Laurie Helgoe
Laurie Helgoe
Laurie Anne Helgoeis an American psychologist and author specializing in personality development and the psychology of desire. In 2008, her writing revealed that scholarly and popular accounts regarding humans who display the personality traits of introversion and extroversion were flawed, and that, instead of representing a 25-30% of the population, introverts make up 57% of the population. The identified flaw was a dated reliance on the early work of Isabel Briggs Myers, and the failure to note the latest comprehensive...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPsychologist
Date of Birth10 December 1960
CountryUnited States of America
Often confused with shyness, introversion does not imply social reticence or discomfort. Rather than being averse to social engagement, introverts become overwhelmed by too much of it, which explains why the introvert is ready to leave a party after an hour and the extravert gains steam as the night goes on.
When a quiet introvert talks, heads turn, and that's power.
Some findings reveal extroverts as more adept at reading nonverbal cues, and attribute this to the extrovert's greater interest and experience with social interactions. Another line of research using subliminal images of facial emotion found introverts to be more sensitive to the differences, and hypothesized that this may be why introverts regulate the amount of incoming social information.
Introverts are generally more sensitive to low-intensity stimuli - they are mentally alerted to inputs that extroverts may miss.
Extroverts are more responsive to high-intensity and "happy" stimuli, which may be why an extrovert gets frustrated at the less "readable" face of the introvert.
Introverts process information internally, and we don't like to express our thoughts until they are fully formed.
This is why it is sometimes hard for introverts to find words: we really hate to compromise, and words are always a compromise.
A good rule of thumb is that any environment that consistently leaves you feeling bad about who you are is the wrong environment.
When an introvert is quiet, don't assume he is depressed, snobbish or socially deficient.
Introverts paradoxically pull away from culture and create culture.
Let's clear one thing up: Introverts do not hate small talk because we dislike people. We hate small talk because we hate the barrier it creates between people.
Extroverts are more attuned to social rewards, so they are more likely to flash a smile for effect. A notable exception are introverts - like me - whom I call "socially accessible" introverts. We have been trained well to smile and nod, which can place a burden on our processing efforts.
Though introverts are drained by interaction, we can take immense pleasure in watching the scene around us.
Introverts are collectors of thoughts, and solitude is where the collection is curated and rearranged to make sense of the present and future.