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what an intriguinggroup of individuals you are ... to a psychologist. (laughter) i've had the opportunityover the last couple of days of listening in on someof your conversations and watching you interact with each other. and i think it's fair to say, already, that there are 47 people in this audience, at this moment,

displaying psychological symptomsi would like to discuss today. and i thought you mightlike to know who you are. but instead of pointing at you, which would be gratuitous and intrusive, i thought i would tell youa few facts and stories, in which you may catcha glimpse of yourself. i'm in the field of researchknown as personality psychology, which is part of a largerpersonality science which spans the full spectrum,from neurons to narratives.

and what we try to do, in our own way, is to make sense of how each of us -- each of you -- is, in certain respects, like all other people, like some other people and like no other person. now, already you maybe saying of yourself,

"i'm not intriguing. i am the 46th most boring personin the western hemisphere." or you may say of yourself, "i am intriguing, even if i am regarded by most peopleas a great, thundering twit." but it is your self-diagnosed boringnessand your inherent "twitiness" that makes me, as a psychologist,really fascinated by you. so let me explain why this is so. one of the most influential approachesin personality science

is known as trait psychology, and it aligns you along five dimensionswhich are normally distributed, and that describe universally held aspectsof difference between people. they spell out the acronym ocean. so, "o" stands for "open to experience," versus those who are more closed. "c" stands for "conscientiousness," in contrast to those with a morelackadaisical approach to life. "e" -- "extroversion," in contrastto more introverted people.

"a" -- "agreeable individuals," in contrast to thosedecidedly not agreeable. and "n" -- "neurotic individuals," in contrast to those who are more stable. all of these dimensions haveimplications for our well-being, for how our life goes. and so we know that, for example, openness and conscientiousnessare very good predictors of life success, but the open people achieve that successthrough being audacious

and, occasionally, odd. the conscientious peopleachieve it through sticking to deadlines, to persevering, as well ashaving some passion. extroversion and agreeablenessare both conducive to working well with people. extroverts, for example,i find intriguing. with my classes, i sometimesgive them a basic fact that might be revealingwith respect to their personality: i tell them that it is virtuallyimpossible for adults

to lick the outside of their own elbow. did you know that? already, some of you have triedto lick the outside of your own elbow. but extroverts amongst you are probably thosewho have not only tried, but they have successfullylicked the elbow of the person sitting next to them. those are the extroverts. let me deal in a bit more detailwith extroversion,

because it's consequentialand it's intriguing, and it helps us understandwhat i call our three natures. first, our biogenic nature --our neurophysiology. second, our sociogenic or second nature, which has to do with the culturaland social aspects of our lives. and third, what makes youindividually you -- idiosyncratic -- what i call your "idiogenic" nature. let me explain. one of the things that characterizesextroverts is they need stimulation.

and that stimulation can be achievedby finding things that are exciting: loud noises, partiesand social events here at ted -- you see the extrovertsforming a magnetic core. they all gather together. and i've seen you. the introverts are more likelyto spend time in the quiet spaces up on the second floor, where they are ableto reduce stimulation -- and may be misconstruedas being antisocial,

but you're not necessarily antisocial. it may be that you simply realizethat you do better when you have a chanceto lower that level of stimulation. sometimes it's an internalstimulant, from your body. caffeine, for example, works much betterwith extroverts than it does introverts. when extroverts come into the officeat nine o'clock in the morning and say, "i really need a cup of coffee," they're not kidding -- they really do.

introverts do not do as well, particularly if the tasksthey're engaged in -- and they've had some coffee -- if those tasks are speeded, and if they're quantitative, introverts may give the appearanceof not being particularly quantitative. but it's a misconstrual. so here are the consequencesthat are really quite intriguing: we're not always what seem to be,

and that takes me to my next point. i should say, before getting to this, something about sexual intercourse, although i may not have time. and so, if you would like me to -- yes, you would? ok. there are studies done on the frequency with whichindividuals engage in the conjugal act,

as broken down by male, female;introvert, extrovert. so i ask you: how many times per minute -- oh, i'm sorry, that was a rat study -- how many times per month do introverted men engage in the act? 3.0. extroverted men? more or less?

yes, more. 5.5 -- almost twice as much. introverted women: 3.1. extroverted women? frankly, speaking as an introverted male, which i will explain later -- they are heroic. 7.5. they not only handleall the male extroverts,

they pick up a few introverts as well. (applause) we communicate differently,extroverts and introverts. extroverts, when they interact, want to have lots of social encounterpunctuated by closeness. they'd like to stand closefor comfortable communication. they like to have a lot of eye contact, or mutual gaze. we found in some research

that they use more diminutive termswhen they meet somebody. so when an extrovert meets a charles, it rapidly becomes "charlie,"and then "chuck," and then "chuckles baby." whereas for introverts, it remains "charles," until he's givena pass to be more intimate by the person he's talking to. we speak differently. extroverts prefer black-and-white,concrete, simple language.

introverts prefer --and i must again tell you that i am as extreme an introvertas you could possibly imagine -- we speak differently. we prefer contextually complex, contingent, weasel-word sentences -- more or less. as it were. not to put too fine a point upon it --

like that. when we talk, we sometimes talk past each other. i had a consulting contracti shared with a colleague who's as different from meas two people can possibly be. first, his name is tom. mine isn't. secondly, he's six foot five. i have a tendency not to be.

and thirdly, he's as extroverteda person as you could find. i am seriously introverted. i overload so much, i can't even have a cup of coffeeafter three in the afternoon and expect to sleep in the evening. we had seconded to this projecta fellow called michael. and michael almost broughtthe project to a crashing halt. so the person who seconded himasked tom and me, "what do you make of michael?"

well, i'll tell youwhat tom said in a minute. he spoke in classic "extrovert-ese." and here is how extroverted earsheard what i said, which is actually pretty accurate. i said, "well michael does havea tendency at times of behaving in a waythat some of us might see as perhaps more assertivethan is normally called for." tom rolled his eyes and he said, "brian, that's what i said:

he's an asshole!" now, as an introvert, i might gently allude to certain"assholic" qualities in this man's behavior, but i'm not going to lunge for the a-word. but the extrovert says, "if he walks like one, if he talkslike one, i call him one." and we go past each other. now is this somethingthat we should be heedful of?

of course. it's important that we know this. is that all we are? are we just a bunch of traits? no, we're not. remember, you're like some other people how about that idiosyncratic you? as elizabeth or as george, you may share your extroversionor your neuroticism.

but are there some distinctivelyelizabethan features of your behavior, or georgian of yours, that make us understand youbetter than just a bunch of traits? that make us love you? not just because you'rea certain type of person. i'm uncomfortable puttingpeople in pigeonholes. i don't even think pigeonsbelong in pigeonholes. so what is it that makes us different? it's the doings that we havein our life -- the personal projects.

you have a personal project right now, but nobody may know it here. it relates to your kid -- you've been back three timesto the hospital, and they still don't know what's wrong. or it could be your mom. and you'd been acting out of character. these are free traits. you're very agreeable,but you act disagreeably

in order to break down those barriersof administrative torpor in the hospital, to get somethingfor your mom or your child. what are these free traits? they're where we enact a script in order to advancea core project in our lives. and they are what matters. don't ask people what type you are; ask them, "what are your coreprojects in your life?"

and we enact those free traits. i'm an introvert, but i have a core project,which is to profess. i'm a professor. and i adore my students, and i adore my field. and i can't wait to tell themabout what's new, what's exciting, what i can't wait to tell them about. and so i act in an extroverted way,

because at eight in the morning, the students need a little bit of humor, a little bit of engagementto keep them going in arduous days of study. but we need to be very careful when we act protractedly out of character. sometimes we may findthat we don't take care of ourselves. i find, for example, after a periodof pseudo-extroverted behavior, i need to repair somewhere on my own.

as susan cain said in her "quiet" book, in a chapter that featuredthe strange canadian professor who was teaching at the time at harvard, i sometimes go to the men's room to escape the slings and arrowsof outrageous extroverts. i remember one particular daywhen i was retired to a cubicle, trying to avoid overstimulation. and a real extrovert camein beside me -- not right in my cubicle, but in the next cubicle over --

and i could hear variousevacuatory noises, which we hate -- even our own, that's why we flushduring as well as after. and then i heardthis gravelly voice saying, "hey, is that dr. little?" if anything is guaranteedto constipate an introvert for six months, it's talking on the john. that's where i'm going now. don't follow me.

thank you.

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