What is Socionics?
Socionics is a personality typology based on:

• A universally symmetrical structure of traits originating from the research of Carl Jung (later supplemented by the so-called Reinin traits);
• The concept of the functions of the individual (initially 8, whose program positions de facto correspond to the 8 types of Jung, today - 12);
• The theory of intertype relationships developed by Aushra Augustinavichute.

Socionics is not a separate science but rather an interdisciplinary tool for classifying the diversity of human psychology. Over time, attempts have been made to link Socionics to cybernetics (the information metabolism hypothesis), sociology (the quadra theory, etc.), philosophy (aspectonics, the concept of meta-energy), neurophysiology (studies by V.L. Talanov), and biopsychology.

Today, there are many directions (schools) within socionics. These range from purely entertaining approaches that do not claim scientific validity, to openly pseudoscientific ones (e.g., attempts to "merge" Socionics with astrology or similar systems, or exploiting the so-called linguistic approach), and more rigorous schools that employ mathematical models to study the diversity of human personality traits (Talanov, Lytov, Khizhnyak, Romanov).

Contrary to some widely held views:

1. The Information Metabolism (IM) hypothesis is not identical to Socionics, even though it was introduced into it by A. Augustinavichute. We are skeptical about the concept of IM in its refined form - as emasculating the true meaning of the sociotype, reducing it to purely verbal, superficial features of the personality. In reality, sociotypes are more accurately understood as reflecting deeper personality traits related to the fulfillment of specific bio-social survival programs.
2. The existence of 16 quantized sociotypes was refuted by V. Talanov’s research. Today, it is more appropriate to view the socion as a continuous spectrum of character traits.
3. Socionics is fully self-sufficient for classifying the internal diversity of character types; it does not require borrowing from external typologies such as psychosophy. In fact, combining Socionics with other systems often complicates and confuses the classification process, rendering its conclusions ambiguous and internally inconsistent.

Basic concepts: Socion

The socion is a 15-dimensional (based on the number of Reinin traits) continuous space of psychological characteristics, in which there are 16 symmetrically located points corresponding to 16 reference types considered in socionics. The set of points for which one of the reference types is the closest to in this space unites all real individuals for whom this type is the leading one (in other words, a set of real people of the same type). Thus, within the socion, the boundaries between regions representing different types are defined using a Voronoi diagram in 15-dimensional space. Since each of the 16 regions is extensive, it should be said that intratype variability is very large. This means that not all individuals of type X (e.g., person A) will necessarily resemble another individual of the same type X (e.g., person B) more than they resemble someone of type Y (e.g., person C).

At the intersection of all coordinate axes (the zero point) lies the character that represents the statistical norm for the population under consideration. The distance (or vector length) from this zero point to an individual’s position in socion space represents the overall level of personality accentuation for that individual.

The distribution of individuals across any axis in the socion space is normal (Gaussian), because all traits are complex and influenced by a multitude of factors—ranging from genetic to situational ones. Accordingly, the overall distribution of individuals in this space is also spherically normal—with a relatively uniform condensation toward the zero point. No 16 isolated groups corresponding to 16 types, as is often commonly believed, exist in reality. Furthermore, due to various endogenous factors (such as mood changes), the position of an individual within the socion space can shift, oscillating around a personal equilibrium point unique to them. If these oscillations are large enough to cross the boundary of another type’s region, an individual’s dominant type may temporarily change.

Basic concepts: Sociotype

A sociotype is a certain strategy of survival and genetic reproduction within a social system. The existence of sociotypes is a consequence of the natural genetic variability of all living things. Variations in genes and ontogenetic conditions lead to differences among individuals within the same population. A certain neurophysiological balance in an individual’s organism (if it is stable over time) causes with a statistically significant probability behavior of a certain kind, which, when repeated, results in a specific way of interacting with the external environment, ultimately reinforcing that choice into a worldview—a stable system of life values of the individual. Thus, sociotype manifests itself at all levels of organization of living evolving systems - from chemical (genetics) to social (ideology).

The definition of sociotypes through combinations of Socionics traits is given in the table below.

Important Considerations:

1. The variance of different Reinin traits varies significantly, as does the contribution of these traits to the overall characteristics of a sociotype. For example, extra/introversion is much more important for determining the properties of a sociotype than carelessness-prudence.
2. A real person is never defined by a single sociotype but by a type profile. It is not necessarily the case that all traits of a person will perfectly align with the model of a specific type. For instance, if a person is extroverted and rational, he or she will turn out to be dynamic with a probability of not 100%, but only slightly more than 50%. Whereas only slightly less than 50% of extrovert-rationals will turn out to be closer to the static pole (and the same is true for any other trio of interrelated traits). Thus, inversion of some traits—especially those with weaker dispersion contributions to the overall properties of a sociotype—is common and normal.

Basic concepts: Dichotomy

A socionic dichotomy (literally, a pair of traits) is a fundamental concept of socionic classification. Each dichotomy represents two mutually exclusive sets of personality traits. In colloquial speech, a dichotomy is sometimes referred to as a "trait", though this is not entirely accurate from a terminological standpoint.

The socion (the collective set of 16 sociotypes) can be initially formed through four dichotomies, provided each is independent of the other three. The dichotomies first considered by C.G. Jung (the so-called "Jung's basis") are usually taken as the basic four (extraversion-introversion, intuition-sensorics, logic-ethics, irrationality-rationality).

In the MBTI, each of the 16 types corresponds to one of the 16 possible combinations of the four dichotomies. In Socionics, the situation is more complex, as the semantic content of each sociotype is influenced by additional Reinin traits, whose poles may not align directly with the poles of Jung’s basis.

Reinin traits (RT) are additional dichotomies derived from the primary dichotomies or from one another using Boolean multiplication of the polar values, forming an Abelian group. In theory, the values of Reinin traits depend nonlinearly on the values of the parent traits, but in practice they are mostly independent of the latter.

Since the time of A. Augustinavichute, various socionicists have proposed conflicting hypotheses about the semantic content of the Reinin traits (some still question whether these traits have any intrinsic content at all). As of now, based on the analysis of large-scale questionnaire data conducted by V. L. Talanov, it has been established that RTs have varying degrees of semantic significance, meaning that their contribution to the overall structure of personality traits studied in Socionics is not uniform.

Basic concepts: Aspect and Function

Socionic aspect - literally: a certain view of the surrounding reality, representing it as a set of phenomena of a certain kind. The number of ways to distinguish the most general categories of phenomena seems to be limited by the very logic of reality.

A function is an apparatus through which a system (in the context of Socionics—an individual, personality, or society) interacts with and manages a specific aspect of reality.

In Socionics, functions are divided into:

1. Irrational (Ne, Ni, Se, Si)
2. Rational (Te, Ti, Fe, Fi)
3. Questim-Declatim (De, Di, Qe, Qi)

The table below shows the coefficients currently in use, with the help of which the value of a function is uniquely derived from the values of the Reinin traits.

for example: Ni = −x + 1.5 * abcx − abc +3 * b − 3 * ac = introversion + 1.5 * irrationality + dynamics + 3 * intuition + 3 * decisiveness

The main characteristics of a function are its STRENGTH, INERTNESS, and VALUE.

FUNCTION STRENGTH - is determined by how much physical and mental resources of the individual are allocated to this function in comparison with others. Since the amount of such resources is comparable across different (relatively healthy and intellectually full-fledged) individuals, the same function can also be compared in terms of strength across different people, and an approximate population average can be determined. Due to natural variability, there will be people in any population whose function strength is above or below the average, and its entire distribution by strength will be close to normal. Most often (with an average probability of around 40-50%), the strongest function of the subject is the program function (according to the A model of the leading type), and the weakest is the painful function. In addition to the program function, the creative or background functions often occupy the strongest position. Similarly, in addition to the painful function, the suggestible or role functions may be the weakest. Restricting and activating functions can be either the strongest or the weakest, but in both cases they are considerably rarer.

FUNCTION INERTNESS - denotes the extent to which a function deviates from the average population norm in its strength (it does not matter whether it deviates towards strength or weakness). An inert function is the one in which a person is most accentuated: they possess unique properties, but at the same time, they often cannot react adequately to the norm, are inflexible, vulnerable, and require support. Work on inert functions is especially important for the survival of the personality, so the corresponding aspects of reality are very well recognized. The most inert functions are often the program and pain functions. The opposite of inert is contact - as the closeness of a function's strength to the population norm. With aspects of contact functions, a person is much more easily able to engage with the current situation, switch, find "common ground" with the environment, and more often and easily compromise. Aspects of contact functions typically do not cause strong reactions in consciousness and are generally less well recognized, "in the background".

FUNCTION VALUE - indicates the overall strength of a pair of complementary functions. A function is valued if, together with its complementary, it is stronger than the sum of the antagonistic functions (or, equivalently, if the pole of the dichotomy from the group of quadratic values giving contribution to its filling coincides with the pole of this dichotomy prevailing in the personality). For example:

• Ne (and also Si) is valued if Ne + Si > Ni + Se (i.e., if the person is closer to the "peripheral" pole than to the "central");
• Ti (and also Fe) is valued if Ti + Fe > Fi + Te (i.e., if the person is closer to the "ascending" pole than to the "descending");
• Qi (and also De) is valued if Qi + De > Di + Qe (i.e., if the person is closer to the "democratic" pole than to the "aristocratic").

Model A

In classical socionics, sociotypes are defined through the order (hierarchy) of functions by means of Model A. Introduced into Jungian typology by Ausra Augustinaviciute, this model is still the most famous and popular among socionists, although, as practice shows, the function order (their distribution by strength, inertia, and value) described in it is not observed in all people. Nevertheless, this order defines the "standard" representative of a given sociotype (i.e., one whose description is used in typodiagnostics).
Among the functions, the most important for determining the properties of sociotypes are the "program" and "pain" functions – their balance accounts for about two-thirds of all the personal traits used in typodiagnostics. The other functions can vary significantly in strength among individuals of the same sociotype.
Model A does not take into account the balance of the questim-declatim functions, introduced into socionics later by V. Talanov and A. Khizhnyak.

FUNCTIONAL STRUCTURE OF A SOCIOTYPE (from the perspective of Model A)

"Mental Ring" – functions that are well understood by the individual, the implementation of which (one's own and others') is actively voiced and evaluated.

"EGO Block". "I want and can" – strong, valued functions. They form the foundation of the personality, determining the priorities of an individual’s worldview; its most mature and developed part.

1. PROGRAM FUNCTION – "I have everything I need". The strongest function, and at the same time inert – stuck, stubborn, not accepting compromises and other points of view that contradict its own. It is on most of the time, and is hard to turn off. The individual views the world through the lens of this function's aspect, striving for its maximization (mainly by minimizing the role and restrictive functions).

2. CREATIVE FUNCTION – "I explain how to get it". Strong, yet contact function - flexible and controllable, turned on and off by the program function when necessary. It listens to and considers external opinions on its aspect without difficulty, seeks compromise, and looks for and tests various options to find the best and most suitable solution.

"SUPEREGO Block". "I don’t want and can’t" – weak, unvalued functions. Manifestations of these aspects in others cause irritation and are perceived as annoying distractions that hinder a normal life. The individual feels a deficiency in these aspects and tries to correct or compensate for them in one way or another.

3. ROLE FUNCTION – "Don’t touch this unnecessarily". A contact function, whose aspect does not inherently interest the subject, but may be used as a "mask" to cover their vulnerability in situations of "playing on someone else's field" (for a program logic type, this field is ethics; for a program sensor, it is intuition, etc.). By demonstrating the patterns developed for this function, the subject may believe that he is thereby engaged in full-fledged creativity. However, for those who have the same function in a stronger position, such creativity looks like a caricature.

4. PAINFUL FUNCTION – "Relieve me". The weakest function. Inert, it tends to remain off. The individual seeks to minimize its aspect both within themselves and in others (primarily by focusing attention on the activating and creative functions). External manifestations of the vulnerable function's aspect are perceived as threats to their subjectivity and are avoided when possible, or devalued and neutralized by any means available (usually by directly involving the program function).

"Vital Ring" – functions that are often not consciously understood and typically not voiced.

"ID Block". "I want, but can’t" – weak valued functions. The individual is most suggestible in relation to these functions. Their manifestations are associated with the joy of being, which they feel they cannot achieve by themselves and wish to receive from others.

5. SUGGESTIVE FUNCTION – "Give me". A weak function, with a desire to develop in this area, but no clear understanding of how to do it. "Omnivorous" – it eagerly absorbs information related to its aspect but struggles to assess the quality of this information and retain it. The individual tends to gravitate toward vivid manifestations of this function in the world, often unaware of the reasons for this behavior.

6. ACTIVATION FUNCTION – "Teach me". A weak function, but one that can be trained to a quite acceptable level – the individual willingly follows others' suggestions and absorbs patterns. Praise for this function is especially motivating.

"SUPER-ID Block". "I can, but don’t want to" – strong, unvalued functions. The individual is capable of accumulating a lot of information on them, but not in order to maximize their aspects, but on the contrary, to nullify their influence.

7. RESTRICTIVE FUNCTION – "I won’t touch". The individual understands well what to do to avoid unnecessarily engaging with this function’s aspect.

8. BACKGROUND FUNCTION – "I remove". The individual understands well how to ensure that others do not encounter this function’s aspect.

What is a Socionic Profile?

From the early years of socionics, experienced typologists recognized that even when people are divided into 16 types, there remains significant internal diversity within each of the resulting groups. The issue of classifying this diversity became prominent, but no unified solution was proposed.

Some socionicists preferred to ignore the existence of intra-type differences, declaring them either insignificant or illusory. Others suggested that these differences were the result of external, acquired distortions—“masks”—which should be skillfully removed during typodiagnostics to uncover the original type. Since masks were often attributed certain type characteristics (leaving only secondary personality factors for the "original" type), this process quickly became controversial, and the schools using it veered toward superficiality.

Some believed that external distortions could be explained using other typologies. However, the results here were similar to the second group, as most typologies in use within the psychological community address essentially the same psychological factors, with only slight modifications.

A fourth group tried to remain within the framework of socionics and proposed a more detailed classification, dividing each type into subtypes. This approach, despite its ambiguity (the question of how and to what extent types can be divided into subtypes remains unresolved), proved to be the most productive at a certain stage.

Later, a theory emerged explaining intra-type diversity by the strengthening or weakening of individual functions within the type's structure. The dead end in this approach was when it simply duplicated the type and its accents (e.g., when a type with the program function X and an accent on the strengthening of function X was declared unrelated to one another). For a long time, and even now, many socionicists from the "old school" have not accepted the fact that "accents" can sometimes be so strong that a person’s characteristics almost align with those of another type, making it extremely difficult to determine the leading type.

V.L. Talanov proved that none of the complex characteristics of personality in socionics form two or more isolated clusters in the population—so that 16 discrete types simply cannot exist. Instead, we should talk about a continuous space of psychological traits, where the standard types are merely reference points in this space (not points of attraction or concentration of probability, but simply positions around which individuals cluster depending on their traits).

For more details see the works of V.L. Talanov:

1. Magnitude and distribution of accentuations in a population. Investigation of boundaries between psychotypes, population distribution of values of socionic functions and traits (2012) http://www.sociotoday.narod2.ru/granicy_tipov1.doc [download].
2. Are psychological types quantized? Testing the density of the population distribution on the boundaries between 16 “standard” psychotypes. Introducing new 4 functions of the psyche. (2016) http://sociotoday.narod.ru/funkc_3.html

After these studies were published, it became clear that people with a relatively "pure" type are in the minority. Most individuals have personality traits that lie between several types, and forcing oneself into a single type in such cases is a way not to improve one's understanding of oneself, but to worsen it.

Debates about the principles of dividing types into subtypes became pointless; a fundamentally new approach was needed.

In modern socionics, a person’s personality is most fully described not by a single type, but by a socionic profile.

A psychological profile is a set of numbers (often represented as a line graph or bar chart), each of which indicates how much a particular personality trait deviates from a baseline level. This method of calculating psychological profiles is widely used in experimental psychological tests that provide a comprehensive personality diagnosis (such as MMPI, SMIL, 16PF by Cattell, etc.).

The socionic profile typically uses the following parameters:

• Type Profile – a set of 16 numbers showing how closely a person’s qualities align with each of the 16 reference types.
• Trait Profile – tracks the contribution of each of the 15 traits by Reinin, identifying accentuated, smoothed, and inverted traits.
• Functional Profile – reflects the relative strength of functions, taking into account their individual accents, i.e., increases or decreases in their values compared to those typical for the person’s leading socionics type.

The Trait Profile is usually normalized, meaning that the sum of the squares of all the traits in the profile must equal 1. The Trait Profile and the Type Profile are equivalent and can be transformed into each other without loss of information. When calculating the Type Profile from the Trait Profile, the values for all 15 dichotomies are summed for each of the 16 types, using the signs corresponding to the poles of that type. When calculating the Trait Profile from the Type Profile, the values for all types are summed using the signs corresponding to the positive pole of the dichotomy (traditionally, the pole for the ILE type), and the result is divided by 16. A Functional Profile can be created based on either the Trait Profile or the Type Profile, although this results in a loss of information about six secondary traits.

All three variants of socionic profiles essentially represent the same personality portrait, but depicted in different ways.

Why is the method of determining the socionic profile fundamentally better than a simple typing into one of the types? Because it allows for a precise assessment of the contribution of all socionics factors to a person’s unique personality. If only the leading type is identified, ignoring the rest, significant information about a person’s qualities is lost.

For example, it is quite possible that a person is closest to the reference sociotype of ILE in terms of the totality of all factors, but at the same time is objectively a socionic ethicist. In classical socionics, typologists in this case face a dilemma: either assign the person to the IEE type (based on Jung’s basis) or to ILE (based on all the factors combined).

Both of these approaches are categorically bad. The first is flawed because IEE in classical socionics is associated with Delta values, which may be entirely foreign to this person, and searching for a Delta dual would be a major mistake. The second option is flawed because ILE is a logical type, and a person who lacks logical traits might view this as a personal defect or an old trauma, leading them to try to "fix" this perceived shortcoming in vain.

The socionic profile method helps avoid such mistakes. According to this approach, it’s entirely possible for a person to closely align with the ILE type, which embodies Alpha values, but still be an ethicist. This combination is just as natural and valid as a more "classic" ILE, IEE, or any other type. In fact, one could describe this as a "ILE with additional accents on IEE, IEI, and SEE" However, the socionics profile method is especially useful because it allows for a more accurate and quantitative determination of the contribution of all atypical traits to the dominant type and the relative strength of all accents, rather than merely diagnosing their presence.

Any personality trait also has its own unique socionic profile, differing both in the relative contribution of each of the factors and in the cumulative share of these factors in the total dispersion of this trait in the population. The value of the linear correlation coefficient between the profiles of the properties allows us to assume the existence of a connection between these properties (either directly or through a third factor). Also, by considering the magnitude of correlation between the calculated personality profile and the profiles of different personality traits, we can determine which of these traits are more likely (and in a more vivid form) to be diagnosed in a given person, and which are less likely to be diagnosed. (Although this probability is also influenced by a number of other factors, first of all, the very share of dispersion of extrasocionic factors in the total variance of each of the properties).

As mentioned above, the method of calculating the type profile was successfully used in professional multifactor questionnaires such as Cattell's MMPI and PF-16 before it was introduced into socionics. But even in comparison with these psychological questionnaires, V.L. Talanov significantly improved the methodology for calculating the psychological profile. Thus, in the questionnaires created according to Talanov's methodology:

1. each questionnaire question participating in the diagnostics has its own socionic profile, calculated on the basis of the previous statistics, and therefore the answer to it simultaneously contributes to the calculation of the strength of all socionic factors (attributes, functions), etc., and not just one;
2. respondents' answers are adjusted by the personal average and by the average (or rather, average) answer to each questionnaire question;
3. a multi-stage quality control system is used, which makes it possible to filter out questionnaires with obviously unreliable data (when the respondent in one way or another "played" with the questionnaire, and did not answer the questions seriously);
4. Questions are selected in the questionnaire so that its structure meets a number of criteria: a minimum of parasitic correlations between the vectors of the main socionic traits; minimum differences between the lengths of vectors corresponding to the 16 types; minimum connection of the prevailing choice of positive or negative answers with any socionic factors, etc.;
5. When calculating the socionic profiles of the questions on the basis of the available statistics, such factors as the uneven number of people of different types or poles of characteristics in the sample are taken into account and corrected; different confidence of people in their type; different levels of non-socionic dispersion - "noise" in the respondents' answers (the value of which can be associated with different levels of people's knowledge of themselves, as well as with the real depth of personal accentuation); the factor of dissimulation (the influence of the level of general self-esteem on the choice of answers), etc.

Thus, in our opinion, Talanov's questionnaires, based on thousands of statistics of typodiagnostics, are at the moment perhaps the best personality questionnaires in terms of their accuracy and coverage of psychological qualities not only in socionics, but also in modern psychology as a whole.

How to Interpret Socionic Profiles

1. The zero level on the graphs does not indicate the complete absence of a trait, but rather its average population value. This means that for half of the population, the trait is expressed more strongly, and for the other half, less strongly.
2. Rare and common traits: some personality traits are rare and appear much less often than in half of the population. Therefore, even if your profile is similar to a type with a rare trait, it doesn't necessarily mean that you possess that trait. The same applies to traits that are almost universal.
3. Different personality traits have different shares of contribution of socionic factors to the total variance. At the same time, the profiles of all properties on the charts visually have the same range of values. This can sometimes mislead uninformed people. For example, some purely physiological properties of a person can gravitate towards a certain trait and have a profile in which this trait clearly dominates. However, in the dispersion of these properties in the population, there will be a significant share of random (extrasocionic) factors. So such properties cannot be reliable markers of this feature.
4. In the same way, the profile of any person filling out the questionnaire on the graphs will have the same standard range of values - regardless of the real variance in the values of his characteristics - that is, the depth of individual personal accentuation. Why is that? Firstly, it is difficult to separate the real depth of personal accentuation from the share of noise in the respondents' answers (which may be a consequence, for example, of the respondent's low level of intelligence or his low diligence in filling out the questionnaire). Secondly, it is simply wrong to assume that the strength of functions and characteristics visible on graphs indicates a measurable number of personality skills. Even if we made a correction for all conceivable factors, socionic parameters are still basically not quantitative, but qualitative. The strength of functions is not absolute, but relative, and indicates exclusively the balance of the strength of the individual's motivations - which strategy of behavior dominates over others and to what extent. If we represent the personality trait profile as a vector in the 15-dimensional space of psychological coordinates, then the length of this vector will be partially reflected only in the parameter S (profile sigma, an indicator of the total measured variance of socionic traits). The strength of the functions will depend only on the angles of this vector relative to the 15 axes of such a space.