curbing its information intake if the primary is Px, or broadening if it's Jx; the tertiary provides relief to the primary and allows an outlet; the aspirational provides support and balance to the primary; and so on - the shadow processes (5,6,7,8) perform similar roles but further into the subconscious, and tend to emerge on a more ad-hoc basis. And then that's why loops can kind of mess you up, because your functions aren't balancing out correctly. Generally the middle function between whichever two are looping is supposed to be intermediating, but is lacking. And then you end up either a hermit or really obnoxious.

But like [MENTION=5578]bologna[/MENTION] said, often JCF is misinterpreted and often tests are flawed. To be fair, it's very hard to test for functions. Just like with the Enneagram, you have to have a decent idea of what you're trying to identify and why, otherwise you get happy-go-lucky ESFJs who test FeNe and broody ENFPs who test FiNi and other such misunderstandings.

 

[527468]

Those "role of the function" descriptions have a tendency to overspecify the very general natures, so that you're questioning how your preferences fit in to such a lifestyle. Description from primary function: "Much like in the movies, the leading role has a heroic quality as using it can get us out of difficult situations." Secondary function: "the supporting role is how we are helpful to others as well as supportive of ourselves." Leaving the intended meaning all too vague.

I prefer function strength/amount of use. Primary function: "This is how you always like to see the world and gain perspective." Secondary function: "This aids furthering and backing ones perspective, reaching new points." Tertiary function: "This motivates a more unreliable contrastive perspective." Inferior function: "This perspective is easily ignored" and also "so things from the outside may disturb it unexpectedly."

 

[skylights]

Those "role of the function" descriptions have a tendency to overspecify the very general natures, so that you're questioning how your preferences fit in to such a lifestyle. Description from primary function: "Much like in the movies, the leading role has a heroic quality as using it can get us out of difficult situations." Secondary function: "the supporting role is how we are helpful to others as well as supportive of ourselves." Leaving the intended meaning all too vague.

I prefer function strength/amount of use. Primary function: "This is how you always like to see the world and gain perspective." Secondary function: "This aids furthering and backing ones perspective, reaching new points." Tertiary function: "This motivates a more unreliable contrastive perspective." Inferior function: "This perspective is easily ignored" and also "so things from the outside may disturb it unexpectedly."

Yeah, I can see ordering them in terms of "what is your highest priority?" or "how do you think most frequently?". I still shy away from going by "strength" order because it's pretty common to hear ExxPs say they think Fi or Ti often feels stronger than Ne or Se, which, being Perceiving functions, are more on "auto" and in the background - less overtly conscious than our introverted Judging functions, which are very clear when we feel that something is wrong. This seems to be less of an issue for J types.