[MBTI General] Differences between ISFJ and ISTJ?

[Lambchop]

ISTJ
Dom: Si, Introverted sensing
Aux: Te, Extraverted Thinking
Ter: Fi, Introverted feeling
Inf: Ne, Extraverted Intuition



ISFJ
Dom: Si, Introverted Sensing
Aux: Fe, Extraverted Feeling
Ter: Ti, Introverted Thinking
Inf: Ne, Extraverted Intuition

From the tests I have taken on function, Ti was my dominant one, followed by Fi and Si. That's why the function test REALLY confused me???

 

[slant]

Functions can vary but those are the normal functions that make up each type. Those are the dominant functions. You still use the others ones but not as much as the dominant ones. If you have a strong Ti it would suggest you lean more towards ISTJ. That does not exactly mean you are one, it just means you have developed that side more than most.

 

[Ozz]

Functions can vary but those are the normal functions that make up each type. Those are the dominant functions. You still use the others ones but not as much as the dominant ones. If you have a strong Ti it would suggest you lean more towards ISTJ. That does not exactly mean you are one, it just means you have developed that side more than most.

Ti dominant would be some kind of Introverted Perceiver.

 

[raz]

ISTJs - "what it's like to be me"

I think for the most part I try to make my life pretty structured, and one thing that other people can depend on is that I have a very strong sense of duty.

I’m a team player but I work best with some time alone. I like it when everything is laid out and I can just concentrate on doing the job. I hate it when I don’t know where I am going, and I like feedback so I know I’m on the right track. If part of the job entails ambiguity, that’s fine just as long as the goal is to reduce ambiguity. I like being financially secure with the bills paid on time so my family can enjoy the things that we like to do. I like to have a fallback plan. I do like to laugh and have fun too, but work is more important to me, and then I make my little jokes. I always think I have to get my work done before I can go out or go home, when I can just sit down and relax without anything hanging over my head. I take responsibility seriously, and if I’m going to put my name on something, my desire is to insure it’s as good as it can be.

A sense of right and wrong is extremely important, and I will not just stand by and watch people doing things wrong. It really tears me apart. I tend to want things in order and people doing the right things. I want to have some rules. I always wanted to please people, and a safe environment to me is where I don’t have to compete with anyone else’s wishes. If I get into a situation where I feel very strongly and can’t articulate the words or can’t win, I just don’t say anything. I tend to put up with conflict rather than deal with it. I try to deal with stress, but I am not necessarily a good confronter. I would like to be more of a stress avoider.

I find myself duty bound sometimes and find that I do things because of what’s expected of me. People can trust and count on me, and I am very dependable, almost to a fault. I strive to keep balance between work and home, and if I’m going to provide for my family I’m going to have to swallow some things at work. When I see families that really want to be together, that’s a relationship that those people worked at for many years to achieve. Being a friend means caring enough about an individual to call them to see how they are doing, and if I can see someone has held true to their word, then they’ve probably gained my trust. If you were to ask me to define the word love, you would get responses like caring, responsibility, and loyalty.

I am a very private person and I don’t like a lot of attention. Although I enjoy being with people, observing them, and just being a part of the group, I really like some solitude. People who don’t know me perceive me as pretty formal and rigid, and then I’ll get out of character and people don’t know how to deal with that. They misinterpret my subtle sense of humor. I do have some ability to improvise every once in a while. I take a lot of pleasure in the simple things.

With a problem, I will try to look at all the parts and line them up to insure I don’t miss something. I have to force myself to look at the big picture and solve it before I can say, “Yes, this is going to work.” I’m not the idea person, but if I have experience I will give my opinion about how I think it should be done. If it’s new, I am very much apt to sit back and take it all in and sit on it and think about it. I try to catch myself, but it’s so unnatural for me to see the good side of things, and turning around my perspective takes a lot out of me. I want a rock-solid case for why I feel the way I do. A lot of my ideas are very practical, not theoretical—the down-to-earth stuff people really need to know. Sometimes when people don’t see my point, I tend to withdraw or stand back.

I can’t stand people who don’t care for others, who are irresponsible or rude, who shoot their mouth off without knowing what they are talking about or who don’t do what they are supposed to do and want something for nothing. I especially can’t tolerate people who don’t take other people’s time or privacy into consideration.

I get up in the morning and do my routine. And I take time at the end of each day to try to plan what’s happening the next day, what I’m going to be working on first, second, third, and so on through out the day, to eliminate the unexpected. Sometimes I might carry a book or something in case I have to wait somewhere. That makes life easy and full. Stability is important to me and change may not be that easy, but variety is good too. I seek advice when I need to change.

From bestfittype.com. Does this sound like you ISTJs?

That description sounds like me a lot. I bolded the parts that don't seem much like me, which were very few. My sense of duty is very strong, and so is my need to finish something. For example, in my accounting class, we have these practice problems on the internet to do for each chapter. There are 3 sets of problems up right now. I did the first 2 and the second was the only required one. The third is sitting there for the third chapter and it's optional. However, I feel weird knowing that I could potentially leave a set of problems undone when I could be doing it for practice.

So, this morning before my class, instead of working on something in a video game that I personally want to do, I'm likely going to go to the computer lab to work on those problems, even though they're optional, just because I don't want to live with knowing I didn't do something because I just might've been too lazy to do it. And, yeah, that's how I think. Si and Te pretty much is a consistent reminder throughout the day of your obligations. >< It's nearly impossible for me to lighten up enough to forget about something I should or could be doing.

For more examples, of how my mind tends to work, here's another one I thought of that might illustrate it. I've been playing Pokemon the last 3 months. I got the first game 3 months ago. A week or so into it, I realized a possible goal of being able to catch all 482 Pokemon. I blame Ne for that. So, I went on to do research to see what was required in order to accomplish it, and found out that if I wanted to do it on my own, I'd have to buy at least 6 more games, a gamecube, and 2 game boy advances. So, I did that. Afterward, I did more research on where to find every single one in the games that weren't the first one I bought, and made a spreadsheet outlining which game contained each one. So, I embarked on the task of working on each game necessary to do it, keeping track of my list of where to find each one so that I wouldn't be playing a game I didn't need to be.

I went through 5 game boy advance games until I had done what was necessary in those games for the Pokemon I needed. After that, I moved on to the Gamecube game, and spent about a week-ish working on getting through that. Once I had finished with what I needed to do with those 6, I was able to let go of them for the time being, and move back to the first original game I had been playing to finish the job in that game. It was more like a 7 game-wide scavenger hunt. Like I said, I blame Ne for giving me the proper vision to even imagine such an idea. My tunnel vision tendencies stayed on track during it. People online offered me help, and I constantly told them, "I'm not going to take any of these Pokemon I need from you. I want to do it all on my own, even if it takes more time."

If I couldn't justify receiving help as absolutely necessary and actually received the help, it would completely nullify the entire goal, making it no longer worth doing. So, something that could've possibly taken 2 weeks if I wanted to be creative enough and take the easier way out ended up taking me 2 months because I wanted to prove to myself that I could complete such a task with a minimal amount of assistance.

 

[compulsiverambler]

In my experience ISTJs come across, at least in public, as much more opinionated and often (though not all of them) more judgemental than ISFJs, who seem one of the most placid, conflict-averse types. That's just my experience though, and the difference that stands out the most to me. ISTJs relish the opportunity to express opinions about big issues and debate and show more emotion when doing so than ISFJs will.

 

[raz]

In my experience ISTJs come across, at least in public, as much more opinionated and often (though not all of them) more judgemental than ISFJs, who seem one of the most placid, conflict-averse types. That's just my experience though, and the difference that stands out the most to me. ISTJs relish the opportunity to express opinions about big issues and debate and show more emotion when doing so than ISFJs will.

I can't argue with that. Perhaps the ISFJs are just more concerned about being considerate with their opinions than we are? My logic is that if you don't speak up, something could potentially get screwed up.

 

[compulsiverambler]

I can't argue with that. Perhaps the ISFJs are just more concerned about being considerate with their opinions than we are? My logic is that if you don't speak up, something could potentially get screwed up.

An ISFJ I'm very close to has strong feelings about political issues but doesn't show it in public or polite company. This particular person admits they like to avoid conflict whenever possible, so that's probably a factor. However I don't get the impression from ISFJs that they're suppressing feelings when it comes to less immediate or personal issues; it's as if when they're around people, the social interaction with that person is what they're sensitive to and focused on, so things like politics just won't be able to spark their interest or strong feelings in that moment, making it fairly easy to keep their thoughts to themselves. Please correct me if that's wrong, ISFJs out there...

 

[Lambchop]

An ISFJ I'm very close to has strong feelings about political issues but doesn't show it in public or polite company. This particular person admits they like to avoid conflict whenever possible, so that's probably a factor. However I don't get the impression from ISFJs that they're suppressing feelings when it comes to less immediate or personal issues; it's as if when they're around people, the social interaction with that person is what they're sensitive to and focused on, so things like politics just won't be able to spark their interest or strong feelings in that moment, making it fairly easy to keep their thoughts to themselves. Please correct me if that's wrong, ISFJs out there...

You are absolutely correct.

 

[Ozz]

In my experience ISTJs come across, at least in public, as much more opinionated and often (though not all of them) more judgemental than ISFJs, who seem one of the most placid, conflict-averse types. That's just my experience though, and the difference that stands out the most to me. ISTJs relish the opportunity to express opinions about big issues and debate and show more emotion when doing so than ISFJs will.

I am opinionated about things that I have thought through and I am pretty sure I can back it up with some facts. The fact the feelings may be hurt doesn't cross my mind at the point as I believe they are better off knowing it.

How would a more sensitive person deal with it? Find a gentle way to say it out after the fact?

 

[Giggly]

In my experience ISTJs come across, at least in public, as much more opinionated and often (though not all of them) more judgemental than ISFJs, who seem one of the most placid, conflict-averse types. That's just my experience though, and the difference that stands out the most to me. ISTJs relish the opportunity to express opinions about big issues and debate and show more emotion when doing so than ISFJs will.

An ISFJ I'm very close to has strong feelings about political issues but doesn't show it in public or polite company. This particular person admits they like to avoid conflict whenever possible, so that's probably a factor. However I don't get the impression from ISFJs that they're suppressing feelings when it comes to less immediate or personal issues; it's as if when they're around people, the social interaction with that person is what they're sensitive to and focused on, so things like politics just won't be able to spark their interest or strong feelings in that moment, making it fairly easy to keep their thoughts to themselves. Please correct me if that's wrong, ISFJs out there...

Yes. Very good.

 

[raz]

Must be an F thing to become in love with someone who understands you.

 

[Lambchop]

I am opinionated about things that I have thought through and I am pretty sure I can back it up with some facts. The fact the feelings may be hurt doesn't cross my mind at the point as I believe they are better off knowing it.

How would a more sensitive person deal with it? Find a gentle way to say it out after the fact?

It depends on what it is, Ozz. Do you have an example?

 

[Lambchop]

Must be an F thing to become in love with someone who understands you.

You don't want to be understood? Are you speaking specifically about something?

 

[raz]

I'm just noticing a tendency with feelers that when someone elaborates on something that explains the feeler's thought process, the feeler begins to admire said person very intensely. It's not that I don't want to be understood, it's just that when someone is able to understand me, I look for more of what the understanding will lead to and how it can help the situation. The main appeal of understanding for me is to just reduce ambiguity.

 

[Lambchop]

I'm just noticing a tendency with feelers that when someone elaborates on something that explains the feeler's thought process, the feeler begins to admire said person very intensely. It's not that I don't want to be understood, it's just that when someone is able to understand me, I look for more of what the understanding will lead to and how it can help the situation. The main appeal of understanding for me is to just reduce ambiguity.

I think I admire anyone who is willing to share themselves openly in a positive way. If I feel (there's that word again!) like people are being helpful, I admire them and appreciate them. And it's subjective...I admit it. When I post something and other people respond to try to help me understand something, I really appreciate it.

Would you agree with Ts being more "rational" than F's? Is that what you mean? Because I could see that.

I've recently decided that I hold grudges more than I think I do. My husband's sister, who I feel betrayed me at one point...went to the ER yesterday. When my husband told me...instead of saying "Is she okay?", I said "What's wrong with her?" and realized that I didn't care that much. I thought I'd forgiven and moved on...but apparently not. I need to work on that!

 

[FallaciaSonata]

Uh....Hey Giggly, did you mis-quote someone else? I think my name is on something I didn't say in one of your posts. Might want to check that.

I've recently decided that I hold grudges more than I think I do. My husband's sister, who I feel betrayed me at one point...went to the ER yesterday. When my husband told me...instead of saying "Is she okay?", I said "What's wrong with her?" and realized that I didn't care that much. I thought I'd forgiven and moved on...but apparently not. I need to work on that!

I don't think that denotes a grudge.... Well, for me, it doesn't. Might sound a bit cold, but in those types of situations I would ask "What happened", or "What's wrong with the person", before I ask "Are they okay?".

Maybe it's my inherent curiosity. Maybe it's Si, wanting to compare it to something I've seen before. Who knows.

I do know, though, that I'm far too lazy to hold a grudge. Way too much useless effort right there.

 

[Giggly]

Uh....Hey Giggly, did you mis-quote someone else? I think my name is on something I didn't say in one of your posts. Might want to check that.

Huh?

I've recently decided that I hold grudges more than I think I do. My husband's sister, who I feel betrayed me at one point...went to the ER yesterday. When my husband told me...instead of saying "Is she okay?", I said "What's wrong with her?" and realized that I didn't care that much. I thought I'd forgiven and moved on...but apparently not. I need to work on that!

Grudges do take a lot of effort, but they do happen sometimes. I think ISFJs are prone to them because of the strong dislike of conflict combined with being horribly sensitive that can easily make for some massive resentment building up. I'm not sure what the solution to that is besides developing a thick skin, more confidence, and expressing your feelings more.

I'm just noticing a tendency with feelers that when someone elaborates on something that explains the feeler's thought process, the feeler begins to admire said person very intensely. It's not that I don't want to be understood, it's just that when someone is able to understand me, I look for more of what the understanding will lead to and how it can help the situation. The main appeal of understanding for me is to just reduce ambiguity.

I like making connections with people and it helps a lot to be understood and accepted.

 

[Habba]

Here's a funny difference I noticed between Fe and Te.

I'm at my friend's place, and we are about to go get some food from a nearby store. It's fall, so temperature outside can be almost anything (you never know if it's warm or cold out there). So we each have to make a mental decision how much clothes are we about to wear. Will T-shirt be just fine, or should a warm jacket be considered?

This is how we make our decisions:

Te (me). I take note of what time of the year it is. September is warmer than October but colder than August. So I should more clothes than I used to wear last month. I take a loot at the thermometer. It tells me it's 13 degrees of celcius (about 55 fahrenheit). Compared to my previous experiences (this is actully a Si part of the process), anything below 15 degrees (59 fahrenheit) is bit too cold for just a t-shirt. So I should put on little bit more than just a t-shirt. It's september, so some long sleeved shirt will do.

So I base my decision on external criteria (thermometer) and apply that data to my previous experiences of the weather.

Now, my friend uses his Fe to make a decision. Rather than having made some categories of warmthness based solely on the temperature, he rather looks outside of his windows and makes a quick study what others are wearing. "Hmm... I see one T-shirt on a fat guy, couple of youngsters with a jacket and a lady with coat. It's probably very cold then. I should get my jacket".

But of course, I think he might have some other criterias besides just staying warm. He might for an example want to blend in crowd too... Perhaps he wouldn't want to draw attention to himself because of a differing outfit.

 

[raz]

On days that I'm not sure, it works like this: I go outside and see how it feels. Then I go inside and go to weather.com. I see the temperature it is right now. I then look at the high for today and base the clothes I wear right now and the clothes I take with me on something that's a middle ground without focusing too much on the weather right now and the weather later in the day. That's because I have a lot of experience putting heavy clothing on in the morning for cold weather just for it to get hot in the afternoon.

Some more examples:

For instance, I love when I have a list of things to do, ordering them sequentially in a fashion that gets them done the most efficiently. The most common way of doing this that I like doing the most is having to go to multiple places. Say for example, that I'm at work, and I have a pile of clothes that I need to bring over to other departments. I have an item from the Ladies' department, an item from Shoes, an item from Home, and an item from Juniors. My first instinct is to figure out where I am moving to, aka which action am I taking. I just do it subconsciously. I'm not sure how others do it, but I would figure that, going across the store to Ladies, then circling back to Shoes, then walking over to the Home department, then from Home to Juniors, then from Juniors back to the Men's department is the shortest trip.

I figure out in my head in the quickest way to get what I need done by finding the shortest method. I do this *all* the time when I'm driving to multiple places. I plan out a list in my head of where to go sequentially so that I drive the least amount of time. This is why I love my GPS so much. It's so freaking awesome for being able to give me the shortest way to a destination.

Another example is how I decide when to speak or if to speak. My English teacher has noted that I seem to be very aware of what I'm saying, and I told her that it's pretty automatic for me to think about how others will take what I say. She said that was very kind of me, but she's an ISFJ. I don't do it because I'm being considerate of others' feelings. If I want to say something, I think first of how someone will react, because if they will react emotionally or get upset, I just won't speak because I don't want to deal with it. Unless what I say is needed to reach a specific goal, it's just unnecessary and I can't justify something. I'd just be saying it to provoke an emotional response, and to me, that's very...empty.

Some more examples...let's see. This one, I thought of yesterday while I was driving. I was listening to this romantic song on my iPod that I absolutely love. It made me think of this girl that I'm just crazy for, and I'm sure for others, listening to a romantic song while thinking of someone special makes the feelings 10x more intense. However, I stopped myself right there. I immediately asked myself, "Are these feelings for her real inside of me? Is this song giving me a false impression of my feelings because of the correlation between the song and my situation? How do I really feel about her on a real level, without something else affecting it? How practical is a potential relationship with her? Are the feelings reciprocated?"

One more. I recently stopped trying to lose weight because I reached around 175 lbs. So, I'm now trying to see how many extra snacks I can eat without gaining weight. I tried for a month and I'm about holding steady. I'm not 100% sure on what's going on, but my weight is safe for the most part after experimenting. However, after the month, I feel a lack of stability in my diet. I'm going after things randomly just because I want to, and I feel like I'm reacting to each day. So, the last few days, I've been trying to think of an actual plan to allow me to have extra things while still giving me a sense of stability and maintaining my weight.

My logic for this was: Does eating these extra things actually matter to me? Am I doing it because it's the general thing in society to do eat high calorie snacks just for fun? I need to stop and make a plan that allows me to have the things that matter to me. These little snacks don't do much for me except give me fulfillment in the moment. However, what's actually important to me is what's in a few months: Thanksgiving and Christmas. So, I'll have to force a larger amount of control for the time being to prepare for the winter holidays. That was a lot of Fi, actually. I stopped to ask myself what actually mattered to me outside of following the routine (Si) and what was being done commonly by other people (Te).

 

[NewEra]

Here's a funny difference I noticed between Fe and Te.

I'm at my friend's place, and we are about to go get some food from a nearby store. It's fall, so temperature outside can be almost anything (you never know if it's warm or cold out there). So we each have to make a mental decision how much clothes are we about to wear. Will T-shirt be just fine, or should a warm jacket be considered?

This is how we make our decisions:

Te (me). I take note of what time of the year it is. September is warmer than October but colder than August. So I should more clothes than I used to wear last month. I take a loot at the thermometer. It tells me it's 13 degrees of celcius (about 55 fahrenheit). Compared to my previous experiences (this is actully a Si part of the process), anything below 15 degrees (59 fahrenheit) is bit too cold for just a t-shirt. So I should put on little bit more than just a t-shirt. It's september, so some long sleeved shirt will do.

So I base my decision on external criteria (thermometer) and apply that data to my previous experiences of the weather.

Now, my friend uses his Fe to make a decision. Rather than having made some categories of warmthness based solely on the temperature, he rather looks outside of his windows and makes a quick study what others are wearing. "Hmm... I see one T-shirt on a fat guy, couple of youngsters with a jacket and a lady with coat. It's probably very cold then. I should get my jacket".

But of course, I think he might have some other criterias besides just staying warm. He might for an example want to blend in crowd too... Perhaps he wouldn't want to draw attention to himself because of a differing outfit.

Good example. The bold (what your friend does) is exactly what I wouldn't do. I'll see what the temperature is, wind chill, etc. before I decide what clothing to wear. And I won't look at what other people are wearing because their body heat insulation might be different from mine.