The age-old debate of whether you are an introvert or extravert still exists and excites people today. Introverts are typically energised internally and seek to spend less time with others or in large groups especially compared to their extraverted counterparts - who typically require greater external input to feel energised.
In business contexts, understanding the preference for extraversion or introversion can help teams and individuals work together more constructively, and can play out in terms of peoples’ job satisfaction and engagement.
Interestingly, there may now be evidence to suggest that something ‘within us’ has an impact on how we experience stimulation. As reported in the Business Insider introverts are found to have less dopamine receptors in the brain than extraverts. Dopamine is the chemical associated with reward, pleasure, and therefore to an extent, happiness. This means that introverts are more sensitive to dopamine than extraverts and therefore need less stimulation to get their receptors firing, hence they seek less external stimulation than extraverts. Extraverts, conversely, are found to have more receptors and therefore require greater stimulation to feel the impact of dopamine.
It is very hard to measure whether someone is introverted or extraverted based on the amount of dopamine receptors they have in their brain, without the use of medical science, of course. However, we can make effective use of psychometrics to accurately answer the extravert – introvert debate. At Sten10 we are experts in the use of such assessments; get in touch to find out more hello@sten10.com
