Extroverts and exercise: how personality affects our approach to the gym
Age: Genetically hardwired since ancient times.
Appearance: Well, that depends on your personality.
My personality is 'enjoys cake'. That doesn't sound very scientifically thorough, but it's a start. Do you enjoy exercise?
On the basis that I'm not a masochist, no, of course not. Interesting. And why is that?
Well, what if I'm at the gym and all the big men look at me? In that case I have good news and bad news. The good news is that you fit an established archetype. A study has determined that people with higher levels of neuroticism are less likely to exercise regularly.
Tell me more about this study. University College London invited 132 volunteers to follow an eight-week exercise course, with questionnaires to fill in about their enjoyment levels.
Who doesn't love a sweaty questionnaire? After that, they had their personalities assessed to see if they generally exhibited signs of extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism or openness.
And all the neurotics hated the exercise? Kind of. All the neurotics felt shy about exercising in front of other people, and preferred to do light workouts in short bursts away from everyone.
What about the others? Those who scored highly in extroversion loved high-intensity training such as weightlifting or spin classes.
Finally, a scientific explanation for why spin classes are so obnoxious. However, they didn't have the best overall fitness. That went to those who scored highly in conscientiousness, because they possessed a better understanding of the long-term benefits of regular exercise.
Aside from underlining how awful extroverts are, what's the point of all this? Well, it's understood that exercise is good for you. But perhaps the reason why people don't do it is because they're picking the wrong exercise for their personality type. When was the last time you went to the gym?
Several years ago. There were lots of big men, and potentially some of them were aware of my existence. So that isn't the right exercise type for your personality. What if you bought some resistance bands and worked out at home every morning?
Yeah, maybe I'd stick to that. There we go. And you should, especially if you consider yourself neurotic. The study showed that, of all the five main personality types, neurotics were the only group who experienced a significant reduction of stress after exercise.
So exercise might make me less neurotic? It's certainly a possibility. And who knows, if you really start enjoying it, you might even become a little bit of an extrovert.
I'm going back to bed. I suppose that's understandable.
Do say: 'I should pick a workout that matches my personality.'
Don't say: 'I hear that cowering at the state of the world burns a ton of calories.'
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