Real-time Personality Assessment (Pt 4): Extrapolation
In this series’ previous post, I wrote about using Wordle to help identify word usage and phrasing trends by people as a prelude to identifying personalities in a real-time sense. In this series’ first post, I wrote about using everyday conversation to identify personalities. In this post, I will combine the two concepts to validate our findings, which I call extrapolation. Essentially, we try to predict responses to 
our questions by changing topics.
For example, after listening to someone, we notice he talks extremely pragmatically about things. Extrapolating, we can ask him a couple decision-related questions such as, “Why do you like your house?” In our minds, we predict a pragmatic response. If he does respond with answers such as, “It’s close to work,” “In the school district we want,” and “We were able to get a good price,” then they support our findings. However, if he responses with, “The setting is beautiful,” “We liked the ambiance when we walked in,” or others, we know we need to work further.
Again, the challenge is being able to spot trends in word usage. The series’ previous post lists five other word pairs in addition to the one here: pragmatic versus emotional. Another challenge is avoiding iron-clad perceptions of people; our observations and conclusions should be ongoing and fluid as new discussions arise. It is quite possible for people to assume different personalities in similar situations depending upon their moods.
For instance, people will often behave one way when they’re happy and another when they’re angry. That’s why results from classical self-reporting personality assessments can vary. The book Was That Really Me? by Naomi Quenk does an excellent job highlighting this phenomenon.
However, this only reinforces the persistent point that personality assessment requires ongoing practice and modification.
Other posts in this series:
- Assessing Personalities thru Everyday Discussions (1.0)
- Real-time Personality Assessment (Pt 2): Important Qualities
- Real-time Personality Assessment (Pt 3): Word Themes
- Black Bark: Real-time Personality Assessment Example
- Real-time Personality Assessment (Pt 2): Important Qualities
- Real-time Personality Assessment (Pt 3): Word Themes
- Real-time Personality Assessment (Pt 4): Extrapolation
- When They Talk About Us It’s Them
- Who Are the Always Late Personality Types?
- Assess Personality Traits with this Listening Game
- “Which Box Do You Want to be In?” Personality Assessment Case Study
- Assessing Personalities From Music People Like To Hear
- Cars And Personality Types, Case Study On What Possessions Tell Us
About Post Author
Personality assessment is most comprehensive available assessment nowadays which can measure attitude, behaviour and personality you have. This kind of assessment brings out the traits to be triumphant in existence
Hi Mike,
Can’t seem to find a live-link to your webpage in your emails? Sometimes I’d like to go to your page from emails many times but would have to google to get there… if you do put in the link please keep it well away from the ‘unsubscribe’ link… hehe.
Liked the ‘personification’ article about NBA etc. Telstra (in Oz) are using Jimmy Barnes and Magda Szubanski to pull at our heartstrings. This is a case in which this does not work for me even though I admire and respect these two.
One day soon only genuine, caring companies will survive. I live for that day… hehe.
Thanks Mike.
Anne, thank you for the comment. I’ve had a heavy out-of-town traveling schedule, so I apologize for the delayed response. I’ve tested the links in emails to myself and they seem to work. I’ll check into this more when I return as some others have indicated some problems too. Yes, personification can pull our heartstrings. As for caring companies, we’ll all need to work as consumers to appreciate and support those companies. Enjoy your day and thank you for visiting. I appreciate it. ~Mike