Can My Personality Type Change?

People constantly question if their personality type can change, especially those who are new to the theory. They’ll say something like this: “Last year, when I took a personality test, I got INFP, but this year I got INTP: did my personality type change?” Of course, you can insert any variation of personality types, time periods, etc. into that statement. Regardless of the details, the basic question remains. Their result changed, and they want to know if that’s actually possible. Can someone’s personality type change over time?

Personality Can Change

Before talking about personality type, it’s important to make a distinction between personality and personality type. Within the context of the Myers-Briggs theory or the 16 personality types, we use personality types as designations for someone’s cognitive function preferences. This is inherently different from personality as a whole. In fact, using the term “personality type” is a bit of a misnomer, but people are so used to the term at this point that there’s no changing it. My point is that personality as a whole encompasses a lot more, and can change over time. People can change.

Related Article: Personality Type is a Misnomer

Personality Type Defines Cognitive Preferences

So, now that we’ve defined personality and separated it from personality type, it’s important to define exactly what “personality type” is. In other words, what does it mean to be an ISTJ or an ISTP? What do these personality types define? Well, as mentioned above, the 16 personality types are designations for one’s cognitive function preferences. Cognitive functions define cognition, or a way of thinking, rather than specific external behavioral characteristics or beliefs. This way of thinking is separate from personal experiences, social influence, etc. This way of thinking may incorporate data from these various external factors into it, but the process of reasoning is distinct from the data. (In the past, we’ve also described cognitive functions as being lenses for information.)

People so often get caught up in stereotypes, and oversimplifications of the personality types because they fail to realize (or remember) this key fact. They focus primarily on the external, and forget that every cognitive function is cerebral. None are inherently deeper or shallower. They’re all just thinking differently. Never forget that there are often multiple paths to the same conclusion. A lot of traits and behaviors are universal, or shared by everyone. You have to look deeper. You have to look at someone’s motive, approach, and reasoning.

In summary, someone’s personality type defines their cumulative way of reasoning, which is the combination of their four preferred cognitive functions.

Jung Believed That Personality Type Can Change

Reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OIM0aajRKsw

Carl Jung did not believe that personality type is static. In other words, he believed that you could change personality types over time. From my understanding, he actually references his personality type changing over time. Or, at the very least, Jung’s self-assessment changed over time. For instance, in Introduction to Jungian Psychology, Jung refers to himself as an intellectual sensation type. At another point in his career, he refers to himself as an intellectual intuitive. In other words, at one point he claims ST, and at another point, NT. I’ll link an external article below that actually talks briefly about this subject.

Read More: https://www.idrlabs.com/articles/2012/02/jung-identified-himself-as-both-intp-and-istp/

Can Personality Type Actually Change?

We at Practical Typing believe that it’s extremely unlikely for someone’s personality type to actually change, so we deviate from Jung in this specific instance. (Sorry, we’re not pure Jungians.) Notice though that I didn’t say it absolutely couldn’t. I’m not going to completely rule out the possibility that a major psychological event could alter one’s way of thinking and processing to such an extent that their personality type could actually change. However, as stated, these sorts of cases are going to be rare. For most people, personality type is going to be set in stone.

Related Article: Speculations on the Brain and Personality

Why Does Personality Type Appear to Change?

1. Different personality test results

Some people take a personality test, get their results, and then come back some time later to do it again. Getting a different result the second time often creates confusion, prompting the question, “Did my personality type change?” The answer, of course, is no. They simply answered the questions differently, which can mean a variety of things. For instance, their self-awareness might have improved since the first time around, prompting them to answer more accurately. Or, perhaps, they answered based on a temporary mood, rather than focusing on the big picture version of themselves.

(Of course, personality tests are never perfect, so technically, both results could be inaccurate.)

2. Different mental health states

Differing mental states can have a huge impact on how our personality type manifests. For instance, depressions often causes people to misidentify as INXX types, because they feel more withdrawn from reality in all senses of the word. In addition, people may identify as feelers, because they’re going through a sad time in their life. Similarly, something might have happened to make them more cynical, resulting in them over-identifying with their thinking function. Of course, I couldn’t possibly cover every scenario here, but the bottom line is that one’s mental health can cause them to have an atypical manifestation of their specific personality type. (Typically, it results in a loop or a grip.) In these scenarios, it takes a nuanced understanding of the cognitive functions to identify their personality type correctly.

3. Cognitive function development down the stack

Lastly, over time, someone’s personality type can appear to change because they start developing their other cognitive functions. This can mean they start developing their third and fourth cognitive functions, or if starting out in a loop (which is not uncommon), they start to develop their second and fourth. Either way, as an individual matures, they should start to develop their less developed cognitive functions, resulting in a more balanced and effective personality. When this happens, external aspects of their personality might appear to change, in addition to them feeling different or thinking somewhat different internally.

Many teenage personality enthusiasts reach adulthood, and then reassess their personality type, genuinely believing that it has changed. For instance, an ISTP who is very stereotypically Ti-Se as a teenager, might suddenly gain an awareness of their intuition function as an adult, and start identifying as an INTP. However, the individual in this scenario isn’t actually manifesting Ne all of a sudden, but rather, Ti-Se + Ni.

In Conclusion…

I think oftentimes personality type is viewed too narrowly. Certain traits that simply indicate maturity or growth get pigeonholed into specific personality types, making those personality types seem like upgrades in comparison to others. It’s important to recognize that someone’s personality type can develop and mature overtime. Everyone should strive to gain an awareness of what this might look like for every personality type, rather than just assuming their type changed or that they were mistyped all along.