{"id":23521,"date":"2014-02-20T06:00:56","date_gmt":"2014-02-20T14:00:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/?p=23521"},"modified":"2024-04-15T17:39:46","modified_gmt":"2024-04-15T21:39:46","slug":"conflict-and-jungs-thinkerfeeler-struggle-in-relationships","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.goodtherapy.org\/blog\/conflict-and-jungs-thinker-feeler-struggle-in-relationships-0220144","title":{"rendered":"Conflict and the Thinker\/Feeler Struggle in Relationships"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"GoodTherapyThe thinking\/feeling dichotomy was first connected to individual differences in psychological types (personalities) by Carl Jung<\/a>. It is used in the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator<\/a>\u2019s personality typology and addresses natural differences in how individuals make decisions and experience emotions<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It is also the cause of a great deal of tension<\/a> and conflict for couples that naturally differ on this dichotomy.<\/p>\n

The terms used for descriptive purposes here can be misleading. For instance, someone with a feeling<\/i> response orientation is not inherently more able to feel or less able to think than someone with a thinking <\/i>response orientation; and someone with a thinking<\/i> orientation is not inherently more able to think or less able to feel than someone with a feeling<\/i> orientation (Reinhold, 2007).<\/p>\n

These terms are used to address fundamental differences in the perceptual and experiential processes automatically triggered when thinking- and feeling-response-oriented individuals are sorting out and expressing what they are thinking and feeling. (Please note that this interpretation differs significantly from those of Carl Jung and the authors of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator.)<\/p>\n

Although human beings are aware that people differ in how they come to conclusions and experience and express emotions, few understand that these differences in self-expression are driven by innately different perceptual and experiential frames of reference. Of particular note is a fundamental difference in the experience of emotions when conflicts arise—a difference of such magnitude that role<\/a>-reversal comprehension is not possible. These differences are a constant in interactions between thinking and feeling individuals, easily confirmed by observation of one\u2019s personal and professional relationships.

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Those with thinking response orientation:<\/p>\n