Dr. Spark told Bored Panda that there is some evidence that extroversion is more valued than introversion in some cultures.
“Possibly more so in the western world, although it is important not to overestimate these differences across cultures,” he said.
“For example, there has been some research out of the UK which showed that mothers of infant children aged 0-12 months rank-ordered extroversion as being more important for their infants than conscientiousness or intelligence. In other words, being introverted (the other end of the extroversion continuum) was not desirable as far as these mothers were concerned,” Dr. Spark said.
“The original expectation by many was that the pandemic would be welcome news for introverts because of the lockdown—almost as if the lockdown was geared towards introverts. However, the reality is not so simple. As it turns out, extroverts have fared better than introverts during lockdown,” the expert told us.
“This is probably because extroverts have a higher level of well-being anyway and were probably better at drawing on their social networks with the help of modern communication technologies. Introverts who were by themselves, probably did quite well from a well-being point of view, however for those introverts who were locked down in a busy household, we can’t be so sure!”
According to Dr. Spark, some introverts feel pressured to become more extroverted. “In general, this pressure will often feel most powerful when you find yourself in social situations,” he said.
“Stress levels are also elevated if you are also high in other personality traits, particularly trait neuroticism, which governs how sensitive to negative emotion you are. Some of the research my colleagues and I have done in a group leadership context suggests that when we act introverted in social situations, we are more likely to think less of ourselves—it’s almost as if we become extra self-critical.”
What’s more, introverts tend to think worse of themselves than what others actually think of them.
“We are harder on ourselves than others are—probably because other people are too busy acting extroverted to pay much attention to us!”
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