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Definition of the 8 cognitive functions with real life examples?

DreamBeliever

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Joined
Mar 2, 2015
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776
I'm looking for some easy to understand definitions of the mbti cognitive functions with real life examples along with it. Can anyone here direct me to some good explanations of Fe, Fi, Se, Si, Ne, Ni, Te, & Ti? Or can anyone here just simply explain them to me? I think I have a good grip on what all of them are, but I just want to double check that I do. I'm also trying to see what ones I can truly see myself in. Any help would be great!
 

VagrantFarce

Active member
Joined
Nov 19, 2008
Messages
1,558
Found these, if it helps:

Keys 2 Cognition - Cognitive Processes

Se - Extroverted Sensing
Extraverted Sensing occurs when we become aware of what is in the physical world in rich detail. We may be drawn to act on what we experience to get an immediate result. We notice relevant facts and occurrences in a sea of data and experiences, learning all the facts we can about the immediate context or area of focus and what goes on in that context. An active seeking of more and more input to get the whole picture may occur until all sources of input have been exhausted or something else captures our attention. Extraverted Sensing is operating when we freely follow exciting physical impulses or instincts as they come up and enjoy the thrill of action in the present moment. A oneness with the physical world and a total absorption may exist as we move, touch, and sense what is around us. The process involves instantly reading cues to see how far we can go in a situation and still get the impact we want or respond to the situation with presence.

Si - Introverted Sensing
Introverted Sensing often involves storing data and information, then comparing and contrasting the current situation with similar ones. The immediate experience or words are instantly linked with the prior experiences, and we register a similarity or a difference—for example, noticing that some food doesn’t taste the same or is saltier than it usually is. Introverted Sensing is also operating when we see someone who reminds us of someone else. Sometimes a feeling associated with the recalled image comes into our awareness along with the information itself. Then the image can be so strong, our body responds as if reliving the experience. The process also involves reviewing the past to draw on the lessons of history, hindsight, and experience. With introverted Sensing, there is often great attention to detail and getting a clear picture of goals and objectives and what is to happen. There can be a oneness with ageless customs that help sustain civilization and culture and protect what is known and long-lasting, even while what is reliable changes.

Ne - Extroverted Intuiting
Extraverted iNtuiting involves noticing hidden meanings and interpreting them, often entertaining a wealth of possible interpretations from just one idea or interpreting what someone’s behavior really means. It also involves seeing things “as if,” with various possible representations of reality. Using this process, we can juggle many different ideas, thoughts, beliefs, and meanings in our mind at once with the possibility that they are all true. This is like weaving themes and threads together. We don’t know the weave until a thought thread appears or is drawn out in the interaction of thoughts, often brought in from other contexts. Thus a strategy or concept often emerges from the here-and-now interactions, not appearing as a whole beforehand. Using this process we can really appreciate brainstorming and trust what emerges, enjoying imaginative play with scenarios and combining possibilities, using a kind of cross-contextual thinking. Extraverted iNtuiting also can involve catalyzing people and extemporaneously shaping situations, spreading an atmosphere of change through emergent leadership.

Ni - Introverted Intuiting
Introverted iNtuiting involves synthesizing the seemingly paradoxical or contradictory, which takes understanding to a new level. Using this process, we can have moments when completely new, unimagined realizations come to us. A disengagement from interactions in the room occurs, followed by a sudden “Aha!” or “That’s it!” The sense of the future and the realizations that come from introverted iNtuiting have a sureness and an imperative quality that seem to demand action and help us stay focused on fulfilling our vision or dream of how things will be in the future. Using this process, we might rely on a focal device or symbolic action to predict, enlighten, or transform. We could find ourselves laying out how the future will unfold based on unseen trends and telling signs. This process can involve working out complex concepts or systems of thinking or conceiving of symbolic or novel ways to understand things that are universal. It can lead to creating transcendent experiences or solutions.

Te - Extroverted Thinking
Contingency planning, scheduling, and quantifying utilize the process of extraverted Thinking. Extraverted Thinking helps us organize our environment and ideas through charts, tables, graphs, flow charts, outlines, and so on. At its most sophisticated, this process is about organizing and monitoring people and things to work efficiently and productively. Empirical thinking is at the core of extraverted Thinking when we challenge someone’s ideas based on the logic of the facts in front of us or lay out reasonable explanations for decisions or conclusions made, often trying to establish order in someone else’s thought process. In written or verbal communication, extraverted Thinking helps us easily follow someone else’s logic, sequence, or organization. It also helps us notice when something is missing, like when someone says he or she is going to talk about four topics and talks about only three. In general, it allows us to compartmentalize many aspects of our lives so we can do what is necessary to accomplish our objectives.

Ti - Introverted Thinking
Introverted Thinking often involves finding just the right word to clearly express an idea concisely, crisply, and to the point. Using introverted Thinking is like having an internal sense of the essential qualities of something, noticing the fine distinctions that make it what it is and then naming it. It also involves an internal reasoning process of deriving subcategories of classes and sub-principles of general principles. These can then be used in problem solving, analysis, and refining of a product or an idea. This process is evidenced in behaviors like taking things or ideas apart to figure out how they work. The analysis involves looking at different sides of an issue and seeing where there is inconsistency. In so doing, we search for a “leverage point” that will fix problems with the least amount of effort or damage to the system. We engage in this process when we notice logical inconsistencies between statements and frameworks, using a model to evaluate the likely accuracy of what’s observed.

Fe - Extroverted Feeling
The process of extraverted Feeling often involves a desire to connect with (or disconnect from) others and is often evidenced by expressions of warmth (or displeasure) and self-disclosure. The “social graces,” such as being polite, being nice, being friendly, being considerate, and being appropriate, often revolve around the process of extraverted Feeling. Keeping in touch, laughing at jokes when others laugh, and trying to get people to act kindly to each other also involve extraverted Feeling. Using this process, we respond according to expressed or even unexpressed wants and needs of others. We may ask people what they want or need or self-disclose to prompt them to talk more about themselves. This often sparks conversation and lets us know more about them so we can better adjust our behavior to them. Often with this process, we feel pulled to be responsible and take care of others’ feelings, sometimes to the point of not separating our feelings from theirs. We may recognize and adhere to shared values, feelings, and social norms to get along.

Fi - Introverted Feeling
It is often hard to assign words to the values used to make introverted Feeling judgments since they are often associated with images, feeling tones, and gut reactions more than words. As a cognitive process, it often serves as a filter for information that matches what is valued, wanted, or worth believing in. There can be a continual weighing of the situational worth or importance of everything and a patient balancing of the core issues of peace and conflict in life’s situations. We engage in the process of introverted Feeling when a value is compromised and we think, “Sometimes, some things just have to be said.” On the other hand, most of the time this process works “in private” and is expressed through actions. It helps us know when people are being fake or insincere or if they are basically good. It is like having an internal sense of the “essence” of a person or a project and reading fine distinctions among feeling tones.
 

Andy

Supreme High Commander
Joined
Nov 16, 2009
Messages
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MBTI Type
INTJ
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5w6
THe functions are all urges to think or act in a particular manner.

Fi - The urge to form opinions based upon ideas of social, moral or emotional worth.
Fe - The urge to act upon ideas of social moral or emotional need or opportunity.
Ti - The urge to form opinions based upon technical or scientific worth
Te - THe urge to act upon ideas of technical or scientific need or opportunity
Si - The urge to consider what has been learnt and project ahead in terms of reliability
Se - The urge to explore, experiment and act spontaneously, inspired by by what is fundamentally there.
Ni - The urge to consider what has been learnt and project ahead in terms of possibilities and potential.
Ne - The urge to expore and act spontaneous, inspired by what things represent..

Introverted funtion urge towards contemplation, extroverted funtions push to action.
 

Frosty

Poking the poodle
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Apr 6, 2015
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Instinctual Variant
sp
Yeah I am interested as well.

Do the functions manifest differently based on their order in your preference? Maybe less control over them-More of the extremes of them fluxuating against each other than a cohesive and thorough voluntary understanding. Maybe this is just the inferior on? And maybe it manifests itself differently depending on the types, or maybe that doesn't matter because of the sort of polar relationship in all types between the dominant and the inferior. But maybe if the inferior is a percieving function or a judging function it makes a difference. Or an extroverted function or an introverted function, I guess that the qualities of the function, absolute negatives and positives would just come into swing in the personality-show their influence in a basic and probably uncontrolled uncomfortable for the person way, and then lessen their influence once a situation was over. But does the usage of the inferior under stress strengthen it? Though it will probably never be preferred, when resorting to stress later would there be any sort of gain in its control or stability? Would it's influence be less detrimental... Would it begin to merge with the personality a bit better? Or does it remain primarily differentiated?

Honestly, for strict definitions of the functions I like Jung. But I haven't been able to find much he has written beyond his definitions online. But he seems the most... Thorough?
 

VagrantFarce

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Stealing from http://lenore-exegesis.com (one of the best resources out there for understanding the cognitive functions, by a wide margin):

Fe: Every need relates a person to part of the socially shared world, at a specific time and place. For example, "I need you to cook dinner tonight." A need makes you part of the world outside yourself rather than a self-contained entity. It gives you a stake in the social arena.
Fi: A need exists entirely within the person. For example, "I need food" or "I need companionship". It can be met in an infinity of different ways. I might get food and companionship from having you cook dinner for me tonight, but I might get my needs met in other ways, too. A need and its conditions of fulfillment are completely different things.

Te: Without a stable space, signs would be too slippery to be meaningful. The same things must sort into the same buckets each time you apply the space. Without that, you have no basis for comparison or communication.
Ti: The space must grow organically out of direct interaction with the reality. Without that, all concepts and categories are arbitrary mental constructs. When you meet up with the concrete reality, they won't apply.

Ne: To use Intuition in an Extraverted way--as a way to navigate through the world--you maintain a flexible understanding of what a sign means, which varies as more and more of that "everything" emerges. You view each interpretation of a sign as nothing more or less than a guess. You may well decide to bet a lot on that guess, but you regard it as just a guess. As more information becomes available, you change your guess.
Ni: To take an Intuitive attitude toward signs in an Introverted way--to give you an atemporal perspective on events that is not bound to any particular time or place--you attempt to discover all the possible meanings of a sign before giving it any interpretation or power to lead you in any particular direction. You continually wonder, "In what other contexts could this sign mean something different?" You discover these other contexts, and these other meanings that a sign could have, through imagination or by acquiring knowledge from other times and places (like by reading books). You refuse to jump to any conclusions about the actual context that gave rise to a sign until you've peered into that vast set of possible reasons that the sign may have appeared.

Se: Se says that the world is filled with stimuli, and all you have to do is let yourself react to them. No need to think, just react. The meaning of a sign is what your gut tells you you should do in response. If it's not here or not now, it's not real.
Si: Si says that the world is so overwhelmingly filled with stimuli that you need something stable to focus on or you'll just be permanently overwhelmed and confused.
 

Andy

Supreme High Commander
Joined
Nov 16, 2009
Messages
1,211
MBTI Type
INTJ
Enneagram
5w6
Yeah I am interested as well.

Do the functions manifest differently based on their order in your preference? Maybe less control over them-More of the extremes of them fluxuating against each other than a cohesive and thorough voluntary understanding. Maybe this is just the inferior on? And maybe it manifests itself differently depending on the types, or maybe that doesn't matter because of the sort of polar relationship in all types between the dominant and the inferior. But maybe if the inferior is a percieving function or a judging function it makes a difference. Or an extroverted function or an introverted function, I guess that the qualities of the function, absolute negatives and positives would just come into swing in the personality-show their influence in a basic and probably uncontrolled uncomfortable for the person way, and then lessen their influence once a situation was over. But does the usage of the inferior under stress strengthen it? Though it will probably never be preferred, when resorting to stress later would there be any sort of gain in its control or stability? Would it's influence be less detrimental... Would it begin to merge with the personality a bit better? Or does it remain primarily differentiated?

Honestly, for strict definitions of the functions I like Jung. But I haven't been able to find much he has written beyond his definitions online. But he seems the most... Thorough?

The position in the function order does influence functions, mostly in terms of what role they play inthe mind. Generally, the 1st, 2nd, 7th and 8th functions are the best developed - that is, the functions least likely to be expressed in a bad way. Even if a low order function is expresed well (a term open to interpritation, I know) it is likely to be less sophisticated than that seen in a person with a the same function in a higher place. For example INJs often have a reputation for being fussy over food and drink (for better or for worse), but an appreciation of direct sensory input is probably the least sophisticated expression of Se to be found. Part of it's popularity is becomes it is such an easy way to express Se. After all, you've got to eat, so why not enjoy it?

An ESP will show much more sphistication in their Se, apprechiating "what is fundamentally there" on much more than just a sensory level. Whether is is the interaction of two people (when combined with Fi), the skill involved in doing something (combined with Ti) or whatever else.
 

Opal

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Jan 16, 2014
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ENTP
Stealing from http://lenore-exegesis.com (one of the best resources out there for understanding the cognitive functions, by a wide margin):


Many of these, especially Ti/Te, seem off to me, or at least incongruent with other descriptions.

The Ni/Ne entry is interesting. It paints Ni as simply more thorough and methodical, sort of how I imagined Ne-Ti might operate, while Ne grasps a working meaning, but does not actively pursue refinement/correction.
 
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