T
hink about the last time you
interrupted someone during
class. I won’t judge. Was it
because they were taking too long to
finish their thought? Did you think of a
better argument and decide to jump in?
Were you simply asking them to speak
louder?
Now, think about the last time
someone interrupted you. Did it bother
you? Did you want to call them out, but
were too afraid to speak up? When you
tried to speak again, did you forget what
you were going to say?
If the first set of questions resonated
with you more, it’s possible you’re an
extrovert. If the second set of questions
felt truer to you, it’s possible you’re
an introvert. Though you might think
you’re fully an “ambivert,” a mixture of
these two traits, you probably do lean
toward one side or another. It depends
on if you get your energy from alone
time or social interaction.
For me, I’ve always been more
introverted. My parents caught onto
this early in my childhood, though I
admit it was pretty obvious — while
my brother’s biggest fear was the dark,
mine was talking to adults. But who
could blame me? Every distant relative
and family friend would tower over me,
ask how old I was and expect me to say
something cute or witty. I usually gave
one-word answers and avoided eye
contact. During holidays and dinner
parties, I always had to escape to my
room for a few minutes alone after every
hour of socializing.
Growing up, I spent most of my
time in my bedroom. Knowing this,
my parents wouldn’t send me to my
room as a punishment and instead told
me to sit on the stairs as a “time-out.”
It was agony, so close to the safety of
my room yet completely vulnerable to
interacting with anyone who decided
to walk past me. It was forced social
interaction. Maybe the possibility of
this punishment was why I was so well-
behaved.
As I’ve gotten older, the amount
of forced interactions has grown
exponentially. I can’t live peacefully in
my room anymore: I have to finish my
extracurriculars, group projects and
presentations before I can have my
alone time. Adulthood is beginning to
feel like one big networking event.
Like most introverts, I find myself
deciding if I should over-exert myself
at social events or stay at home and
disappoint people by canceling on them.
It’s a fine line because, even when I do
socialize, I’m often interrupted or not
taken seriously because I don’t speak
much. When I stay in my bedroom for
the night, my friends think I don’t want
to spend time with them. There seems
to be no right answer.
In her book, “Quiet: The Power
of
Introverts
in
a
World
that
Can’t
Stop
Talking,”
author
and
psychologist Susan Cain traces our
extrovert-centric culture to the early
20th century, when Dale Carnegie and
other businessmen began their ascent
to success through public speaking and
sales. As consumerism grew, the more
our culture shifted toward selling the
appearance of a product, which quickly
translated into personality as well.
While smaller businessmen and
farmers once valued “inner quality”
over “outer quality,” when louder
personalities entered the scene with
bigger voices and bigger ideas, they
took hold and became mainstream. As
companies grew, the American ideal for
success matched their faces: it doesn’t
matter what you’re selling, it’s how you
sell it — and if you sell yourself well,
you’ll be successful.
Today, our society is centered around
this ideal, so identifying as one of the
quiet ones isn’t exactly something
to call attention to. Many introverts
find themselves “pretending” to be
extroverts, as I have done in my time
working in corporate America, waiting
for the release of alone time in the
bathroom between meetings or on my
commute home.
Though this extrovert norm may
feel natural in the United States,
other
cultures
don’t
all
function
like ours — other nations have more
introverted norms like independence,
while the United States is among the
most extrovert-centric. Open floor
plans, required participation grades and
large social circles fuel our capitalist
society, equating sociability and stage
presence with success.
In her book, Cain goes on to cite the
University of Michigan Ross School
of Business and its push toward group
projects and constant collaboration to
promote extrovert tendencies. She calls
this idea the “New GroupThink,” or the
mainstream preference of collaborative
work over individual work. She goes
on to mention that solitude can be
the clearest path to efficiency and
innovation, particularly pointing to the
top computer scientists, musicians and
college students who always prioritize
working individually. Still, business
schools are weaving social skills into
their degree requirements, taking a cue
from Carnegie and other businesspeople
of his time. (For the record, I’ve been
searching for years and still have never
met an introvert in Ross. Let me know if
you find one. I want to talk.)
Though it may not be to the same
extent, the rest of the University sets
itself up as an extroverted school where
the “Leaders and the Best” — or maybe
“loudest and the best” is more fitting
— are constantly connecting.
Students are heavily encouraged
to go to office hours and may find
themselves without letters of
recommendation if they are too
socially anxious to do so. Grades
will suffer if students do not
speak up frequently during class.
As I’ve written about before in
The Daily, career fairs are often
framed as mandatory and the
only way to find a job post-grad.
In a place where many students
feel like they’re not doing
enough, introverts face the same
pressures but often have less
social energy to keep up with
everyone else.
To an extrovert, the introvert’s
dilemma may be a simple fix.
“Can’t you just go up to someone
and start talking to them?”
they might ask, or “Shouldn’t
everyone get a rush from going
to a party?” This might be a good
time to point out that people
don’t “choose” to be an introvert;
as Cain cites in her book, it’s
been psychologically proven that
acetylcholine is more active in
introverts’ brains, which gives
them pleasure from remaining
calm and focusing on one thing
for a long time. To contrast,
dopamine is more active in
extroverts’
brains
which
provides the motivation to seek
external rewards like earning
money and climbing the social ladder.
Cain also points out the contrasting
effects of these neurotransmitters on the
brain: Introverts are more likely to share
private information online because of
the removed social cues. Extroverts
are often more impulsive. Introverted
babies are often the ones that cry,
not
extroverts,
because
they’re
more reactive and have a lower threshold
for stimuli. Other species have introverts
and extroverts that find specific
habitats to suit their personality, such as
“sitter” fruit flies that tend to stay in one
place and “rover” fruit flies that tend to
explore more.
Curious about the effects of this
personality difference on the University
community, I met with four students
who identify as introverts, each at
various points in their college careers,
and asked about how they’re managing
to thrive despite the pressures of hustle
culture.
I
n early March, just a week
before
classes
were
moved
online, I met with LSA senior
Alexandra Niforos (she/her) at the
Michigan League. She was sitting by
herself doing work in Maizie’s Kitchen
& Market before I arrived. As an
executive producer for MUSKET, the
largest student-run musical theatre
organization on campus, she had been
working nonstop for the past few
weeks preparing for their upcoming
production. I imagine her Google
Calendar was completely filled with
meetings and rehearsals.
Based on her schedule, you might not
have guessed Niforos is an introvert. In
fact, she even chose her major, English,
based on its level of introversion,
recognizing that her need for alone time
conflicted with her love for musical
theatre.
“I actually wanted to apply to SMTD,
but decided not to because I don’t thrive
in performance,” she said. “That world
is too extroverted for me, so I like
dictating things from the administrative
side (through MUSKET).”
Though Niforos is often energized by
spending time with friends or producing
a show, she always reaches a limit with
these interactions. Some situations may
be quicker to exhaust her than others,
but she always hits a point when she
needs to go home.
“Ideally, I would spend 50 percent of
my time alone,” she said. “But I never
get that.”
When I asked why not, she scoffed,
“Because I do a million and one things!”
Niforos lamented the pressure of
being successful in college, which
includes going to classes (although
she has purposefully never taken a
course that includes the phrase “group
project” in the description) and having
an impressive resume. She does enjoy
being productive and made clear that
she only involves herself in what she’s
passionate about, but even her passions
leave her in desperate need of alone
time. Yet, it’s difficult to clear the time
in her day for it.
“I don’t know, it just seems selfish
to prioritize (solitude),” she said. “It’s
hard to say that I need an hour at home
because that’s not socially acceptable.
I just feel this pressure all the time to
adapt to a world that doesn’t fit (my)
personality style and the way of being
my best self.”
To
cope
with
the
pressure,
Niforos said she does spend equal
time recovering after intense social
interaction. For example, by taking
a week off after an intensive week
finishing a MUSKET production.
Sanjay Das (he/him), a U-M alumnus
with a degree in biomolecular science
and current medical student at Central
Michigan
University,
expressed
a
similar sentiment to Niforos in needing
equal recovery time to interaction time.
“If I go through a period of
extrovertedness,
I
then
have
to
go
through
a
phase
of
introvertedness,” Das told The
Daily in a phone interview.
“I do prefer to be more in an
introverted
zone,
because
every day I feel like I have
only a certain amount of social
battery charge.”
As a freshman at the
University, Das did what many
introverts
would
probably
avoid — he joined Beta Theta
Pi, a social fraternity. Rather
than being burned out by
constant social interaction,
however, Das noted that the
fraternity helped him make
friends as an introvert.
“Actually, the only thing
that made the University
bearable was Beta Theta Pi,”
he said.
Throughout
his
time
as a pre-med student, Das
constantly felt the need to be
productive, which conflicted
with his introversion and left
him feeling burned out.
“I just thought, ‘I have
to take this extra class or
stay extra hours in the lab
just to put myself in a more
advantageous place for when
I apply to medical school,’” he
said.
Now in medical school, he’s
hoping to become a surgeon or
incorporate research into his
career to make more time for solitude
within his work.
Though Das has found great success
through his introversion, he also
believes
extroversion
is
necessary
for the medical field and often finds
himself assuming those who are social
are the most successful. He noted his
University experience would have been
easier had he not been introverted.
“If I were an extrovert, I wouldn’t
have avoided stuff because it was too
far out of my comfort zone,” he said.
“I think I would have gotten more out
of U-M, since I felt shell-shocked with
everything that was going on.”
Parker
Kehrig
(they/them),
an
LSA sophomore studying sociology
and women’s studies, is also dealing
with a University culture that values
productivity and extroversion. Kehrig
and I are from the same competitive
hometown, Grosse Pointe, so I related
to a lot of their points. Our interview
in the Shapiro Undergraduate Library
ended up being a lot louder than one
would expect from two introverts.
“I just think there’s a certain amount
of extroversion that’s expected here,
with an emphasis on networking and
party culture,” they said. “There’s
this idea at ‘top-tier’ universities that
everyone has to be running all the
time and if you’re not running, you’re
failing ... If you don’t pass out, you’re not
working hard enough.”
Kehrig pointed out the relationship
between this productivity mindset and
capitalism, which leads one to think
that missing out on anything is turning
down a valuable opportunity. Because
Kehrig wants to get into graduate school
and make a living wage, they said they
have to buy into this mindset somewhat
and load up their schedule.
When asked about their schedule
this semester, they responded, “I’m
taking 16 credits, working at Spectrum
Center, helping with a UROP project
about criminalization confinement, and
participating in the Telluride House.”
As a result, there are times when the
fear of missing out, or FOMO, keeps
Kehrig from getting enough alone
time to recharge. They also experience
anxiety,
which
exacerbates
their
introverted tendencies and often makes
it difficult to focus in public spaces.
“If I wasn’t so anxious, maybe I
would be more extroverted,” they said.
“Sometimes I do have to leave a function
when I’m not in the right headspace, but
I also can’t cancel … (because) I have
FOMO.”
Kehrig still made it clear that they
love spending time with people and
making new friends, they just need to
balance their social life with their alone
time to avoid becoming overwhelmed.
Trevor McCarty (he/him), a graduate
student in the School for Environment
and Sustainability (SEAS) who received
his
bachelor’s
in
Biopsychology,
Cognition and Neuroscience, mirrored
similar feelings as Kehrig in his
sociability. McCarty reached out to
me a few months ago to respond to
my first Daily article about introversion,
recognizing the similarities between us,
and I was intrigued by his confidence
in cold-emailing a stranger. We met at
Amer’s Delicatessen for an interview in
early March.
McCarty reiterated that introversion
doesn’t mean you don’t like being
around people, it means you need a
recuperation period afterward because
it takes energy.
“People
think
introversion
is
synonymous with shyness and there
are probably correlations, but it’s
not the same thing,” he said. “I’m
very expressive with my friends.
And I actually do really well in both
collaborative and individual learning
spaces, I think learning with people is
better.”
McCarty compared the introversion
and extroversion of his undergraduate
program with his graduate program,
which offered him different outlets for
socializing.
“BCN is so big that you can just be a
fly on the wall — I just went to class then
came home and did my homework,” he
said. “SEAS is much smaller than most
undergrad programs and lends itself
to people socializing outside of class.
Being an extrovert is definitely better
there because you can connect easier
with a wider variety of people.”
McCarty
is
studying
climate
adaptation and resilience, focusing on a
framework that will allow communities
to adapt in the face of climate change.
Because McCarty is so passionate about
his work, he said that it’s easy to talk to
people who are interested in the same
thing as him, even though big program
events can be draining.
McCarty has never been ashamed
of his introversion and rather sees it
as a way to find “the spaces that make
(him) feel the most (himself).” Because
of his positive outlook on introversion,
McCarty wishes others valued it more.
“As a child, I felt like I had to get out
of my shyness, like I was thrown into
the water and couldn’t swim,” he said.
“That seems wrong … We need to have
a society where extroversion is not seen
as the default, where we cultivate the
kind of value that can be gained from
introverts.”
Wednesday, April 1, 2020 // The Statement
4B
5B
Wednesday, April 1, 2020 // The Statement
BY HANNAH BRAUER, STATEMENT COLUMNIST
The quiet revolution: introverts at U-M
Read more at
MichiganDaily.com
ILLUSTRATION BY MICHELLE FAN