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[INTP] INTPs RE: the Telephone

Sandy

New member
Joined
Oct 10, 2007
Messages
552
MBTI Type
INFP
Howdy folks! :hi: I just found out that my youngest son (20) is an INTP! My sweetheart is an INTP as well. It has just occured to me that both of these good men react roughly the same way on the phone: they both lose interest and want to get off the phone after about 15 minutes.

My youngest stated that he quickly runs out of things to say, and there is a definite change in his voice that tells me that he wants to get off the phone (without actually telling me). My boyfriend states that he gets tired and finds that talking on the phone more than 15 minutes drains him. I can also tell it in his voice that he needs to hang up (even though he doesn't state it - because he is so darn polite).

They both have said that when they are face-to-face with someone, than they can talk for hours and hours, but on the phone, they lose interest quickly.

Your thoughts?
 

Metamorphosis

New member
Joined
May 9, 2007
Messages
3,474
MBTI Type
INTJ
Howdy folks! :hi: I just found out that my youngest son (20) is an INTP! My sweetheart is an INTP as well. It has just occured to me that both of these good men react roughly the same way on the phone: they both lose interest and want to get off the phone after about 15 minutes.

My youngest stated that he quickly runs out of things to say, and there is a definite change in his voice that tells me that he wants to get off the phone (without actually telling me). My boyfriend states that he gets tired and finds that talking on the phone more than 15 minutes drains him. I can also tell it in his voice that he needs to hang up (even though he doesn't state it - because he is so darn polite).

They both have said that when they are face-to-face with someone, than they can talk for hours and hours, but on the phone, they lose interest quickly.

Your thoughts?

I wish my mom had your intuition about phone calls.
 

cafe

Well-known member
Joined
Apr 19, 2007
Messages
9,827
MBTI Type
INFJ
Enneagram
9w1
The only time my INTP has ever shown any interest in talking on the phone more than a few minutes has been when he was going to school out of state or driving OTR and we didn't see each other often. He will also talk to his mom and sister on the phone for fairly decent periods of time, but they live out of the country and he only talks to them a few times a year and sees them every several years. That may change when the are stateside again in a few months, I don't know.

At our house, we have three INTs, two INFs, and one I can't figure out and if we two INFs did not answer the phone, it wouldn't get answered the vast majority of the time.
 

Usehername

On a mission
Joined
May 30, 2007
Messages
3,794
lol

whenever i called home from my gap year in africa my mom wanted to talk about EVERYTHING. now, sure, i had stuff to talk about (went on safari, etc.) but she also wanted to tell me useless information of daily trivialities that i knew would be going on b/c I lived there.

i would be ready to hang up in about 8 minutes and she just wanted to talk and talk and talk.
 

Athenian200

Protocol Droid
Joined
Jul 1, 2007
Messages
8,828
MBTI Type
INFJ
Enneagram
4w5
Howdy folks! :hi: I just found out that my youngest son (20) is an INTP! My sweetheart is an INTP as well. It has just occured to me that both of these good men react roughly the same way on the phone: they both lose interest and want to get off the phone after about 15 minutes.

My youngest stated that he quickly runs out of things to say, and there is a definite change in his voice that tells me that he wants to get off the phone (without actually telling me). My boyfriend states that he gets tired and finds that talking on the phone more than 15 minutes drains him. I can also tell it in his voice that he needs to hang up (even though he doesn't state it - because he is so darn polite).

They both have said that when they are face-to-face with someone, than they can talk for hours and hours, but on the phone, they lose interest quickly.

Your thoughts?

Well, it does fit with their inferior Fe, and telephone conversations are often rather Fe in nature.

Of course, I'm an INFJ, and exactly the other way around. I feel more drained having to talk to someone in person, and start getting worn out after about an hour or two. But I can talk for five hours or more on the phone, as long as I have water nearby.
 

Varelse

Wait, what?
Joined
Apr 25, 2007
Messages
1,698
MBTI Type
INTJ
The phone invariably disturbs me, I usually am in the middle of something, and I don't particularly like such a method of communication anyway.

IM is fine-I try to leave such open if I'm on the computer and avaible, though I haven't been doing so well with such lately. IM doesn't demand that I stay on, and allows me more time to respond.

Face-to-face can also be good, though it taxes my response speed.
 

Recluse

New member
Joined
Sep 3, 2007
Messages
213
MBTI Type
INXP
I start to feel panicky if I'm on the phone for an extended period of time with my boyfriend. I have to hang up and take a few minutes to calm myself before I'm able to call back and resume our conversation. Fortunately, he's patient with my idiosyncratic behavior, which is caused by anxiety. Possibly some other INTPs experience a similar--if perhaps less intense--reaction, particularly if they're unaccustomed to socializing by phone.
 

arborvitae

New member
Joined
Sep 15, 2007
Messages
40
MBTI Type
ISFP
That's funny, my INTP boyfriend is similar. He says he just doesn't get a lot out of talking on the phone and doesn't really respond to joking and flirting. We don't talk on the phone beyond what's necessary to make plans. At first I was kinda sensitive to how short he is on the phone, but he's always affectionate and involved in person-to-person contact.
 

Sandy

New member
Joined
Oct 10, 2007
Messages
552
MBTI Type
INFP
Thanks for all your responses! I just had a feeling that INTPs shared this little trait.
 

LucrativeSid

New member
Joined
Oct 20, 2007
Messages
837
Being on the phone for more than 10 minutes is like having your face being sucked into a black hole. I'm not sure why I don't like it, exactly. I don't get uncomfortable, but I do get bored, and I start to feel like I'm tied down.
 

warick

New member
Joined
Oct 16, 2007
Messages
79
MBTI Type
INTJ
I immediately get distant and lose focus if the conversation steers away from anything that isn't relevant (i.e. smalltalk). With my wife this is after 30 seconds, but I can usually talk to my mom for a while (30 minutes) before running out of stuff to talk about. To me, there just isn't that much to talk about, I don't talk to most people for more than 15 minutes in person about anything.
 

arcticangel02

To the top of the world
Joined
Oct 5, 2007
Messages
892
MBTI Type
eNFP
I've had fairly long phone conversations with my INTP friend, but there does tend to be long patches of silence (we're both often doing other things at the same time) and she does seem to prefer talking on MSN. Although more than once I've thought she was grumpy or whatever when talking on MSN, but as soon as I spoke to her on the phone, she was as pleasant as she normally is... I suppose that's the INTPs tendancy to be matter-of-fact about conversations, and not really use emoticons or exclamation marks. I'll admit I use both waay too much.
 

Ghost of the dead horse

filling some space
Joined
Sep 7, 2007
Messages
3,553
MBTI Type
ENTJ
they both lose interest and want to get off the phone after about 15 minutes.
:shocking: Oh my gawd 15 minutes?

It must be a matter of accustomation. I like to talk in person and to write and read on the net, both for hours at a time.

I don't think it's that much a matter of personality, just some practicality and situations and learning.

I want to be with the person whom I'm talking to to experience the conversation more fully.

On the other hand, I like to write on the web, to make it possible for both parties to think about the subject in greater depth.

Telephone conversations are - for me - something that I do to get something purposeful done. Some people want to chat with me a while before they can accept my invitation to see them, so I chat with them (and enjoy it). With others, we just get fast to the point, with few pleasantries - and save the good discussions for the time when we meet.

Just for background info, I've been a telephone interviewer for 4 years and I know how to talk on the phone. I just don't find it so entirely enjoyable as a conversation in person, or one on the web, perhaps because of the difficulty to see how interested one is. The anxiety of long phone calls often grows during the conversations, and it may or may not be recognizable from the voice (I have experience). Email writing, IM and face-to-face conversations all avoid this pitfall.
 

The_Liquid_Laser

Glowy Goopy Goodness
Joined
Jul 11, 2007
Messages
3,376
MBTI Type
ENTP
This must be a trait I share with INTP's, because I really do not like to talk on the phone for long at all. I know I must annoy a lot of people with this behavior, like they think I do not care about them or something. I really prefer to keep phone conversations as short as possible.

Come to think of it though the only person who usually initiates hanging up before I do is my Dad who is INTP. Also the average phone conversation between me and another INTP friend of mine is at most 30 seconds (probably less). I see the phone as a means for efficient communication and not for socializing. This might just be an xNTP thing?
 

celesul

New member
Joined
Jun 14, 2007
Messages
190
MBTI Type
ENTP
I've had fairly long phone conversations with my INTP friend, but there does tend to be long patches of silence (we're both often doing other things at the same time).

That describes me oddly well. I usually hate answering the phone, although I will if I know it's a friend. If there is anything interesting, especially when talking to another NT, we'll start debating, which is fun. Otherwise, on the phone and on IM, I get distracted and don't answer for quite a while.
 

Economica

Dhampyr
Joined
Apr 23, 2007
Messages
2,054
MBTI Type
INTJ
I see the phone as a means for efficient communication and not for socializing. This might just be an xNTP thing?

No, I for one feel the same way. If I need to stay in touch with people I don't get to see very often, I prefer to write them or chat with them.

Admittedly I haven't tried the Skype + webcam combination yet. That might work for me.
 

cascadeco

New member
Joined
Oct 7, 2007
Messages
9,083
MBTI Type
INFJ
Enneagram
9w1
Instinctual Variant
sp/sx
Hmm... I don't like socializing on the phone at all. I get quite impatient with it, and I've always been this way. Just chit-chatting on the phone...yuck. Email's much better - I actually set up all my social stuff via email!
 

kristin

New member
Joined
Oct 18, 2007
Messages
11
MBTI Type
INTJ
I think it comes down to a T issue more than specifically an INTP issue. In my experience, Fs like to have long conversations on the phone, while Ts use the phone for very brief, specific purposes. When my ENFP sister or ESFP SO calls me, I find myself thinking, "What is the purpose of this call? Is there something specific they called to tell me?" My attention wanders and my patience dwindles the longer I'm on the phone. Don't get me wrong - I love long discussions - it's just that I would much rather do them in person. This also applies to every T in my life I can think of.

A suggestion: You might try text messaging. Most Ts I know, including myself, will respond much more quickly to a brief text. If you save the long conversations for when you see them in person you'll get much more out of them.
 

Sandy

New member
Joined
Oct 10, 2007
Messages
552
MBTI Type
INFP
Wonderful replies! Thanks so much for the insight!
 

Usehername

On a mission
Joined
May 30, 2007
Messages
3,794
I see the phone as a means for efficient communication and not for socializing. This might just be an xNTP thing?

I know that the first time I really recognized that people truly used the phone for socializing was when I lent my cell to my ENFP friend. He was calling his dad. I heard him say, "Hi, Dad. How's your day been?"

and I was baffled.

he was calling for a purpose; he needed a ride somewhere. and he wasn't even sucking up to get a ride. he was just genuinely conversing on the phone. why did it take me 20 years to figure out that people besides girly girls use the phone for more than efficient conversation?
 
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