Can you switch types?

[Tigerlily]

I know this has been discussed before, but is it possible? Can another person influence your type change?

I think my Husband has rubbed off on me over the years because I keep scoring INTJ whenever I take an MBTI test online. I think the kids have made me less J and my Husband has brought out my Thinking side.

When I first took an MBTI test online I scored I-56 N-75 F-12 J-78 and now

this.

Here are my results from January of this year.

Thoughts?

 

[Ivy]

Probably for similar reasons that I sometimes test INTP. In the culture of your marriage you both value I, N, T, and J traits, so naturally that is what you will respond to in a test question. I think after we take so many tests and learn so much about the ideas in MBTI, we start to predict accurately which trait each question is measuring. I don't really think I'm an INTP but I get that result more often than any other, these days.

 

[kelric]

I don't know if it's so much a type change as a broadening of attitudes as you have experiences in different situations and spend a lot of time with people you care about (and see things from their point of view).

Part of it's also the nature of the questions that seem to be asked on various tests. For example, I'm a pretty strong P - but on most tests I've taken, I come across as much more J than I used to. Why? Work. A lot of the situations tests ask about only arise for me at work, and as I work in a very J environment, I tend to skew a bit that way because in that environment, it's simply the only way I'm allowed to function at all (although I try to avoid it, to the neverending annoyance of some supervisors ).

I imagine that having kids (especially kids the age your kids are) works just the opposite way - requiring a bit more spontaneity than your J-ness might otherwise prefer. So we adapt to circumstances. Do you still identify more with INFJ than INTJ?

 

[Xander]

Change your actual type? No.
Change your expressed type? Well unless you are restricted or retarded then yes you should do this anyway.

 

[ThatsWhatHeSaid]

Go to the Control Panel and follow the link to Edit Profile. Scroll down to additional information and you'll find a box that says "Type." You can change it to whatever you want.

Pretend moved to Feedback.



(I definitely think you can switch between types. Why not? For me, E/I and T/F switch the most. The problem with MBTI is that you're reporting on yourself which means [a] you're biased, you may not know yourself [c] you may not understand the question or know how to answer it and [d] there's no baseline to compare to, so one person's intuition is another person's sensation.)

 

[SillySapienne]

I'm constantly under the influence of T and frequently confined to a self-imposed solitude...

Yet I is and continues to be, a romantic idealist ENFP

:rolli:

 

[Kiddo]

When I first took the MBTI, I tested as an INTP. Of course, I was very depressed and stressed out during those times. I actually found it strange that I had changed into an INFJ. However, during this time of change, I felt like I was returning to how I had been when I was a kid. Later, when I stumbled across some school evaluations from my elementary years, it confirmed that I was very much an INJ child.

I think stress and depression can change a person's type. Also a change in the environment can temporarily change a person's type. For example, people act differently at work than at home. And I think people can develop other functions and that can distort type. Overall though, I think there is a set of preferences that are ingrained from childhood and those represent the most natural type for an individual.

 

[redacted]

i strongly doubt someone can switch their preferred cognitive functions.

it definitely makes sense that people will test differently over time, though. but tests hold very little weight anyway.

i think i've tested as every N type.

 

[moonlit_reveries]

We don't change our preferred type but our perception of our type changes over time. We also evolve within own type and learn new skills use lesser-used functions more gracefully and in stress we can dip into our shadow functions. External factors can influence us to do do both. However despite all this our core stays the same, there's just different expressions of it.

 

[Domino]

Organically speaking, I don't believe you can switch types. However, you can certainly "put on" or project other elements.

ENFJ = Fe>Ni>Se>Ti - Fi>Ne>Si>Te

I have access to ALL of those functions, but obviously PREFER (unconsciously choose) certain functions over others. I can use my Ti, but I don't RELY on it. Sometimes, I use the "ghost" functions, such as Fi WITH Fe but I don't dwell in Fi. See what I mean? Everyone's got different grasps on their function order, but it's not because you changed. You're just better able to access an otherwise distant or lower-tier function because of your exposure to T.

I sound very T at times and can be brisk and business-like and even harsh, but I'm not T.

 

[phoenix13]

Nope. but you can change which functions you're using at a given time.

The "type" you are just refers to your "preferences," ie your default.

 

[Totenkindly]

I know this has been discussed before, but is it possible? Can another person influence your type change?

I think my Husband has rubbed off on me over the years because I keep scoring INTJ whenever I take an MBTI test online. I think the kids have made me less J and my Husband has brought out my Thinking side.

I don't see it as changing the preferences, I see it as tempering them and allowing us to cope better in less-preferred situations and even perhaps becoming comfortable.

I can act more "J" when I need to, but it exhausts me if I do it too long. I didn't used to be able to do it at all, honestly. I don't think it made me "more j" in nature, though -- I just see the value in it and can use it as a tool.

Just like T's or F's might still be T or F based on how they approach something, but they have learned to take the other approach into account and see value, rather than feeling threatened or getting mad when others use it.

 

[booyalab]

I don't see it as changing the preferences, I see it as tempering them and allowing us to cope better in less-preferred situations and even perhaps becoming comfortable.

Yeah, otherwise known as accruing wisdom.
She might be changing types if she's starting to exhibit completely different character flaws, but that's probably not the case and I can't see how that would happen either unless someone got brain damage.

 

[Nocapszy]

Type isn't even real. Cognitive processes are.

Organically speaking, I don't believe you can switch types. However, you can certainly "put on" or project other elements.

Wtf are you talking about 'organically speaking'? I think I know, and if I'm right I agree, but I don't know, so I might not.

 

[Domino]

Wtf are you talking about 'organically speaking'? I think I know, and if I'm right I agree, but I don't know, so I might not.

I mean if someone didn't break into your house in the middle of the night and swap your brain with a remotely-controlled robotic nuclear-pile device. I can't believe I'm explaining that to you, as obvious as it was!

 

[Nocapszy]

What is this an acid trip?

Oh wait - I think that happened on episode spongebob squarepants or some other such show. Then again it could just as easily be both. Or maybe the proc stacks diminishingly.


Fine. Don't answer.

 

[nightwatcher]

There’s also the theory that you more or less automatically integrate your lesser functions with age. An INFJ, for example, begins using the 3rd function, Introverted Thinking, more often beyond approx. 25, and the 4th, Sensing, at around 40. Obviously, not all of us are textbook cases and other external factors play a role; that’s why typing fictional characters can be dicey (not that it stops me from trying), because we usually see them under extreme influences for dramatic purposes. One way to get a fix on your root type then is to try to remember how you were under age 25 when you’re answering test questions.

Though most people don’t actually change types, I don’t think you can totally rule out exceptions to any typology. That seems too dogmatic. We simply lack the tools to measure the vastly complex psyche with that much precision and certainty. It’s like measuring a nebulous quantum particle; you can never reduce its probability cloud to a complete and accurate set of properties and fixed location. And the measurements are always observer-influenced, never totally objective.

 

["?"]

I know this has been discussed before, but is it possible? Can another person influence your type change?

Thoughts?

Type doesn't change. You simply develop and/or use functions as you adapt to your environment which is why the thought of continued testing and more so deciding one's type from cognitive test is preposterous.

 

[Nocapszy]

Type doesn't change. You simply develop and/or use functions as you adapt to your environment

How do you know? I want a full QED, which is, I think what Jen was hoping for.

which is why the thought of continued testing and more so deciding one's type from cognitive test is preposterous.

Trust me, there are many, much more relevant reasons.

 

["?"]

How do you know? I want a full QED, which is, I think what Jen was hoping for.

Not sure what you mean by QED, but Jung was explicit in saying:

For the sake of clarity let us again recapitulate: The products of all the functions can be conscious, but we speak of the consciousness of a function only when not merely its application is at the disposal of the will, but when at the same time its principle is decisive for the orientation of consciousness. The latter event is true when, for instance, thinking is not a mere esprit de l'escalier, or rumination, but when its decisions possess an absolute validity, so that the logical conclusion in a given case holds good, whether as motive or as guarantee of practical action, without the backing of any further evidence. This absolute sovereignty always belongs, empirically, to one function alone, and can belong only to one function, since the equally independent intervention of another function would necessarily yield a different orientation, which would at least partially contradict the first. But, since it is a vital condition for the conscious adaptation-process that constantly clear and unambiguous aims should be in evidence, the presence of a second function of equivalent power is naturally forbidden'.