embrace the paradox

I’m such a sucker for personality, intelligence and other (pseudo-)psychological tests, and Vernon has just drawn my attention to yet another (choose the link for “Do you use your left or right hemisphere more?”).

My results:

Your Brain Usage Profile

Auditory : 53%
Visual : 46%
Left : 44%
Right : 55%

Thom, you show a slight right-hemisphere dominance with a moderate
preference for auditory processing, an unusual and somewhat paradoxical
combination of characteristics.

You are drawn to a random and sometimes nonchalant synthesis of material. You learn as it seems important to a specific situation, and might even
develop a resentment of others who attempt to direct your learning down a
specific channel.

Your right-hemispheric dominance provides a structure that is only loosely
organized and one which processes entire swatches of reality, overlooking
details. You are emotional in your reactions and perceptual more than
logical in your approach, although you can impose structure and a language
base when necessary.

Your auditory preference, on the other hand, implies that you process
information sequentially and unidimensionally. This combination of
right-brain and auditory modes creates conflict, as you want to process data
more rapidly than your natural processes allow.

Your tendency to be creative and free-flowing is accompanied by sufficient
ability to organize and be logical, allowing you a reasonable degree of
success in a number of different endeavors. You take in information
methodically and systematically which can then be synthesized rapidly. In
this manner, you manage to function consistently well, although certainly
less efficiently than you desire.

You prefer the abstract and are a theoretician at heart while retaining the
ability to be practical. You find the symbolism in a great deal of what you
encounter and are something of a “mystic.”

With regards to your lifestyle, you have the mentality which would be good
as a philosopher, writer, journalist, or instructor, or possibly as a
systems designer or social worker. Perhaps most important is your ability to
“listen to your inner voice” as a mode of skipping over unnecessary steps to
achieve your goals.

This feels like rather a good fit to the way I view and interact with the world and, not surprisingly, my brain usage profile again is described as having “an unusual and somewhat paradoxical combination of characteristics.” Words to this effect seem to pop up in most of my testing and personality assessments. I suppose that means I’m unique, complex and challenging, or perhaps just a mixed-up, screwed-up mess.

This was a particularly interesting test, albeit I have no assurance of any real validity, other than the fact that it feels “right” (and there’s that “perceptual more than logical” bent right there). For each question, there’s no right or wrong answer–rather, each choice corresponds to either left- or right-brain dominance, and either auditory or visual processing, or a neutral orientation to one or the other–so it was interesting to see how I wrestled with choosing the “best” for me, when I could come up with a rationale in each instance for any of the responses.