EXTRAVERT

Strengths

• Generate ideas best by talking about the topic and interviewing people
• Do not make outlines; instead think better when writing quickly and impulsively
• Use free writing as a means to develop ideas

• May write fragmentally (touching on too many ideas) or superficially
• May lack awareness of the audience if the audience is not a part of their active outer experience
• Can become blocked they are unable to develop an inner dialogue with themselves

INTUITION

• Write best when given general directions from which they create their own goals
• Try to develop unique approaches to topics
• Tend to innovate organizational patterns

Weaknesses

• Pay little attention to mechanics in writing
• Tend to forget to include concrete examples and not provide background information
• May fail to follow directions closely

THINKING

Strengths

• Tend to excel at writing logically, objectively, and analytically
• Essays are often well organized
• Select topics that can be written about with distance rather than self-involvement

• Often establish a point of view and then argue against it

Weaknesses

• May regard their beliefs as universally held and thus be abrasive and dogmatic
• Objectify ideas and examples to a point where they lack personal interest
• Readers may regard their writing as cold

PERCEIVING

Strengths

• Investigate their topics thoroughly and present carefully considered ideas
• Select broad topics and dive into research
• Pause often in writing to consider numerous alternatives

Weaknesses

• May write on topics that are too broad or may lose sight of their original goals
• Writing may lack a clear thesis
• May only begin to write when there is an external deadline for an assignment

Prepared by Kristin Zook, from material by James S. Major and Jean S. Filetti, Defense Intelligence College, Washington, D.C.  Published in Writing Lab Newsletter.