|A young boy smelling a flower. / Photo by: O_Solara via Shutterstock|
During the 1940s, after Carl Jung had introduced the concept of the archetypes, Isabel Myers Briggs was able to invent a tool that would indicate an individual’s personality type. This tool came to be known as the MBTI or the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, myersbriggs.org says.
Under the MBTI, apart from distinguishing whether a person was an introvert or an extrovert, they were further classified into 16 personality types.
Moreover, the classification was also based on whether they were Sensors or Intuitives, Thinking or Feeling and Perceiving or Judging.
On that note, the focus of this analysis will be to determine what distinguishes Sensors from Intuitives.
To begin with, 16styletypes.com states that the differences between the sensors and intuitives mainly lie in how they handle information.
To elaborate, sensors rely more on tangible pieces of information. In opposition to this, the intuitives tend to rely on pattern recognition and make inferences or speculations from there.
Secondly, they also have their own notions of time, values, and basic interests.
To explain how they perceive time, sensors will be more eager to learn about the here and now while the intuitives prefer to think about the future.
As for their values, sensors value those that they can interact within the real world such as friends and family while intuitives focus on the possibilities, concepts, and perspectives.
According to Personality Hacker, 70% of the world are sensors, while 30% of the world are intuitives.
Moving on, sensors and Intuitives will be described separately in the next segments.
According to truity.com, sensors are individuals who are factual in their perception of the world and information. When observing their surroundings, they take things as they are and do not look give meaning to those observations.
Additionally, when sensors take in information, they would rather deal with them one by one and perceive them literally.
Next, when asked to describe something, they will tell people only what is visible to them such as the size of an object or image, the colors, and the shapes.
Sensors prefer to apply information in a practical manner and implement it in a logical sequence.
Furthermore, they also highly value the family, tradition, and history.
|A woman meditating on a grass field. / Photo by: Photographee.eu via Shutterstock|
On the other hand, intuitives prefer to read between the lines. As part of their observations, they will not just take things at face value but will attribute interpretations to them.
In addition, since these observations are often abstract, it makes it harder for them to convey this to others.
In continuation, intuitives prefer to see things that are not visible to the naked eye or the abstract.
They would rather speculate and theorize about a certain matter than just let it be.
When taking in information, intuitives have the tendency to absorb them all at once and what it could be in the future.
When they are asked to impart their observations, they will make descriptions based on what they think they mean and the feelings they get from them.
Intuitives tend to place more value on things that pertain to the mind such as memes, paradigms, and controversies.
Their conversations would often focus on these and they would rather not engage in small talk.
Going Beyond Their Differences
One can deduce from all the traits distinguished that sensors thrive on the real world, whereas the intuitives flourish in the world of the abstract and symbolic.
In relation to this, sensors deem practicality and experience in the physical world important while intuitives would rather dwell on the imaginary.
Moreover, sensors tend to be more detail-oriented while intuitives are more focused on the “bigger picture”.
These differences in perception can be at times a reason for conflict between them.
According to truity.com, it is possible for them to resolve it.
One of their suggestions is that Intuitives need to stop trying to give other meanings to what a sensor says while a sensor needs to ask the intuitive the breakdown or the step-by-step process of a solution rather than just giving a general idea.
Another suggestion is that intuitives should be more sensitive to the traditions sensor values.
It is also advised that parents, whichever category they fall into, recognize their sensor children’s need for stability, such wanting to know when to eat, what time they can play and their routinary sleep schedule.
Even though the world is apparently not designed for the intuitives, they can still survive in a sensory world.
In conclusion, comparing the sensors and intuitives does not mean that either of them has a better mental process. They are simply two sides of the manner of thinking.
Both have their own advantages.
One finds strength in what is physical, tangible and visible. Those are the sensors.
The other finds strength in the imaginary, abstract and invisible. Those are the intuitives.