MBTI - The impact of Personality Type on interest in Hiking, Canoeing, & Kayaking
By Ross Reinhold, INTJ

Background Introduction. I've long fantacized about having free access to CAPT's inventory administration services so I could set up a booth at various sporting or leisure time shows to discover the MBTI personality types of the devotees of various pursuits. My assumption has been - as it is with many kinds of careers - that birds of feather flock together in their choice of leisure time activities.

When I can tear myself away from the computer, web authoring and writing, I love to be in the out of doors -hiking, camping, canoeing, exploring. A few years ago, I decided to bring this affection for the outside . . . inside, so-to-speak, by creating an online travel journal called SuperiorTrails.com. For several years I've nursed along an online publication on one of my other pre-occupations - personality type (PersonalityPathways.com) so now I had these two online bookends of quite different enjoyments. When I first began Pathways, it was a simple introduction to type with a companion self-scoring inventory designed to serve as a type verifying instrument. I used the website exclusively with my coaching clients to supplement my face-face meetings on personality typing and whatever career related issue was the reason we were together. Over time I refined the type verifying inventory, gave it a name (Cognitive Style Inventory), and released it to the general public and other type practitioners as a type verifying or MBTI introduction tool.

The Current Study. A year ago I had an inspiration to experiment with using the CSI as an online research tool to explore what might the relationship of Type and some of my favorite life sports/leisure time pursuits. So I launched an ongoing study (go here for more info) and the results continue to pour in on a daily basis. Every 6 months or so, I do an update and these are published at www.superiortrails.com/research-report.html. This article is drawn from a subset of those results plus some data from yet to be published updates. In addition to the overall results I present some interesting findings on hiking and overnight backpacking. How similar or dissimilar are these enthusiasts from the general population? How does type impact one's choice of leisure time activities?

I've outlined caveats to interpretting these results elsewhere. Despite the flaws in the research design, as more results come in and patterns persist, I feel more comfortable with taking more serious whatever trends emerge.

General Data. Table 1. is a type distribution of all people who have participated. Theoretically, all of these people have at least some interest in outdoor pursuits . . . as it was those interests we solicited. However, a small percentage of those who replied were not *outdoors types* - having somehow missed the factoid that these were the object of our study. They were not numerous enough to alter the trends of the data.

I also computed Type Distribution Ratios against two sets of norms. The first contrasts the results with the type composition of APT (The primary professional organization of users of personality type). This helps adjust for the fact that certain types are by nature more likely to take an inventory of personality than other types (INFP vs ISTP for example). I also compared the results with a general normative distribution of type reported by Hammer and Mitchell in the Journal of Psychological Type, Volume 37, 1996. Table 2. shows the ratio computed by averaging the results from the two bench mark samples - thus attempting to correct for type distribution in the general population and for interest in personality type.

General Results.

What stands out in looking at Table 2?

• 6 Personality Types are more than twice as likely (ratios of 2 or more) to engage in our selected outdoor recreational activities than what we would expect from their presence in the general population and from their membership in a major personality type organization. [INFJ, ISTP, ISFP, INFP, INTP, & ESTP]

• 2 additional types had impressive ratios of participation (in excess of 1.5): INTJ & ESFP.

• In general, Introverted types are much more likely than Extraverted types to participate in the collection of outdoor activities (See Sample Survey Response Form) covered by this survey.

• Of the 8 Extraverted types, only 2 showed significant interest in these activities (ESTP and ESFP).

• Comparing the 8 J types (xxxJ) versus the 8 P types (xxxP), Ps in general are much more strongly drawn to these pursuits.

• ESTP had the highest rate of adjusted participation - which is quite consistent with popular type literature's depiction of the interests of this particular personality type. The second highest adjusted rate of participation was for INFP - a fact I would NOT have predicted from popular type literature's depiction of the interests of the INFP personality type.

• All 4 SP types (xSxP) had a significantly greater interest in these activities than would have been predicited from their interest in the subject of personality and their representation in the general population. This finding is consistent with popular type literature's depiction of their interests.

• The adjusted rate of participation of 3 personality types was low enough (below .5) to imply a negative relationship. ESTJs, ESFJs, and ENFJs in general find little appeal in these kinds of outdoor activities.*
  
  *A cursory review of data received after the above tabulations indicates a slightly higher rate of participation for ENFJ and a lower rate for ENTJ than what existed in the first set of data. If this trend continues, ENFJ and ENTJ would have more equal rates of participation, the net result being all 4 ExxJ types will have a lower than expected rate of participation in the surveyed leisure time activities.

Nature of Outdoor Recreation & Type

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