This sort of distinction is among the few times, I have felt the familiar feeling of "science" happening in personality theory.
You mean that last paper trying to distinguish between trait and archetype? What Mitchell aimed for in his paper?
There's also the real life side. For example I'm filming students doing math tasks to try to verify any definite differences in approaches taken by ES, IS, EN, IN students, the learning styles I use. Best-fit type, of course.
The differences among the groups are striking. Here's a summary of what we found...
Introversion and Sensing (IS)
• Used squares paper and markers; none used tiles unless the facilitator suggested it
• None used numbers to find common denominators
Introversion and Intuition (IN)
• Only students who drew shapes other than rectangles or used isometric graph paper
• One student built shapes with markers rather than the tiles
• Worked quietly for up to nine minutes on a task
• All used numbers to find common denominators
Extraversion and Sensing (ES)
• Altered the materials to make sense of problems (only ones who shaded tiles, divided graph squares in half, etc., to fit in thirds and sixths)
• Used trial and error without asking for help in between experiments
• None used numbers to look for common denominators
• Used square graph paper and tiles
Extraversion and Intuition (EN)
• Careless mistakes; used colors that didn’t match problem or counted tiles and squares incorrectly
• Unaware of the denominator they were illustrating, i.e., talking about 12ths while illustrating 10ths.
• So confident in their answer that they didn’t see mistakes even while explaining their solution
• Long verbal explanations
This is just the tip of the iceberg--we're repeating the whole thing with more controls this year. Already, though, some of teh "math experts" I'm working with are realizing that the curricula they're advocating took quickly take away concrete representations, etc. It isn't trait but an actual split in what kids need to learn...