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How to differentiate between social anxiety/shyness and soc last?

Entropic

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What the title says. I am for example reading this thread because I am really trying to get a better grasp of the soc instinct:

http://www.enneagraminstitute.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=28156#.UU3HR1eRfXI

However, I constantly see people mentioning social anxiety and shyness and to a degree introversion in relation to why they are soc last. The only other time seemed to be related to grasping historical connections but I am not sure being able to cognitively grasp the background for WWI is a true indication of the soc instinct or not. I mean, I understand it but I can't say that beyond understanding it that these things are interesting, relevant or something I pay attention to. Not in history or in present day time.

Also, I'm not suffering from shyness or social anxiety. I do however fail to understand this sense of "belongingness" that was described to be indicative of strong soc, that you're a part of something greater.

My rationale would thus be this: that a person who still has this sense but is too shy/socially anxious to seek it out would still be a soc first or second, yes? As is usual with our dominant instinct, we feel a certain lack or need if we do not fulfill or satisfy it properly and neuroticism could also appear in relation to our instincts by being afraid of it.

Thoughts?
 

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I'm pretty sure social anxiety makes more sense for so-first people, because they care enough about it to actually get anxious :) I agree with your rationale whole-heartedly; as a so-first (maybe second) person, it's something I've been through a lot.
 
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Good question. I do have quite high social anxiety, and I'm probably SO second. Even though I'm naturally introverted and do not need too much approval from others, I assume I have a fear of being negatively judged from needing some kind of acceptance, which is where the anxiety comes in. I'll agree that people with high SO are more inclined to this than the others.
 

Entropic

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I'm pretty sure social anxiety makes more sense for so-first people, because they care enough about it to actually get anxious :) I agree with your rationale whole-heartedly; as a so-first (maybe second) person, it's something I've been through a lot.

Good points. I can experience panic attacks when I'm out and I get overwhelmed by stimuli but I don't suffer from agrophobia. Just that sometimes after having an exhausting day I just need to get away from everyone and everything and sit in my sofa and do nothing.

Is there any person the forum who suffers from severe shyness/social anxiety and is identified and confirmed as soc last and is willing to explain how it works? I'd be very curious to hear. I can see the connection between the two but I wonder how it truly operates.
 

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I think a certain degree of shyness or social discomfort can result from being a loner who's not used to being in social situations. Maybe if you're social last, the discomfort would be more about being in a new situation and not being sure how to handle the situation than directly about your image and how others see you (which would be the case for So-first or second).

I wouldn't say I'm particularly shy, but I do often feel slightly uncomfortable when I'm in a social situation because it forces me to be more extraverted, which I'm not used to. I don't consciously worry about my social image or making mistakes. Although I may feel like an idiot afterward if I say something really stupid or awkward. I'm not immune to that.
 

madhatter

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However, I constantly see people mentioning social anxiety and shyness and to a degree introversion in relation to why they are soc last. The only other time seemed to be related to grasping historical connections but I am not sure being able to cognitively grasp the background for WWI is a true indication of the soc instinct or not. I mean, I understand it but I can't say that beyond understanding it that these things are interesting, relevant or something I pay attention to. Not in history or in present day time.

To the first, I'm not shy, only reserved, and I'm SO-dom (as you know). As for social anxiety, I have felt this to some extent, nothing major, and mostly when I was young. How it manifests is just this feeling of being overwhelmed. I don't know what I'm supposed to say or what I'm supposed to do, in a lot of situations. Other people seem to do it with such ease; I must have missed that day in Kindergarten when they taught social skills. I think this stems from the core 5 and inferior Fe. I've gotten better at faking it, but I still suck at Fe.

As for historical connections, I don't think the ability to grasp them is indicative of SO dominance, but the interest in them may be. Personally, studying and understanding social, cultural, linguistic and historical, and political connections are fascinating to me. In hindsight, it's not surprising that I became a linguist, and the fields of linguistics that draw me even less surprising. Whenever I had a literature or short story class in college, I loved when the professor laid out that background for the story, because it gave me a framework to better understand the story.

Also, I'm not suffering from shyness or social anxiety. I do however fail to understand this sense of "belongingness" that was described to be indicative of strong soc, that you're a part of something greater.

See this part that people often associate with SO, being part of something "greater" or "larger"...it's too broad for me. I do have a sense of belonging to my family, but the latter, I don't really identify with that. I don't need to be part of something "greater" than myself, but I need to fulfill that desire for belonging. I don't think it's something "larger" or "greater".

My rationale would thus be this: that a person who still has this sense but is too shy/socially anxious to seek it out would still be a soc first or second, yes? As is usual with our dominant instinct, we feel a certain lack or need if we do not fulfill or satisfy it properly and neuroticism could also appear in relation to our instincts by being afraid of it.

Depends. I would say my 5 detachment often deters me from fulfilling my SO needs, but I don't think it's "shyness" that deters me. Not really "social anxiety" either, but it can be argued that a 5's detachment stems from anxiety. I don't really feel "social anxiety" in that specific sense is what does it. It's much deeper than that.
 
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I'm so-last and I am very shy. However, I've never taken my shyness to be a reflection on my instinctual stackings. I'm shy because I'm quiet and introverted (not just in the Jungian sense) and don't usually have much to say to people until I get to know them better, and I tend to perceive those things as defects in myself that I'm self-conscious about.

On the other hand, I believe I'm so-last because I don't cultivate group membership or merge with and promote community agenda in order to fulfill my primary need for security. I'm more apt instead to seek out personal and targeted connections with people and activities.
 

Entropic

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[MENTION=16013]madhatter[/MENTION] thanks for that post. I can't respond in length but I agree that core type probably plays a large role, so does the MBTI. I've never been blessed with social grace as I can be very crass and blunt and I've always felt people seemed to make social connections with such ease compared to I. It's probably because I'm a 5 that I experience it this way and while I don't seek a sense of community like a soc first I do seek what I think are deep and meaningful relationships. It's also interesting how I became a social anthropologist but my study foci are on very narrow subjects related to my personal interests e.g. music and the studies tend to focus why people like music.

I do think my interest in typology and anthropology could be to help me cover my blind spot though.
 

madhatter

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I do think my interest in typology and anthropology could be to help me cover my blind spot though.

What kind of anthropology?
 

Entropic

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What kind of anthropology?

Social/cultural.

Basically my logic goes; I don't get this person but it's because they are X type so it's ok that I don't. Not sure if that's something you relate to.
 

madhatter

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Social/cultural.

Basically my logic goes; I don't get this person but it's because they are X type so it's ok that I don't. Not sure if that's something you relate to.

I only took one anthropology class, but it was linguistic anthropology.

Hm, I suppose I relate to that. My thought process is similar. I determine someone is type X. I think, oh, that's why I didn't get that person, they have a completely different thought process from me. I may not ever completely understand them, but it helps me understand them to an extent. If I can see that, I'm no longer thinking, that's irrational; it's just different.

This understanding into other people is why I love studying typology and psychological theory
 

Entropic

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I only took one anthropology class, but it was linguistic anthropology.

Hm, I suppose I relate to that. My thought process is similar. I determine someone is type X. I think, oh, that's why I didn't get that person, they have a completely different thought process from me. I may not ever completely understand them, but it helps me understand them to an extent. If I can see that, I'm no longer thinking, that's irrational; it's just different.

This understanding into other people is why I love studying typology and psychological theory

Makes sense that you'd focus more on human communication. I'm interested in linguistics but it's more in the realms of discourse analysis.

I wonder if that's just a 5 coping mechanism in general then. Agreed that it's one of the reasons why I love anthropology because I can study something I love and why others love it and it legitimate.
 

madhatter

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Makes sense that you'd focus more on human communication. I'm interested in linguistics but it's more in the realms of discourse analysis.

I'm interested in all things linguistic. When I go to grad school, I'm going to have a hard time picking a focus. I love purely theoretical discourse analysis, like syntax or phonology, but I also sometimes get frustrated with the extent of the abstraction that the generativists use to justify their more far-flung theories. But I'm really drawn to dialectology, historical linguistics, and sociolinguistics, as well as pragmatics. Comparing how languages are related and how languages differs in different social contexts...hmmmmmmm. LOL.

I wonder if that's just a 5 coping mechanism in general then. Agreed that it's one of the reasons why I love anthropology because I can study something I love and why others love it and it legitimate.

Good point. These systems do give us a context to intellectualize and to study others without it being creepy.
 

Entropic

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I'm interested in all things linguistic. When I go to grad school, I'm going to have a hard time picking a focus. I love purely theoretical discourse analysis, like syntax or phonology, but I also sometimes get frustrated with the extent of the abstraction that the generativists use to justify their more far-flung theories. But I'm really drawn to dialectology, historical linguistics, and sociolinguistics, as well as pragmatics. Comparing how languages are related and how languages differs in different social contexts...hmmmmmmm. LOL.

You should totally google Mike Wesch (mwesch) on Youtube. He's most likely an so 5 who's a professor in digital anthropology. I think you will find a lot of his works interesting. I for example love this video he did, part because it's so social anthropology in a nutshell:
Good point. These systems do give us a context to intellectualize and to study others without it being creepy.
Yeah, and truth is that before I had a reference system I felt very frustrated and often avoided social situations where I felt I didn't understand or get anything out of it. It was harder to accept, especially when I felt people encroached on my social space like people trying to express their feelings physically (like I later read some stuff about social comfort zones and such and while it still annoys me I can deal with it better since I now understand why it's important for some people).
 

madhatter

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You should totally google Mike Wesch (mwesch) on Youtube. He's most likely an so 5 who's a professor in digital anthropology. I think you will find a lot of his works interesting. I for example love this video he did, part because it's so social anthropology in a nutshell:

That is fascinating. I'll have to find more of his stuff. One thing that I take a passing notice of on these types of forums: how tone and intonation is portrayed through text. It can be difficult to convey what is so natural face-to-face. But there are ways that we get around that. Emoticons. Bold and italics. Caps. Punctuation. How quickly an etiquette was formed dictating these things. "Don't use Caps...I feel like you're yelling at me." "Oh, she used only one period after 'no.', she must be mad or annoyed." "Don't use text-speak...it's uncouth and I can't understand what you're saying." I see people argue, and a lot of times, it's just a simple matter of mis-communication and the misinterpretation of tone and pragmatics.

Yeah, and truth is that before I had a reference system I felt very frustrated and often avoided social situations where I felt I didn't understand or get anything out of it. It was harder to accept, especially when I felt people encroached on my social space like people trying to express their feelings physically (like I later read some stuff about social comfort zones and such and while it still annoys me I can deal with it better since I now understand why it's important for some people).

I experienced similar frustration.

I haven't heard of social comfort zones. What do you feel like is an encroachment of your social comfort zone? I do need a physical comfort zone, like the "personal bubble". I used to work at a daycare, and there are some kids who just love to hang on you. They want to cuddle right up to you, and for me it was absolutely suffocating. I could only handle it for a very short time. With the older kids who did this to me, I would say, I need a two-foot radius, personal bubble now. What's sad, I need to do this with my mom. She's very "hands-y."
 

Entropic

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That is fascinating. I'll have to find more of his stuff. One thing that I take a passing notice of on these types of forums: how tone and intonation is portrayed through text. It can be difficult to convey what is so natural face-to-face. But there are ways that we get around that. Emoticons. Bold and italics. Caps. Punctuation. How quickly an etiquette was formed dictating these things. "Don't use Caps...I feel like you're yelling at me." "Oh, she used only one period after 'no.', she must be mad or annoyed." "Don't use text-speak...it's uncouth and I can't understand what you're saying." I see people argue, and a lot of times, it's just a simple matter of mis-communication and the misinterpretation of tone and pragmatics.

I'm more wary of "feeling tone" like I just get feelings of "this person seems angry" and so on but other than that I don't pay so much attention to it. I just get vibes that build up over time. I wonder if that's a difference in MBTI also, like you're focused on the details that create structure. I once did some half-assed research about how people express themselves over the internet and why they do it in the manner they do it but I didn't get very far. Again, I like it as a subject but I just kind of lack passion. It's interesting but clearly not interesting enough.
I experienced similar frustration.

I haven't heard of social comfort zones. What do you feel like is an encroachment of your social comfort zone? I do need a physical comfort zone, like the "personal bubble". I used to work at a daycare, and there are some kids who just love to hang on you. They want to cuddle right up to you, and for me it was absolutely suffocating. I could only handle it for a very short time. With the older kids who did this to me, I would say, I need a two-foot radius, personal bubble now. What's sad, I need to do this with my mom. She's very "hands-y."

For example people touching me with their hands, and I don't mean sexually, but just someone who wants to put their hands on my shoulder for example or similar. That always makes me feel very uncomfortable to the point where I just feel something like "GET THE FUCK AWAY FROM ME". Same with my grandmother. Also very "hands-y", and I suspect it's because she's an ESFJ with a kinaesthetic learning preference so for her it's very difficult to say, imagine the touch of something without actually touching it.

This was more exaggerated when I was unhealthy also as I even disliked hugging people close to me and such. I feel that doing it excessively undermines the value of physical touch as well as it is ultimately something I'd only really accept with an SO. Other people are on restricted grounds.
 

Flatlander

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I haven't heard of social comfort zones. What do you feel like is an encroachment of your social comfort zone? I do need a physical comfort zone, like the "personal bubble". I used to work at a daycare, and there are some kids who just love to hang on you. They want to cuddle right up to you, and for me it was absolutely suffocating. I could only handle it for a very short time. With the older kids who did this to me, I would say, I need a two-foot radius, personal bubble now. What's sad, I need to do this with my mom. She's very "hands-y."

Do you have a problem doing this with your mother? If so, why do you think?
 

madhatter

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I wonder if that's a difference in MBTI also, like you're focused on the details that create structure.

Undoubtedly. I have always had a "strong" Ni function, but I've never really doubted that I prefer sensation. I have quite the eye for detail. I see many websites correlate N and linguistics, which is not off-base, because many of my professors at university seemed very N. But you really do need to have an attention to detail. Linguistics is often lumped together with English, but it's really more like math. That's why the intro classes were so fun to me, because they separated the linguists from the English majors. I could always tell who the English majors were, because they had that deer in the headlight look. I was thinking about getting an English major, but quickly switched over to linguistics, because it suited me better. I liked the literature classes, but I quickly grow impatient of what I see as far-flung interpretations. Please don't ask me to analyze what the author was "really" trying to say. Just let me analyze these rules for phonological change or syntactic structure, and leave me alone, haha.

This was more exaggerated when I was unhealthy also as I even disliked hugging people close to me and such. I feel that doing it excessively undermines the value of physical touch as well as it is ultimately something I'd only really accept with an SO. Other people are on restricted grounds.

When I was unhealthy, I never wanted people to touch or hug me either. I'm still not a hugger by any means (except with my family), but I have loosened up a bit. I still don't like it when people I just met want to hug me, but I try not to be a jerk about it.
 

madhatter

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Do you have a problem doing this with your mother? If so, why do you think?

It was more of a problem when we were both unhealthier. I would snap and she would get hurt. She always wants to stroke my cheek or hold my hand or kiss and hug me, which I just think is weird. What would make me angry is I would ask her not to do certain things and she still won't listen...that would absolutely infuriate me. Like, "Mom, I understand you want to kiss me goodbye, and that's fine, but don't kiss me on my ear...that's weird and kind of creepy." And then she would still do it. She would say she was aiming for my cheek. But when I would recoil away, her feelings would be hurt. I get that one of her love languages is physical touch, but it's not one of mine. That one is one of my lowest scores. When I'm feeling particularly surly (which is not an uncommon occurrence...I can be quite temperamental), I don't even want people to talk to me, let alone touch me. So I don't understand why she doesn't understand that I don't want a big wet kiss on my ear. The thing is, I don't mind physical touch, but on my terms. That sounds kind of selfish, but it is what it is. I need to be in the right head space to be open to it.
 

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I am an so/sp person and I have a lot of social anxiety.

I think that I would be afraid of a one-on-one person conversation, I am anxious for intimacy. I think that is due to my childhood (been moving around a lot - friends who weren't friends and so on) It created an anxiety and thus, sx is my last. However, once I was settled in my current school and made a friend, being deceived by that friend and made a new one - two - who are loyal to me, my 'sociality' increased. (they know that I am sometimes hard to understand, but they try their best - they also help me with my anxiety, which I appreciate) But because of my slight trauma, I still fear intimacy.

For so to be last and sx to be first, it would be the other way round I guess. You'd be comfortable with one single person, because you feel in control, but with a group... total disaster. You feel 'being eyed upon' (lol - new verb)

That's as far that my reasoning goes... (don't know a lot of social instincts though)
 
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