[MBTI General] Personality type and ethnicity differences

[highlander]

Interesting study on personality type and ethnicity.

Have you noticed different patterns in type based on ethnicity? It seems possible that there could be differences in type distributions based on genetics with certain patterns being more common in some parts of the world than others..

Some key quotes

While culture may not lead to differences in type (Kirby et al., 2007), research has shown that there are often differences in type distributions and/or facet scores among various ethnic groups.

findings indicated that while the modal reported type (ENFP) was the same across three ethnic subgroups, significant differences were found on the Step II facets.

Additionally, Hammer and Mitchell (1996) found that Introversion, Intuition and Perceiving were more common among Caucasians than African Americans and Hispanics. However, Sensing and Thinking were more common among African Americans, while Extraversion, Feeling and Judging were more common among Hispanics.

Specifically, Introversion, Intuition, and Perceiving were more common among males. Likewise, Extraversion, Sensing, and Judging were more common among females

Larger differences yet were found between males and females on the Thinking/Feeling dichotomy as 56.5% of males and 24.5% of females in the National Representative Sample indicated a preference for Thinking. Similarly, 43.5% of males indicated a preference for Feeling, opposed to the 75.5% of females (Myers et al., 1998).

ISTJ was the most frequently reported type for African Americans, Caucasians and Latinos, while the most frequently reported type for Asians and Indians was ESTJ. For all ethnic groups, however, ISTJ was most frequently selected as participant’s best-fit type.

Results show that a greater proportion of African Americans, Caucasians, Indians, and Latinos indicated a preference for Extraversion, while a greater proportion of Asians indicated a preference for Introversion.

In addition, more African Americas, Asians, Indians, and Latinos indicated a preference for Sensing, while more Caucasians were found to have a preference for Intuition. Finally, Thinking, and Judging were preferred over Feeling and Perceiving, for all ethnic groups.

A preference for Sensing was indicated more frequently as being best-fit among African Americans, Asians, and Latinos while Intuition was selected more frequently among Caucasians and Indians.

 

[miss fortune]

of course there's questions...

the test is self reported, after all... wouldn't it be likely that someone from a background that tended to emphasize the importance of certain traits would be more likely to mentally associate themselves with them even if they didn't, in fact, possess those traits strongly?

different cultures tend to, traditionally, have different value systems based on behaviors... for example, the differences between the whole US "advertise yourself to get what you want... fake it until you make it" and tall poppy syndrome that's more popular in other portions of the anglosphere which encourages more modesty

there's also different traits more emphasized in different socioeconomic groups, or families that have come from different socioeconomic groups. I come from a rather economically depressed area in the midwestern US that has historically been lower middle class to blue collar... hard work, keeping your head down and not asking questions, appreciating what and who you have and hands on practicality were values that were pretty much driven into my skull since birth. Whether or not I possess these traits personally some little bit of me, in the back of my mind, always reminds me that those traits are important and one should strive for them. The older I get, the better I am at reminding myself that I really suck at some of those things and should definitely focus on my strengths instead. And the sad part is, what I grew up with is completely sociologically NORMAL. One can assume that such a phenomenon could color other results as well...


I could go on for a while, but I hate walls of text... basically the tl;dr version is that there's going to be a media and cultural influence to the answers of any self reporting test no matter how honest a person thinks that they are.

 

[Arctic Hysteria]

Which countries/cultures have the most xNFx pwease?

I lately discovered that many Asian young men who live in Asia are INTJ. Hmmm
Most of Asian moms are ESxJ. Most of regular Asian girls are xSFJ, the more open minded of them are ENFP. I've never met one single Asian INFP in my life

 

[Kullervo]

Personality has a substantial hereditary component so it would be surprising if racial differences did not exist, even if they are minimal.

I would be interested to see why the various trends are associated with each group (for example, why Causcasians are more N but all the others are S), and how significant they really are. From what I understand a lot of traits that vary markedly across racial lines follow "Rushton's law"; Africans and East Asians being at extremes with Caucasians somewhere in the middle.

The male/female differences are much better documented, and I think they have been discussed elsewhere around the forum. Biological sex is known to have an impact on personality.

 

[EJCC]

Interesting. Makes you wonder about nature vs. nurture as it relates to type. (I would guess that most of these differences have to do with cultural upbringing.) Would love to see more data on this.