Personality tests have gone viral within the past several decades because of their inherent appeal; MBTI and Enneagram come to mind first, naturally. But ultimately what both of these tests measure misses the forest for the trees. It can be useful and fun occasionally and can be used as something to think about as a vector for self-analysis, but to quote Beatrice Storc, it measures a “behavioral symptom, and not a cause”. Personality, after all, is an emergent property of thought combined with environment to produce outcomes, and is very much dependent on context.
Neurotyping is an alternative system based on types of thought (and the kinds of personalities that tend to accompany those thought patterns) which has been very useful for my personal understanding of the world and psychology in my personal life. It’s definitely still pop psychology, since the system is only known by a relatively small group of people and therefore actual research is little-to-none, but its analysis has been proved invaluably useful compared to MBTI in my personal experience, so that’s the vector through which I will analyze and present it.
The system was made by Beatrice Storc, and the original time it was introduced was in using characters from anime as examples of what these types of categories looked like manifested in media characters with naturally more extreme personality types. Beatrice is probably going to be mentioned a million times throughout this post, so for the sake of my own sanity I’ll just refer to her as Bea or Digi (based on the old username Diginee and formerly Digibro).
The extent of the data I’ve personally collected for the system is my spreadsheet in which characters and people of significance are entered along with any other data that could possibly have a correlation, and then correlations are tested. I have roughly 800 characters in that section of the spreadsheet, and roughly 400 people of different denominations. I cross-reference this sheet with the community-made one of a similar nature whenever necessary. I’ve written a lot about this subject, and some of the information contained within this manual is to some extent recycled from some of my previous work on this subject, combined with the general consensus.
The most difficult part of Neurotyping is to try and collage some data to point to any possible correlations/patterns/definitive conclusions based on Neurotype past the intuitive level, which ultimately proves incredibly difficult due to limited sample size and the difficulty inherent in attempting to introduce a more novel or unconventional system to a person who doesn’t want to listen to an hour-long explanation of all of the complexities. Tests exist for this system, but ultimately are hampered both by the smaller size of the current community and the understanding of the individual’s own thought patterns and any subconscious biases tending towards certain answers, or trying to get a certain conclusion.
A system I’ve been slowly leaning towards is a more ‘situation-based’ system, where test takers are described a certain situation and then describe their thought processes due to the difficulty of thinking about thought in a vacuum. Ultimately though, all of this is speculation, and would need to be implemented and tested to have much objective validity or meaning in a lexical context, which is still a work in progress at the time of writing.
Ultimately everything Neurotyping-related, especially the theories I specifically put forth, are experiential and based on internal phenomena and are a system to analyze and categorize these impressions; Nothing more and nothing less. I would personally attest to the value of these systems and tools to understand the thought patterns of myself and of others in my personal life, but I don't have a statistic or study I can throw out to prove it beyond a shadow of a doubt, and I wouldn’t wait with bated breath for that to change any time soon. So this guide will function as mostly speculative nerd-dom, so keep that in mind.
Since it’s mostly a psychological/philosophical framework, a lot of things are recontextualized using the system. Or at the very least they were for me. A lot of situations in retrospect were influenced by different modes of thought and my assumption that all people had styles of thought similar to my own hampered my ability to effectively communicate and interpret the thoughts and feelings of other people. If nothing else, Neurotyping has helped to break out of that personally, and to have somewhat of a better perspective of the types of thought of others and how they differ from my own, and to proceed in using that as a mode of analysis much of the time.
Once I started learning the system and began to apply it to more and more things in my life, I would have things scream out to me that I previously hadn’t been able to codify into words before then, as well as being a form of adhesive in my mind that could help the grand puzzle stick together, and a way to modularize thought such that it could fit in neatly to what already exists.
You can find the video which originally introduced the earliest version of the Neurotyping system by YGG Studios here, but you don’t have to watch it to understand this manual. Regardless, I'd highly recommend it. It's an excellent video particularly if you’ve watched enough different anime series to know the different characters being used as examples, but this isn’t a must to understand the video. This video covers most of the same ground that I do in my The Chart and The Neurotypes sections, though the content differs in several places where our perspectives and ways of thinking differ. My sections tend to use more real celebrities and hypotheticals/analogies as examples, if that’s more useful to you.
I love this original video, and I’ve no doubt watched it at least 100 times, but watching it with the level of scrutiny that comes from being embroiled in this realm of thought for the past several years reveals some flaws with the video as an introduction to Neurotyping as a concept. The original video has its fair share of problems by virtue of being the first introduction with the concept, and the theory around the chart and system has vastly evolved since the release of the video. Another video was released afterward clarifying a lot of the issues, and the issues with the first video as per my perspective are the following:
- The “over-personality-ifying” of the different Neurotypes presents a problem --- The conflation of types of thought and personality are problems with nearly every aspect of the community (as will inevitably be the case), but this is especially bad in the first video. The second video fixes some part of this problem, but still has some issues with this topic.
- Going along with the previous points, the names were very unrefined and shaky at this point. Reasonable people, Caretakers, Room Brighteners, Shadow Guardians, Middle Managers, etc. have way too heavy of an evocative implication that’s too specific and personality-oriented. The second video clarifies these issues.
- Is somewhat alienating to people who don’t have a comprehensive understanding of the medium being used for example (which I imagine they’d agree with). Which is part of the exigence of writing this manual.
Ultimately, it should be noticed that this chart is conjecture and theoretic to the utmost degree. The most evidence that can be really cited is flimsy, but it provides more of an alternative philosophical framework than others, in understanding how others are different from you in thoughts and how to breach those gaps in communication ultimately has proven incredibly useful to me personally and many others in the Neurotyping community. I’m not a spokesperson for the Neurotyping community, far from it, it’s completely possible those people will decide that this manual is complete nonsense, and that is fine if that is their perspective. Neurotyping is a hotly debated topic with lots of subtopics and I won’t pretend to have answers to all of those questions. Neurotyping fictional characters and celebrities is ultimately a fun, vibe-based hobby in my experience, but as we all are viewing these people and characters from different perspectives, our insight is limited. My version and interpretation of Neurotyping as a system is all I can speak for. Beatrice, the Neurotyping community at large, and the Neurotypeline (a Neurotying podcast) all differ from each other and from my perspective in several ways, and so if you want their perspective listen to them and not me. I’ve spent the past few years thinking about and elaborating on my personal systems and philosophy around dealing with these things, but ultimately I’m a single human (allegedly), and infinite interpretations of these systems are possible. Some of the subsystems, such as Subtypes and Primary Functions, are entirely my own, and are even less scientifically provable in an organized sense, since they’re even deeper into the jaws of conjecture than the work that is at the very least acknowledged by the Neurotyping community at large.
SECTION 1:THE CHART
The most commonly used Neurotyping Chart looks like the below:
The chart has a lot of words which can seem intimidating at first glance but ultimately breaks down once the x and y axes are explained. All that a Neurotype truly is, in sincerity, is where your Impressionism and Laterality meet. Think of it like how your Longitude and Latitude meet to make your location.
The Chart has 2 main axes: Impressionism and Laterality. The more impressionistic you are, the more you value the intuitive understanding of something instead of specific words, systems, or concrete reasoning. The two ends of the x-axis spectrum are Impressionist and Lexical, where an Impressionist tends to value a more complete, intuitive understanding of something, possibly at the expense of the ability to put it into definitive words, whereas a Lexical person tends to value more the systematic structures of things, and places value mostly on feelings and ideas that can be clearly put into words, and explained logically.
More stereotypically Impressionistic forms of expression include art, dance, theater, and sports, areas in which having a strong and reliable intuition or emotional understanding of your environment is very useful. However this doesn’t mean that every artist, dancer, performer, or athlete is necessarily impressionistic. An example of a lexical athlete who uses his logical mind to his advantage is Eiichiro from Baby Steps, a character who reached the top of his class in spite of his lack of talent or natural intelligence through sheer hard work. Eiichiro began playing Tennis, breaking the Tennis court down into zones to understand lexically the trajectories of different shots, and understanding the different strategies that would often come intuitively to a more impressionistic thinker through observation, and writing them down in his notebook after each play.
More stereotypically Lexical forms of expression include Science, Mathematics, Economics, or Chess, where understanding the ‘objectively correct’ and most logical answer tends to be of primary importance. However, examples of more impressionistic Chess players are those who are often playing more daring openings, more brave sacrifices, and generally using a more romantic style of play that focuses more on catching the opponent off guard or opening up certain positions/pieces than trying to remember 40 moves of deep engine theory or playing the move that is ‘the most logical’. To quote Mikhail Tal, one of the most influential and successful chess players of all time, “There are two types of sacrifices: correct ones, and mine”.
Lexical thinkers tend to use words more as a tool for understanding; hence why a common substitution for Lexical in charts and sheets that you’ll see in the community is categorical. They often rely on being able to put things into clear or particular language to fully understand something. Impressionists on the other hand tend to use words after the fact to attempt to convey the thought that has already formed, where the thought is descriptive (describing the existing thought) instead of prescriptive (forming the thought) to borrow some philosophy terms. Put simply, Lexical thinkers often use words to form thoughts whereas Impressionistic thinkers use words to describe an existing thought or impression that they’ve already formulated.
The ends of the y-axis spectrum are Linear and Lateral, where a Linear person tends to focus primarily on one train of thought as opposed to the more dispersed thoughts of a Lateral person. Put simply, a linear person has a more “one-track mind” where lateral people tend to be mentally multi-tasking, akin to a computer’s Random Access Memory (to steal an analogy from Beatrice). Linear people are often most able to place themselves in the current moment and with their current train of thought, whereas a lateral person will often struggle more so to place themselves due to having mixed feelings on lots of different things, as a result of having more thoughts emerging from the same original place.
A linear mind is like a drill, pointed in a specific direction it will continue to dig deeper into the same train of thought instead of a more lateral thinker which will tend to go from idea to idea quickly. An analogy I’ve heard to express the differences in these kinds of thoughts is that linear minds are vertical, whereas lateral minds are horizontal. Lateral people’s thoughts are often very disconnected from the matter at hand, where a Linear person lives more in the moment. A lateral person can often be processing several different things at once that feel completely unrelated to their physical environment, and thus can be difficult to understand for more linear thinkers who don’t follow the step-by-step mental leaps that the more lateral person is making. There’s nothing necessarily wrong with either of these kinds of thought, and neither is necessarily any better or worse than the other, but both are good for different tasks and different roles.
A lateral thinker is often to be easily bored with things that don’t have some degree of complexity, and are more able to entertain themselves with their breadth of thoughts. The ultimate measure of the intelligence of a lateral thinker is how useful and accurate their thoughts are, and how well they work together to form an overarching perspective or framework.
A common pitfall is to conflate laterality with intelligence, when they’re not at all synonymous. Some infamous internet users, such as Chris Chan and The New Storyteller are both hyper-lateral, but also have very severe learning disabilities. The most infamous example is definitely Chris Chan, who’s convinced herself that all fictional characters are real in various alternate dimensions, and that she has the ability to communicate across and go to these different dimensions. Laterality tends to correlate with more ‘mental complexity’, or connecting more different things and constructing more grand and specific worldviews, but this complexity isn’t always useful or meaningful. People online tend to make charts by editing pictures of characters on top of the chart where they think they would preside. This can be done with pretty much any photo editing software, but Pixlr is a pretty easy-to-use and free option.
THE NEUROTYPES
As previously mentioned, your Neurotype is the intersection of how Lateral you are and how Impressionistic you are on the chart. If you’re slightly linear and slightly lexical, you are then Understanding.
Going from bottom-to-top and then right-to-left, the most commonly accepted Neurotypes are: Bookkeepers, Contemplatives, Technicians, Human Calculators/Computers, Level-Headed, Understanding, Quick-Witted/Astute, Analyst, Clearsighted, Externalist, Overseer, Fascinator, Pure Instinct/Instinctual, Impressionist/Sensate, Aesthetician, and Newtype. For the sake of readability and ease of use, I will provide a crude butchering generalization of these types on a basic level and work upward from there. Each Neurotype has several fictional examples, picked to be as inarguable as is reasonably possible. But if fiction (especially anime or cartoons) aren’t your favorite thing, I also have high profile and media profile examples; The high profile example represents high-sitting figures (politicians, chess grandmasters, world leaders, famous people, well-known political commentators) and the media profile represents slightly more obscure individuals (YouTubers, streamers, content creators, media personalities). YouTubers with over 5 million subscribers will also be considered high profile. In the event that the high profile representative of a Neurotype is not as popular as others, that likely means that this specific Neurotype is underrepresented in the documentation. I’d advise reading the basic descriptions of all of them and not just the one you feel like you may be based on the previous section. Below is a guide to abbreviations:
Bookkeepers/BK (Very Linear, Very Lexical): Straightforward, direct, and logical, these kinds of thinkers often tend to mean the words they say in the way that is direct and accurate to its definition, and will often be frustrated in conversations or environments where the conversation is heavily based on implication, and for that reason often struggle in environments where more abstract subjects are being discussed. Bookkeepers have a tendency to enter jobs where they have a set of specific and rigid rules that are followed and understood.
Bookkeepers tend to be very direct and say very literally what they mean. They tend to have a no-nonsense attitude and hold themselves and sometimes others to a code of conduct they’ve either created or inherited from their surroundings. These types often tend to embody the “straight man” comedy archetype wherein one character is more eccentric, and the ‘straight man’ character stays more rational and deadpan to contrast the high-energy insanity of the more energetic partner.
Contemplatives/Co (Linear, Very Lexical): Similar to Bookkeepers, Contemplatives often have a firm understanding of the lexical systems in place, but often also are able to put distance between themselves and the lexical world that they observe around them. Contemplatives tend to juxtapose their understanding of the world with the more doubtful internal track of thought, thus having more of a difference between the thoughts that they present and the thoughts that are often running through their head.
Because of their slight laterality, they are often able to simultaneously consider a different perspective by hopping out of their own temporarily, but are not as likely to commonly do this as more lateral thinkers. Contemplatives tend to be split between two versions of themselves; The more Bookkeeper-esque running train of thought, and a second perspective. The word seems illogical to these types, so they construct their internal systems to give them a sense of order.
High Profile: George Lucas (Filmmaker of Star Wars)
Media Profile: Geno Samuel (YouTuber and Documentarian)
Fictional Examples: Bruce Wayne (Batman), Light Yagami (Death Note), Malcolm Reynolds (Firefly)
Technicians/TC (Lateral, Very Lexical): While maintaining the same overtly lexical understanding of the world as their more linear counterparts, Technicians are usually processing several different things at once. Technicians tend to craft ‘bubbles’ around certain subjects or areas, and tend to mostly bounce between thoughts within that certain range, which earns them the nickname of Technician. These kinds of thinkers are often good in scenarios and jobs which require them to understand and consider several different sets of information and data at once, such as programming and science.
High Profile: Magnus Carlsen (Chess World Champion)
Media Profile: Sean Fitzgerald (Political commentator)
Human Calculators/HC (Very Lateral, Very Lexical): Very lateral thinkers overall tend to be very difficult to understand for other thinkers who are not similarly lateral, and even for other lateral thinkers. Human Calculators are similar to Technicians, but possessing an even further breadth of perspective, and a tendency to think in calculations, and are best equipped for jobs where you have to understand an incredibly large array of data; Data management, statistics, certain kinds of game development and computer science, etc.
These types of people’s brains tend to resemble a vastly intricate spreadsheet
High Profile: Steven Hawking (Mathematician)
Media Profile: Steven “Destiny” Kenneth Bonnell II (Political commentator)
Fictional Examples: Norma (Dead End: Paranormal Park), Entrapta (She-Ra), L (Death Note), Gregory House (House M.D)
Level-Headed/LH (Very Linear, Lexical): Level-Headed thinkers maintain the strongly logically driven world-view of the Bookkeeper, but also gives themselves and others more emotional wiggleroom through applying the logical structure more so to emotions and allowing the lexical framework to intermingle with impressionistic understandings or emotions.
Understanding/Un (Linear, Lexical): Understanding, being one of the middle categories, is able to have a large amount of people to a lot of people of different Neurotypes. In fiction, these types of characters tend to attempt to codify the more lateral and often less lexical worlds and perspectives of those around them, with just enough of both to understand those types of thinkers while also having more structure.
Astute/As (Lateral, Lexical): Where Human Calculators and Technicians can often resemble knowledge hoarders who gather large understandings and sets of information for the sake of itself, Astute thinkers have a more eccentric spark in addition to the more Spreadsheet elements. Slightly lexical people are more likely to add the question to a specific thought or piece of data To what end? and pull and prod the set of thoughts or lexemes in different directions, and are more willing to let themselves waver from what is literally true.
High Profile: Matthew Patrick/MatPat (YouTuber)
Media Profile: Levy Rozman (YouTuber, International Master of Chess)
Fictional Examples: Rose Lalonde (Homestuck), Sunraku (Shangri-La Frontier), Kaoru Yamazaki (Welcome to the NHK)
Analyst/An (Very Lateral, Lexical): Keeping the structurally lexical view of society as the Human Calculator, but also being more willing to factor emotions and different styles of expression into the equation, the analyst is able to construct a laterally intricate worldview with more room for direction and impressionism than that of a Human Calculator. These types tend to try to systematize emotions and expressions in a logical way, and often have enough impressionism to have a more grand or creative vision at which they can point their analysis.
In fiction these types of characters tend to be mad scientists, who have wide-spanning visions of the world and strong beliefs.
High Profile: Slavoj Zizek (Philosopher)
Media Profile: Jack Lawrence (Philosophy Tiktoker)
Fictional Examples: Reagan Ridley (Inside Job), Shiroe (Log Horizon), Joel Dawson (Love and Monsters),
Clearsighted/Cs (Very Linear, Impressionist): Often bearing an open mind and strong gut, Clearsighted people tend to stay in the moment but consider that moment first and foremost on the emotional level. These thinkers often have a strong and conclusive sense of right and wrong, and a strong and definitive (occasionally rigid) sense of their emotional perception at any given moment.
High Profile: Dwayne the Rock Johnson (Actor)
Media Profile: Ben Scott/Puffin Forest (YouTuber)
Fictional Examples: Ash (Pokemon), Clark Kent/Kal El (Superman), Johnothan Joestar (JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure), Tristan Taylor (Yu-Gi-Oh)
Externalist/Ex (Linear, Impressionist): Often represented by stereotypical popular kids, Externalists have a similar level of strength of character as their neighbor Clearsighted but with a level of interfacing with society and more of a willingness to construct a public-facing image of themselves in the face of society, which isn’t necessarily dishonest, just a way of dealing with the complexity of society. Externalists also have the advantage of not having to embody that identity in the same way that a more linear thinker would.
High Profile: Felix Kjellberg (YouTuber)
Media Profile: Garnt Maneetapho (YouTuber)
Fictional Examples: Lance (Voltron: Legendary Defender), Scanlan (Vox Machina), Lois Lane (My Adventures with Superman), Euphemia li Britannia (Code Geass)
Overseer/Os (Lateral, Impressionist): While maintaining the social thinking of Externalists, Overseers tend to provide a more grand perspective or vision, and will often be more deliberate with what they do and don’t say. Where most Externalists have somewhat of a filter with what they say and don’t say, Overseers tend to have a more scattered view of themselves and of the world, and are more prone to spending a long time reflecting on social situations and environments to form a framework with which to act.
High Profile: Jordan Peterson (Philosopher Ph.D)
Media Profile: Jacob Geller (YouTuber)
Fictional Examples: Homura Akemi (Madoka Magica), Raven (Teen Titans), Wally (Pokemon), Tori Spring (Heartstopper)
Fascinator/Fa (Very Lateral, Impressionist): The Fascinator, along with all other high lats, tends to be difficult to understand from an outside perspective due to the intricacy of their worldview. With a slight impressionistic lean, these types tend to have a very much narrative frame around their life and with which new thoughts are formed, with also a tendency to organize and lexicalize these ideas in ways that are more coherent to more lexical thinkers, or are outlined in more definitive steps or means. These types are very likely to have an obsessive personality type with an interest in some kind of creative vision. If I were to describe the Fascinator in one word, it would be visionary. Fascinators tend to have grand visions of themselves and of the world and act in accordance with those understandings.
High Profile: Brennan Lee Mulligan (Actor)
Media Profile: Natalie Wynn/Contrapoints (YouTuber)
Fictional Examples: Griffith (Berserk), Haruhi Suzumiya (The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya), Beth Harmon (The Queen’s Gambit), Rango (Rango), Rick Sanchez (Rick and Morty)
Pure Instinct/PI (Very Linear, Very Impressionist): Although these types of people and characters tend to be portrayed as dumb or not stereotypically intelligent, Pure Instinct thinkers can use the strength of their intuition and definitiveness of their identity to become proficient in more impressionism-driven mediums such as athletics and art. These people’s thoughts tend to be consumed mostly if not wholly by the continuous emotional state and intuitive understanding that they’re taking in from the world around them. This kind of slots into the stereotype of the Kinesthetic Learner; Someone whose intuition can guide them to conclusions once it has an opportunity to be exercised. Pure Instincts are also one of the most capable of intense, uninterrupted, and straightforward flow states which explains part of it’s over representation in heavily masculine culture and wrestling (along with other sports).
High Profile: Michael Bay (Filmmaker)
Media Profile: Logan Paul (YouTuber)
Fictional Examples: Gon (Hunter x Hunter), Guts (Berserk), Denji (Chainsaw Man), Rock Lee (Naruto)
Impressionist (Linear, Very Impressionist): Often enraptured by a certain idea of themself in relation to society, the Impressionist/Sensate tends to speak more through actions than words as do most fully impressionistic thinkers. They tend to have a strong sense of self and a bit of a ‘persona’ that they put on as a means of surviving in the world but also as a means of understanding themselves and providing more definitiveness to their personality. A lot of stereotypical counter-culture falls into these very impressionist mid laterality categories (particularly Im and Ae), because from a lot of these thinkers emerge novel systems of aesthetic without being too absorbed in detail or specifics as a more lateral thinker might.
High Profile: Post Malone (Musician)
Media Profile: Hasan Piker (Streamer and Activist)
Fictional Examples: Luz (The Owl House), Miles Morales (Spider-verse), Laserhawk (Captain Laserhawk), Damian Wayne (DC),
Aesthetician (Lateral, Very Impressionist): Often stereotyped as complex, emotional messes, Aestheticians are the one of the categories that are the most living inside their continual overlapping emotional states. These types tend to value or orient themselves or their thought around a particular system of aesthetic or intuition, and tend to think more in loosely connected vibes and emotional initiatives than anything close to linear, lexical reality.
High Profile: Billie Eilish (Musician)
Media Profile: Shaelin Jornigan (Artist)
Fictional Examples: Tulip (Infinity Train: Book 1), Catra (She-Ra and the Princesses of Power), Mello (Death Note).
Newtype (Very Lateral, Very Impressionist): Newtypes tend to have vast internal emotional understandings and very little ability to lexically codify it. Tending to be a wellspring of emotional tenderness and novelty, the Newtype is one of the most difficult Neurotypes to understand since the inner world is at once deeply vast, and also disconnected from logical foundations and expanding largely outwards from the Newtype's emotions. Taking the emotional wreck stereotype of the Aesthetician and turning it up to 11, a Newtype is ultimately forced to turn to art or incredibly intricate prose to attempt to explain even a fraction of their feelings. Stereotypical ‘Tortured Artists’ typically fall in this category, or really any of the lateral impressionist categories (not always, of course).
High Profile: Vincent Van Gogh (Historical Artist)
For ease of understanding, the categories will be split into quadrants: LatLex (Lateral Lexical), LinLex (Linear Lexical), LatImp (Lateral Impressionist), and LinImp (Linear Impressionist). The 4 in the center will also be considered a quadrant to demonstrate some concepts. In the name of simplicity, I’ll explain a basic overview of each quadrant, as well as list the Neurotypes in that Quadrant, and give examples of people in each quadrant (and you can also check the chart from above and use the axes).
Quadrant 1: Center (Ex., Un., QW., Os.)
I’ll start with the Center even though not everyone considers it a quadrant simply because it is likely the most common (naturally). Center categories tend to be the most balanced on impressionism and lexicality, and be personalities that are often better at interacting with others because, if we assume that the Effective Range of Communication (Henceforth known as the EROC) for any neurotype is a 3-by-3 with itself as the focal point, the center categories have by far the most neurotypes they can easily communicate with (the corner categories, then, having the least reach). EROC is being used to mean Neurotypes that the Neurotype in question is able to easily and intuitively communicate with due to a similarity in thought patterns and structure. Demonstration of the 3-by-3 with Quick-Witted as an example:
This graph uses the Yellow dot as the focal point, the Blue lines as the boundaries, and anything within the blue as being in the EROC. Being inside or outside of the EROC doesn’t necessarily mean anything, it’s just that people tend to have an easier time communicating with people who are similar to them in Neurotype. Although I have some other theories as to how this may work, such as this one in the Visual Guides section, which theorizes that it’s easier to get along with someone of your same Laterality than Impressionism on average.
Most 'popular' people in social situations are one of these types because of this relative ease of communication and commonality due to having no extreme lexicality, impressionism, linearity, or laterality. The more lexical side of the Center has the advantage of being able to understand and empathize with at some level the emotions and emotional decision making of others and listen to their gut, while also defaulting to a more logical and organized view to approach these issues in life. On the other hand, the more Impressionistic side of the center has the opposite advantage; on some level they can value, understand, and adhere to the systems and rules of the world and people around them, but they intuitively think and behave through emotional or intuitive understandings.
Quadrant 2: LinLex (Linear and Lexical: Bk., Co., LH., Un.)
People who are Linear and Lexical tend to mentally abide by a set of mental rules or logic (even if non-explicitly) and those systems tend to be relatively more on the simple side. People of this type are often good at understanding rules or logic minute-to-minute, instead of spending alot of time worrying about the structure of these internal systems or thinking too much about the more abstract.
Linear and lexical people tend to be good in management situations, law, politics, and criminal justice, due to their understanding of rules without concerning themselves too much with understanding the meta-structure by which this system is upheld. They are good at mentally finding the appropriate rule for the situation, without getting too stuck in analysis paralysis and while having less difficulty explaining their reasoning and position than a more lateral thinker often would due to their linearity meaning that their reasoning is often less convoluted or intricate.
Linear thinking tends to happen by selecting one primary point of origin, and focusing thoughts on that thing, and looking at things primarily in relation to that original thing that their thought is currently based on.
Quadrant 3: LatLex (Lateral and Lexical: Tc., HC., QW., An.):
Lateral and lexical people tend to be attracted to mechanical complexity, and tend to be most interested in subjects that have a lot of nuance and complexity (such as science, math, chemistry, etc.). These kinds of thinkers tend to have several on-going trains of thought, but those thoughts are definitively lexically oriented. These thinkers often make good Professors, Mathematicians, eSports competitors for Strategy or Fighting games, or Programmers due to their ability to track lots of things at once in relation to a whole while also keeping those things being tracked as ‘lexically clean’ — meaning not corrupted by anything potentially unfalsifiable (to a lesser extent for the Impressionistic/right side of LatLex).
These are the people on the chart who’s brains most closely resemble a computer, database, or spreadsheet.
Lateral lexicals tend to focus themselves around understanding systems, and enjoy having a mind in which lots of different things are connected along logical (or semi-logical) means.
The more Impressionistic side of LatLex tends to concern itself with providing lexical codifications of more impressionistic thoughts and ideas, which tends to make them good comedians, project managers, and manipulators. The more Lexical side of LatLex tends to be more detached from the impressionistic understandings and actions of others if they can’t be explained in definitive language, and tend to focus on and take pride in understanding lots of interconnected facts forming a broad understanding of their particular interest(s).
The more linear side of LatLex tends to have their thoughts like a decentralized file folder, where pieces of info are organized into groups as they relate. On the other hand, the more lateral side of LatLex is more like a spreadsheet; Everything is related and processed along lines of similarity but are not ultimately grouped together with much stringency. Lateral thinkers in general tend to be best at finding connections between things and ideas that are unconventional, and LatLex tends to do this with more lexical subjects, thus part of why the categories are heavily associated with math and science.
Linear impressionists are similar to linear lexicals in the sense that their inner world is more focused on one or two things at a time, but those few things are understood on an emotional or intuitive level first and foremost. These kinds of people are the most likely to rely on their instincts and gut primarily, and their intelligence is typically determined by how often that instinct turns out to be right.
These kinds of people are often associated with roles that require either strong instinct, or a good intuitive social understanding, such as many styles of YouTubers, Celebrities, Athletes, Socialites, and Pop Stars. Jobs that are based around gut or instinct or that those qualities would be helpful with that also don’t require a complex persona tend to be best for these types.
These types are also the most likely to have an easy time succeeding in social settings, because their intuitive and uncomplicated sense of self and often understanding of other people leads them to be able to navigate situations with others relatively easily. Where linear and lexical people tend to associate themselves with narrow systems of logic, linear and impressionistic people tend to associate themselves with narrow systems of aesthetic or intuition.
The more impressionistic side of LinImp tends to focus primarily on their own emotions more than balancing their own with those of others, and the strength of the impressionistic side of LinImp is in its ability to be true to itself without too much difficulty or complication, and they tend to have a strong and intuitive gut that they follow most of the time. The more lateral side of lin-imp tends to have more of a fluid persona; They have their normal self, and a face or persona that they put on to navigate the world and social situations. More lateral impressionists by contrast tend to have lots of different faces that they present outwardly, and tend to oscillate between them more fluidly.
LatImp combines the mental complexity of LatLex with the often emotional/intuitive nature of LinImps to form people who tend to be caught up in complex emotions and intuitive understandings of the world. These kinds of people tend to be creative with intense passion and a complicated worldview or set of emotions that is easier to convey through art or prose than the limiting conventions of words.
Both impressionistic and lateral people have a tendency to struggle to put things in clear, definitive, and direct language, so this is compounded with people in the LatImp category, who have a tendency to abandon clear and direct language as a mode for communication unless they’re particularly masochistic in favor of some kind of art, aesthetic, presentation, or prose. Their language tends to be somewhat broad, abstract and conceptual, which can be frustrating to more linear or lexical thinkers. These types of people tend to be good artists, musicians, poets, and general creatives.
Similar to LinImp, the Impressionistic (right) side of LatImp tends to focus on their own immensely complex inner world, whereas the Lexical (left) side of LatImp tends to focus more on having intuitive understandings of others in some sense in addition to their own internal world. This isn’t to say the Impressionistic side of LatImp is necessarily any less caring or compassionate, just that the axis of their thought tends to come from their own strong intuitive emotions which they then externalize outwards, wheras the Lexical Side of LatImp tends to focus their thought on people or groups of people particularly in relation to the self.
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This chart is also known as the Propro Chart. To avoid this manual being 1,000 pages long, I won’t go as in-depth on ProTyping as I do in Neurotyping, but it is a common system used by the community, and one with a lot of merit in the eyes of many (myself included). Depicted below is the Protyping chart. The first image indicates axes and the second demonstrates type names. Charts are courtesy of Urcoy, and which indicate and represent the original incarnation of the charts and names. Since then several of these category names have been updated. Superadvisor has since been changed to Experimenter, Cool Cat has been changed to Tracker, Phantom has been changed to Gatherer, Seer has been changed to Absorber, Philosoraptor has been changed to Philosopher, Reviewer has been changed to Theorist, Rationalist has been changed to Investigator, Specialist has been changed to Debater, Wizard has been changed to Drifter, Raven has been changed to Adventurer, and Archivist has been changed to Challenger. Depicted below is the initial chart, and below that is the revised version.
Figure 2A & 2B: Propro Chart Originals
Figure 2C: Revised Propro
The chart has 2 axes: Stationary vs Protean and Prospective vs Extemporal. Stationary thinkers are thinkers which tend to construct a ‘box’ of sorts that their thoughts stay within and tend to be relatively the same even in different circumstances. Protean on the other hand represents thinkers that are ever-changing and are completely different people in response to certain environments or people. Everyone is very protean compared to not protean at all, but some are more stationary than others, thus being the reason for this axis. Protean thinkers tend to have very different types of thought and different kinds of identities resolving around different contexts, with more protean thinkers often struggling to find a definitive sense of identity. Stationary thinkers tend to require more new information, and more solidity of that information, in order to change or form an opinion. A joke in the Neurocord (the Neurotyping community) is that the Protean thinker is one who cycles through new political ideologies each week.
The other axis, the y axis, is Prospective vs Extemporal, where Prospective thinkers are the types to analyze a situation internally for extensive periods of time before acting, whereas Extemporal thinkers tend to address issues as they arise. This axis can also be framed as Internal vs External, but with a bit more added depth. Prospective thinkers tend to spend longer pondering than acting, and tend to think things through as opposed to acting them through. Extemporal thinkers on the other hand act through issues as opposed to analyzing them, and as such are less prone to analysis paralysis.
And where your x-axis and y-axis meet represents your Protype, which represents the meta-framework of your thoughts; How you use them and the way in which you utilize them over time. Unlike Neurotyping, Protyping isn’t used to represent individual types of thoughts and individual types of producing thoughts, Protyping tends to more so concern itself with meta-narratives surrounding thoughts and how they are implemented. Names are still a work in progress.
SECTION 2: TRENDS/ANALYSIS
The presentation of Neurotypes often give way to certain perceptions and commonality in focus of thought; Fully Lexical thought tends to manifest in propositional thought, i.e. thinking in terms of fact or in terms of strict logical coherence. Slightly lexical thought tends to manifest in augmentative/procedural thought, which is similar to fully lexical propositional thought, but considers themselves and others’ impressions to have more leeway in thought . Augmentative thought also usually leaves more room for creative manipulation of lexemes into more esoteric arrangements. Slightly impressionist thought tends to manifest in social/perspectival thought, which tends to balance their perception of the perspectives of others and of the social groups they are a part of to divine thoughts. Very impressionistic thought tends to result in introspective/participatory thought, which divines information from experience and intuition primarily, with little room for lexical codification. Put simply,
Very Lexical Thought tends to revolve around structure or proposition.
Lexical Thought tends to revolve around societal expectation or conditions of large groups of people, such as collective ideals.
Impressionistic Thought tends to revolve around social groups, and creating some kind of social identity. This tends to manifest in understanding the self in relation to social groups.
Very Impressionistic Thought tends to revolve around the individual experience that the thinker is going through.
The same applies to lateral thought, done in landscapes; meaning, how much information is being processed. The landscape of thought, in a sense, with width and breadth depending on laterality.
Very Linear Thought tends to revolve around the immediate surroundings and landmarks, and relating knowledge to that. Known as Salience Landscape.
Linear Thought tends to comprise having a certain simple framework and some slight distance between the agent and the environment. Known as Prescience Landscape.
Lateral Thought tends to focus on actualizing trends in reality, and relating trends and modes of topology into realization.
Very Lateral thought tends to become the most abstracted from the current moment, and can introduce a whole new world of complexity wherein the thinker’s mind is equally if not more vast than their outside world. Manipulating variables and nodes of thought in their mind forms the ‘symbolic algebra of meaning’ as per Timecake.
Next, the chart also measures two kinds of abstraction in thought. There are two main types of abstraction (defined as thought separated from direct event): Agentic and Arenic abstraction (Ag-abstraction and Ar-abstraction). Agentic abstraction is being used to mean abstraction from the agent in question, from the thinker. Meaning focusing on concepts other than yourself and your emotional state. Ag-abstraction manifests in lexicality, focusing on the words or structure more so than the emotional impression that is being conveyed using those words. Similarly, Arenic Abstraction means focusing on internal thoughts or concepts more so than what is physically in your environment, or arena, hence the name. This tends to manifest in laterality, as lateral people are the most likely to be having several trains of thought which are unrelated to the current goings-on. If this doesn’t make sense to you that’s fine, since it’s pretty in the weeds. I’d recommend analyzing Timecake’s graph depicted below, where most of this analysis originates.
Figure 3: Timecake’s Graph
PRACTICALITY/HOW TO ACTUALLY NEUROTYPE
Ok, great, we’ve gotten a good understanding of the chart, what the general directions reference, and a general idea of each Neurotype, but now the question is raised: How exactly do I apply this system outward? What are the practical implications? Well, that depends on what exactly you’re wanting to use it for.
Placing people into a specific box is difficult, and using Neurotyping to do things other than this feels difficult at first glance. If you’re anything like me, as soon as you apply this system outward, the Neurotypes of others cleanly fall into the Neurotypes of the chart. But keep in mind this is their Neurotype in respect to you. From your vantage point. People often put up fronts of being a different Neurotype than they actually are, and you have to know someone decently well to know definitively their Neurotype unless they wear their heart on their sleeve.
However, there are certainly ways that Neurotyping can be applied interpersonally (and intrapersonally), in that you can analyze both yourself and other peoples’ expression in terms of this Neurotyping Process:
Step 1: What are they trying to say?
Step 2: How are they conveying that information?
Step 3: Repeat the process for each new interaction and analyze the results until you feel you have a solid grasp of the person’s Neurotype.
What you should really be looking at is how does their communication relate to their message? If they’re trying to convey a certain emotion, or a certain fact, if they tell you it directly,
Common forms of emotional communication that may demonstrate some level of impressionism:
Frequent and abundant hand movements during conversation
Packing emotion and conviction into statements, very expressive language
Conveying a lot through body language
Is attempting to try to convey a particular feeling more than a thought
Emotional language, consistent use of adverbs.
Common forms of indirect communication which may demonstrate some level of laterality:
Frequent use of metaphor
Seems like their ideas spill out of their mouths (also can be indicative of more lexicality but not always)
Switching from idea to idea frequently
Encircling an idea without directly stating it, as if casting a mold around it.
Being very separated from the current moment.
Use of abstract language
Common form of categorical communication identifiable as lexicality:
Reverence for rules and structure
Unemotional language
Closer to monotone (but not necessarily monotone).
Matter-of-fact style of speech.
Common forms of direct communication identifiable as linearity:
Speech mostly based on current environment
Ideas are related mostly to self, less abstract
These can be used as examples of how to practically apply Neurotyping outward as a system, but a lot of it is based on vibes, and will be progressively easier, as well as requiring less conscious thought, less of oh wow this person seems to slot into the idea of an Overseer and more into why this person tends to express themselves in lateral and impressionist ways. At a certain point it becomes intuitive and requires little outside thought.
NEIL DEGRASSE TYSON
Neil DeGrasse Tyson is linear, and probably impressionist, which is unintuitive considering that he’s a scientist which is associated with lat-lex. Neil focuses heavily on the emotional impact of discoveries, using a lot of metaphorical language and hand gestures to convey his point in place of scientific jargon or logical syllogism (which is part of why he’s able to connect with so many people who aren’t scientists). He’s excellent at translating lat-lex ideas into lin-imp or lin-lex frameworks, and bridging gaps in technical knowledge across the minds of his viewers.
An example of this is when he discussed the extent to which we have explored the cosmos, where he compares the amount we have explored to a glass of water in the ocean, where the point of the analogy is to make the amount explored feel small whereas most people conceive of the cosmos as being so large, and so much as being explored.
What convinced me of his linearity is the way that once he is on a track it is impossible to get him to stop going as far down that path as he reasonably believes possible, to the point where he ends up bulldozing his conversational partners because he begins the linear path down a specific subject and takes the conversational partner with him down that rabbit hole without necessarily the most care for the meta-conversation as anything other than a way to divulge the ideas that fascinate him so thoroughly.
The reason why he gets a whole note is because I think he’s pivotal as an example to demonstrate how loosely connected modes of thought and professions truly are. For example, scientific technobabble is typically associated with lateral and lexical thinkers, for which that technobabble is automatically instantiated with meaning by virtue of its logical coherence, but it is made approachable by the way Neil deconstructs this language that the meaning isn’t baked into the words or letters for him; It’s his external understanding of the impact of these things that he says. He communicates more with his tone and with his metaphors as opposed to the literal words that he’s saying.
BUILDING A THOUGHT
This section is the one which meshes the conjecture with the philosophy, which is the defining of the process that is thinking and trying to map that out into an effective philosophical model. There are lots of different compositions of different thoughts, and so lots of neologisms will be necessary to map out this new conception; Most of the entries in the Definitions section will be from here. Thoughts are consistent of nodes, each representing a single unit of the metric of thinking. Thoughts are further broken down into two main types; impressodes and lexodes (distinct from leximes and impressions in that leximes and impressions represent single units of a lexicon or of an emotional understanding, whereas lexodes and impressodes represent single units of a thought characterized by being lexical or impressionistic in nature, respectively). Impressodes represent thoughts emerging from emotional understanding (“the right brain”) , where lexodes represent thoughts emerging from logical or analytical understandings (“the left brain”). A thought, then, is typically constructed of a variable arrangement of lexodes and impressodes, and the composition thereof represents the overall impressionism or lexicality of a thought. For example, a thought composed of 5 lexodes and 3 impressodes is technically a lexical thought, but not in the same sense that a thought composed of 8 lexodes and 0 impressodes is. This is the difference between the sorts of thoughts that a very lexical vs a somewhat lexical thinker will have. All of this is metaphorical, of course, no one would argue that they’re literally made up of physical entities called impressodes or lexodes, it’s more so a representation of the way that thoughts can differ in relation to others.
A NOTE ON CULTURE
Since Neurotyping is ultimately a way of analyzing ways of thought, culture, communal philosophy, and society/city of origin naturally has a heavy impact on the way that the brain will think. A brain is a putty that will wrap around its environment and form a newer framework to adapt, and depending on the mold can change the new shape that forms. However this isn’t holistically true. People can grow up in very similar environments and become diametrically opposed regardless. An example of a Linear and Lexical culture is Japan, a workaholic landscape in which upholding certain specific rules and bureaucracy is what 90% of the education system is based around. Any environment like this tends to develop lin-lexes, but especially a culture as uniform and forthright as that of the Japanese.
America is an example of a generally linear society; Emotional understandings are certainly valued, you’re supposed to have a deep respect for the specific history and deep values of your society, but bureaucracy and pure instinct thought are both negatively stigmatized due to America’s individualist, faux meritocratic framework. I would personally put the stereotypical American in somewhere between Level-Headed and Clearsighted; Someone who has some level of understanding and appreciation of the larger systems that organize their society, appreciates their own conception of justice, and the more abstract virtues of American society (again this is for the stereotype, not necessarily reflective of the average American).
Additionally, it should not be discounted that certain cultures, value systems, and communal mindsets can effect and nudge thinkers towards specific neurotypes by punishing (or at the very least not rewarding) types of thought determined to be un-useful to the functioning of society (often any kind of thought that isn’t linear and lexical, as impressionism and laterality both give a level of abstraction from the environment whereas a tyrannical government will often want a person’s mind to revolve around a strictly hierarchical set of rules or structures).
Schools equip new thinkers with many of the cognitive tools that they’ll apply in their every-day lives; Societies and social environments equip individuals with much of the way that individuals go about turning impressions into lexemes. The units of a lexicon also funnels impressions into readily expressible contexts; in that way, language informs the thoughts that are able to be effectively communicated and the depth to which they are enabled to be effectively communicated.
This isn’t to say that a particular society is necessarily a particular Neurotype or quadrant, just that certain kinds of societal structures and lexicons can change the way that people interface with thoughts and communication as they grow, and therefore the information that will be flowing through the minds of thinkers within that given system.
A NOTE ON SUBCULTURE….
Subcultures are way more likely to be divided and compartmentalized into different and more particular types of thought considering they are largely cultures that people organize themselves into, as opposed to just being a group of people who exist in close proximity and under the same set of laws.
The Otaku subculture, for example, which is obsessed with intaking as much anime and manga as possible for the more spreadsheet same-y elements, is a predominantly LatLex culture which can often be intimidating to a less lexical or lateral general public who primarily appreciate animation for its ability to function as a unique mode of visual storytelling, which it certainly is.
The Army promotes a similar kind of mindset to general Japanese life, and is also ultimately encouraging LinLex styles of thought in similar ways.
An example of a Lat-Imp culture is many Occultist circles, wherein “enlightenment” or “spiritual fulfillment” are the main goals.
Jobs also can break down on Neurotype lines; People may prefer jobs which more so utilize their style of thought, or over time their style of thought morphs into what is expected of them by their job, called a neurotendency. Certain types of Neurotypes correspond to certain jobs to some degree. Detective work is usually associated with lexicality, as is science, whereas art is often associated with impressionism. Ultimately, these kinds of environments are going to breed certain neurotypes by virtue of the style of work and the types of people who tend to come into these communities, which is why the stereotype perpetuates and retains a veneer of validity. That’s not to say that having a particular Neurotype precludes some individuals from having certain jobs or lifestyles, but certain types of jobs and certain types of outlooks tend to be more intuitively applicable to people of similar neurotypes (i.e. hippies are seldom lexical).
A NOTE ON FICTION
One of the most useful applications of Neurotyping at least for me personally is in character creation. Having an immediate intuitive understanding of the manner of thought of a character and how that interacts with other elements of their character makes a character immediately feel like more of a real human. Being that communication and action are both downstream from thought, understanding the style and method of thought of the thinker that you wish to create will go a long way.
Although Neurotypes don’t map on cleanly to ‘character archetypes’, they tend to coincide with certain Neurotypes. Most Wizards in stories are Lateral and Lexical. Most Barbarians are Linear and Impressionist. Most stereotypical ‘geniuses’ are Lateral and Lexical. Most artists are stereotypically Lateral and Impressionistic. It can help to understand the mindspace that these characters inhabit, so you can understand the interplay between your characters as well as their dynamics. For example, the following is a list of characters from my personal works and their associated Neurotypes, and how that affects the way I write them into my stories:
Zane, the main character of Death Hopper, is definitively an Analyst. And the way I represent that within the story is through his lexical hyper-cognitive approach to the world, and depicting his racing thoughts and questions within his mind in scenes where it would be applicable, and attempting to make his thoughts fit within a cognitive framework built foundationally on lexemes, walls guiding the rivers of impressions.
CONVERTING FROM MBTI/ENNEAGRAM
Since the two are vaguely in the same ballpark, you’ll often hear the question “Well I’m X MBTI Result, so what does that mean for my Neurotype?”. The answer is.. not very much. There are certainly correlations, strong ones at that, but the MBTI test ultimately has more variables that are outside of Neurotyping’s focal point, such as Introverted v. Extroverted and Prospecting v. Judging. It can be said that Intuiting as opposed to Sensing (N instead of S) tends to correlate with higher laterality, and that Feeling as opposed to Thinking (F instead of T) tends to correlate with higher Impressionism (obviously) neither of these correlations are absolute.
It can be fun to find correlations and to find the most common MBTI results for different Neurotypes and predispositions, but ultimately you’re trying to convert an apple into an orange if you try to directly exchange an MBTI result for a Neurotype.
SECTION 3: THE REAL CONJECTURE
Time to fall into a realm of heavy theory and conjecture, so be warned that this chapter focuses primarily on my personal theories and highlighting the theories of others.
PRIMARY FUNCTIONS AND SUBTYPES
These are the systems I myself have made, so perhaps take them with a bit more of a grain of salt (if you aren’t already ‘grain of salt’-ing). There are several different methods of thought that every person uses, but for the purposes of analysis and metathought, I have broken down some patterns I’ve seen into more specific categories of thought and into different Primary and Secondary Functions and I have further divided those functions into Linear and Lateral functions. A more Lateral person usually uses primarily Lateral functions, and vice versa, though Linear and Lateral people are also capable of using the other’s functions as tools. Thinkers who are not very linear or very lateral tend to use a balance of both types of functions.
Lateral Functions are functions that make use of Laterality Nodes (blue) which apply several different simultaneous thoughts. Put simply, these functions are those which result in several resulting thoughts instead of one continuous train.
Conversely, Linear Functions are functions that make primary use of Spark (green), which is a thought or thing that is being thought about, and derive most of the thought from the momentary mental environment/landmarks. All thought is at some level derived from environmental triggers and causes, but Linear Functions tend to be particularly focused on producing one or few resultant thoughts, often more so based and logically drawing nearly exclusively from the spark and one or a few other elements. For this reason Linear Functions often provide more definitive conclusions at the potential expense of other nuances.
Medium Functions are somewhere in the middle, and sometimes use both Spark and Laterality Nodes.
Lateral Functions include Analytical, Connective, Diasporative, and Parsative. Analytical function represents having several disconnected thought processes revolving around one basis or axis of thought. For example, being in a garden. and consciously processing that the apple is red, the apple is smaller than the rest in the bag, and that the apple looks fresher or newer than the pears upon seeing an apple. Analytical function is one of the more useful and versatile functions, which can produce lots of disconnected observations about a subject or axis of thought, but is limited in connectivity.
Connective function represents the form of laterality which begins with the same Axis as Analytical, but deviates further away from the axis than Analytical would until it hits new ideas. For example, being in a garden, and seeing a red apple, and thinking about how red is the color you associate with blood, it’s the size of a pokeball, it resembles a specific shot of an apple from a tv show, etc. Connective is somewhat of a middle-ground between Analytical and Diasporative.
Diasporative function represents the form of laterality most commonly associated with ADHD alongside Connective; Simultaneously thinking about several completely unrelated things with no axis upon which the thoughts revolve. For example, entering a garden and thinking that an apple is red, the pear is green, the tree is big, that your favorite pokemon is Serperior, and that purple is an objectively superior color to yellow.
Parsative is the most linear of the Lateral functions, in that it produces often a more limited range of resultant thoughts. Parsative thought tends to have several branching thoughts on something similar to Analytical, but the thinker specifically only acts or deeply considers a few of the resultant thoughts. Think of it as picking and choosing what thoughts are good or useful, and making an intentional decision to avoid spending too much time thinking about superfluous things; The roots grow, but are cut off before they sprout.
Medium Functions include Pivot Function, a thought pattern in which a person rides primarily on one train of thought, but then completely jumps ship to another metaphorical train, sometimes seemingly at random. For example, a person enters a garden and spends a while focusing on a specific apple, but then randomly switches to thinking about something completely unrelated.
Linear Functions include Diegetic Function, where the thinker’s continuous train of thought is based on the current moment and environment, and will often form shorter bursts of thought or conclusions when put in a new situation.
Interrogative Function represents when a thinker’s continuous train of thought overrides environmental stimulus. This kind of thought is typically what people tend to think of when people get ‘lost in thought’, in that they are so focused on whatever train they’re currently riding that it overtakes their physical world or physical/environmental stimulus. An example of this would be entering a garden but continuing to think about a movie you watched beforehand.
Intermittent Function represents a mix of Interrogative and Diegetic function, where the thinker tends to keep more of a grip of larger environmental stimulus as an axis for a longer period of time, but is still willing to abandon ship if a new landmark makes an immediate imprint.
DelineationFunction represents a thinker spending a long time on a specific narrow train of thought and then spending a while jumping to a new one.
Corresponding Functions Some functions have similar or corresponding uses and structures to their diametrically opposed counterparts. For example, Delineative and Parsative are similar in that both spend a while mapping out their mental path, but they are different in that Delineation is based in actively attempting to make leaps between trains of thoughts whereas Parsing focuses on snipping unnecessary thoughts in the bud after they’ve already emerged. Put simply, Delineation is the process of evaluating where to go, whereas Parsing is the process of eliminating thoughts to determine where not to go. Lateral functions often replicate similar structures to linear functions, just with more concurrent thoughts and with less straightforward focus. Below are the original graphs I made for Functions:
Figure 4a: Linear Functions
Figure 4b: Medium Function
Figure 4c: Lateral Functions
THE CONSTRICTIVE-GENERATIVE AXIS
The Parsative thought process was defined in the previous section, but it has another meaning; Parsing information, sorting it to try to form conclusions based on the data available to you. For this purpose, the Parsative axis of this spectrum has been renamed to Constrictive thought. On the other end is Generative thought. Where Constrictive thinkers tend to be sorting through information trying to find right answers, Generative thinkers focus on expanding thought outward from a point. Generative thought is definitionally and unintentionally creative; It creates by being. It expands the world around you, extrapolates from ideas, and builds off of your environment. Generative tends to be useful for creative endeavors or in philosophy, where generating thoughts from the environment and generating systems thereof is practical and effective. However, Constrictive is very useful in its own contexts, such as detective work. Generativity is often associated with creativity and humor, but is also with maladaptive daydreaming, unhealthy obsession, and emotional complicatedness which can lead to problems. Constrictive thinking on the other hand, whilst not having the same problems as generative, can lead to viewing everything as a ‘problem’ to be ‘solved’. It can ultimately lead to apathy, trying to make the decision that is ‘correct’ instead of the one that is true to the person, and trying to make a conclusion from something where they may not be one.
Generativity tends to be correlated with laterality, but they’re not in any sense one-to-one. Lateral constrictive thinkers tend to just be putting more variables into their conclusion when analyzing a situation. Generative thought is the variety of thought that tends to lead lateral thinkers to having vast internal landscapes. Generative thought is a double-edged sword; it can cause vast creativity, and allow the thinker to make connections which would otherwise seem opaque to other thinkers, but generative thought can also lead to becoming lost in your mind, or believing your internal mechanisms over the existing world, which can lead to delusions, dissociation, and mood swings. The same applies to Constrictive thought, and is the basis for the “problem-solution” style of thinking which is on the one hand useful in certain scenarios and on the other hand detrimental in other scenarios in which comprehension is more important than determining a conclusion.
Everyone, excluding possibly individuals who are in states of extreme mental illness, bounces between the two of these thinking styles intuitively. Issues arise when one overtakes the other and the balance is disrupted, such as a highly generative thinker ending up thinking that the world they’ve built in their head is better than the real one, or the constrictive thinker turning everything into evidence for some grand conclusion. Extremely unbalanced generative and constrictive thinking is most common in those with Schizophrenia or Schizo-adjacent conditions, piggybacking off of the associations of Schizophrenia with stretching everything to fit a foregone conclusion, and developing a deeply intricate (if lexically nonfalsifiable) worldview.
Ultimately, most thinkers are somewhere in the middle of the two extremes, whereas some people are more so to one end of the spectrum. If you try to make an effort to notice when you’re using constrictive or generative thought, it can be easier to balance the two and not lean too hard into one style of thinking, and can encourage a level of mindfulness within thoughts and actions. Think of the difference between generative and constrictive thought as the difference between expanding outward from thought and contracting inward from thought towards a conclusion.
OUROBORISTA’S CHART
A chart made by Ouroborista, a well-respected member of the community, substitutes the names for complete neologisms. This chart is well-used and respected enough to receive mention, but I find it unintuitive for teaching new people due to the intimidating language. This chart is better in terms of not having any connotations or associations with existing concepts, which is both its biggest weakness in terms of introducing it and making it intuitive to new Neurotypers and its biggest strength in making the chart pure and unaffected by outside connotative associations with language. Think of it as an ‘advanced Neurotyping chart’ option.
SUBTYPES
Subtypes represent the Output to the Input of Neurotype. Phrased differently, Neurotypes are different manners of transportation --- Subtypes are the destination. They represent the way that Neurotypes manifest differently in different people, and exist mostly to expel 1-dimensional stereotypes. Not all people will fit neatly into a Subtype, and some people in a Neurotype may feel completely different than any of the proposed Subtypes. Such is a somewhat inevitable result of any more specific sub-typing, since representing everyone would require a theoretically infinite number of subtypes. These subtypes can at best represent trendlines, and the most common manifestation of each style of thought. Many subtypes which represent the stereotype of the Neurotype simply retain the name of the original Neurotype. The subtypes exist on two axes; External-Internal, and Relaxed-Intense. They will be labeled with E or I, and R or I. For example, EI means external intense, and IR means internal relaxed. There are far more intersections possible here which could account for a larger number of thinkers, but I’ll tentatively leave that to a more rigorous thinker instead of making this book into a Subtyping manual. I’ll provide examples and descriptions of subtypes at the corners, and the remainder will be worked on as I work on a more comprehensive subtyping guide. Some subtypes are passed — meaning they represent the stereotype, and therefore retain the name of the original Neurotype. If you were to describe one of these thinkers, you’d phrase it as either Bookkeeper (pure) or Bookkeeper(BK). Examples include fictional characters mixed in with celebrities.
Bookkeeper subtypes:
- Manualist ER: Often relaxed and advisory, the Manualist applies the by-the-book thought process of a Bookkeeper as a secondary, optional route that can be provided to those around them. As opposed to the stereotype of the bookkeeper, the Manualist doesn’t hold others to the laws that they hold themselves to, nor do they particularly make a fuss if someone doesn’t follow one of what they see as ‘the rules’. Manualists have a firm understanding of the rules and by and large live by and through them, but they keep that understanding mostly to themselves and entertain the more impressionistic and lateral understandings of others in the best way they know how (though often disregarding most of it perceived as nonsense or which cannot be turned into a linear lexical codification). See Brianna Wu, Geoff Thew.
- Structuralist IR: The structuralist is similar to the Manualist in their relaxed attitude, but they have even less of a desire to apply their mode of thought to others, and often keep mostly to themselves. They live a structured, organized life and are okay with that. See
- Enforcer EI: Often frustrated that the outside world is illogical to their understanding, and tries to externalize these thoughts. See Ben Shapiro
- Passed II: Has the same internal frustrations as the Enforcer, but does not make an effort to externalize those thoughts and tends to keep their head down unless provoked. Stereotypical ‘Type-A’ combined with Enforcer leads to an internal dissonance from more lateral or impressionistic thinkers which they keep to themselves. See Mike Pence
Human Calculator Subtypes:
Interfacer ER: The interfacer is similar to the Manualist in that it uses its hyperlexical understanding of the world to navigate through it, but the Interfacer is different in that its conception is more vast and often ranges through more intricacies of specific topics. These are the types to give extensive run-downs on the entire history, make, and model of a vehicle that they find even remotely interesting with the spreadsheet-esque structure of their data-storing brains.
Lexemetician EI: The lexemetician represents the most maligned version of the Human Calculator, the one which lays out the breadth of its hyperlexical understanding for everyone else to see, often imposing that upon the worldviews of others or viewing their worldview as superior due to its higher degree of complication, or its intense lexicality. These types often set out with an attempt to make others see the grand truth, before being crushed by the terrifying revelation that not all humans are as logical or lexically organized as they are.
Formulator IR: The formulator tends to design internal systems or absorb through osmosis that of those around them, and apply that hyperlateral understanding to their life and the problems therein. Often unwilling to seriously consider emotional or imprecise understandings that can’t be put into a lexically coherent argument, but more tolerant of them than other highly lexical thinkers.
Planner II: Stereotypical schemer/manipulator, i.e. palpatine.
Pure Instinct subtypes:
Ignitor EI: Often unconcerned with the momentary feelings of others, and more concerned with making sure that their impressionistic thought is being understood by other thinkers, the Ignitor is the Neurotype most associated with D&D Barbarians and similarly rage-filled characters. Though this rage isn’t necessarily a bad thing, depending on where it’s pointed at.
Guts II: Named after the protagonist of Berserk who is one of the most in-depth depictions of this archetype. Thoughts remain internally oriented but are incredibly intense. These kinds of thinkers tend to stick to themselves until their emotional dust has settled, at which point they will aim forthright in the direction that their intuition points them without taking the time to explain it to others.
Instinctual ER: Instinctual thinkers tend to be akin to the Manualist bookkeeper in that they provide their instinctual arguments and viewpoints as an alternative to the existing positions but not necessarily
Viber IR: Vibers are instinct-based thinkers who follow where their instinct leads them without necessarily caring if others follow their same intuitive path.
Newtype subtypes:
Impression Weaver ER: The rare few Newtypes who manage to retain a level of extroversion and also not be completely crushed by a world that is not exceptionally friendly to the Newtype become Impression Weavers, whose abnormal and indirect expression connect only with more impressionistic thinkers who can pick up what they’re putting down, which causes this kind of thinker to be more difficult to understand for linear-lexicals. That is if they don’t attempt to justify themselves with an endless string of words like a lingual Sisyphus.
Spinner IR: The Spinner is likely the most common sort of Newtype, being sent into introversion by their environment making it difficult for these types to connect to others who don’t share their hyper-specific or hyper-impressionistic worldview.
Maverick EI: Unapologetic about challenging the edges and ends of linear-lexical ideas, the Maverick provides an intense juxtaposition with linearly defined rules and ideas.
Laintype II: Often left to marinate in their own intense inner world and complex set of emotions, these Newtypes forsake the world and often resort to showing instead of telling those feelings to others, for better or for worse (typically worse). These types can often become excellent musicians or artists who channel their frustration and pain into their work.
DEFINITIONS
Lexode: A thought node constructed of lexemes.
Lexeme: Elements of a lexicon.
Lexicon: A list of symbols which can be used to shape thought in a more orderly and structured manner.
Lexical: (of a thought, adj.) Constructed of lexemes;
(of a person, adj.) A person whose thoughts are primarily consistent with Lexodes, or who constructs thoughts using lexemes first and Impressions emerge from there.
Impressode: A thought node constructed of Impressions.
Impressions: An intuitive understanding of something which is not lexically oriented.
Impressionist(ic): (of a thought, adj.) Constructed of impressions;
(of a person, adj.) A person whose thoughts are primarily consistent with Impressodes, or who constructs thoughts using impressions first and lexemes emerge from there.
Lexically Pure: A lexically constructed thought which is unaffected by impressions.
Impressionistically Pure: An impressionistically constructed thought which is unaffected by lexemes.
VISUAL GUIDES (IF NECESSARY)
Suppose that all of the possible information in the brain and environment that could be thought about in a moment is represented by the diagram. The nodes (grey circles) are being used to represent individual things, objects, thoughts, or actions that can be focused on or actively thought about.
This graph is made for the sake of illustrating a point and is not anywhere close to on scale:
Figure 5: Mindscape
A more linear person is going to focus in more on a specific thing or idea, and their thought at a given moment is likely to look like this:
Figure 5B: Linear Thought
This graph represents what a largely linear thinker’s focus looks like. And while they’re thinking about it, the nodes outside of their red circle are likely only going to be viewed by how they connect to the few nodes that they are currently focused on. Finding connections between nodes tends to be more direct, as linear people tend to view things as being more separate from each other.
4C: Median Thought
This graph represents, then, what someone in the middle of linearity and laterality would focus on; A few things are being actively focused on and processed at once, such that they can maintain focus and do some level of mental multi-tasking, but not so much that it disrupts them in everyday life, makes them get too bogged down in analysis paralysis, or causes them to make large connections or jumps between nodes.
Figure 4D: Lateral Thought
This graph represents largely lateral people, who are at once processing lots of disparate information and relating them to each other in ways that are unintuitive for a more linear thinker. These kinds of people tend to get bogged down in analysis paralysis or have lots of conflicting feelings about things, but are also good at finding connections others may not see.
Figure 6: Extraordinary Graph
This chart represents extraordinary laterality vs extraordinary linearity; The majority of people are likely not as linear as the extraordinary linearity. The extraordinary laterality graph is a bit more realistic, but still definitely outside of the bell curve that is typical for most people.
Given that the chart trends somewhat towards linearity, here would be my guess as to the average person’s level of laterality:
Figure 6A: The Median
Lexical Thinkers’ preferred mode of thought is often (where red dot is an impression/intuition):
Figure 7A: Lexeme to Word
Whereas an Impressionist’s preferred modes of thought may look more like
Figure 7B: Impression to Word
Naturally, someone who is in the middle of Lexical and Impressionist will have a mix and match of these preferred kinds of thought, though if they are on the left or right they will tend to have more of their side’s preferred thought patterns.
SECTION 4: CONCLUSION
FUTURE PLANS
After this Manual releases, I plan to follow up with a manual on Subtypes and Functions specifically, as well as an extensive document detailing the interview process, insights I’ve gained in the process, as well as a list of quotes and references as to the strength and weaknesses of the typology systems as well as comparing it to other systems. More content related to Neurotyping is to be expected, as well as the completion of my long-term fiction projects.
FURTHER READING
As I said in the Prologue, I’m absolutely not the end-all in terms of knowledge of this subject. I’d contend that I’m unusually educated and invested in the theorycrafting of this study, but if you want to research more about this subject, here are some recommended links:
