#JunkMeme: The Power of Quiet People
A Newsletter from Dr. Jake Tuber
You may have come across my #JunkMeme commentary directly on Linkedin, wherein I expose a meme that has been making the rounds but doesn’t deserve its virality.
This particular #junkmeme has been so prolific that it deserves its own thorough critique. It has been everywhere of late. It drives me bonkers.
A few caveats before I am unflinchingly harsh:
First, I’m generally in favor of the spirit of this meme. Much of modern work rewards the talkers. So I’m all for reconceptualizing how we interact to get the most out of everyone. A Cheat Sheet that calls this out is probably doing more good than harm.
Second, and to that end, this Cheat Sheet does have a few good practical pieces of advice. Many of the ‘7 Tips for Leaders to Empower Quiet Talent’ are worthwhile and I would recommend them! Offering prep time, smaller meetings, and creating quiet working spaces are all worthy practices.
It’s unfortunate that they’re buried beneath a lot of junk.
A big problem with this meme is that it fully conflates quietness with Introversion. The two are not the same. Merriam Webster defines introversion as:
“The state of or tendency toward being predominantly concerned with and obtaining gratification from one's own mental life: a personality trait or style characterized by a preference for or orientation to one's own thoughts and feelings.”
Now, you’d expect there to be significant overlap between people who are more inwardly-focused (introverts) and those appear to be Quiet People, and you’d be right! There is evidence that introverts are more likely to be quieter than extroverts. But introverts and quiet people not the same thing. Introversion is an actual dimension of a genetically-driven Big Five Personality Trait. Quietness is a common behavior.
This immediately becomes problematic. Remember, the meme is called “The Power of Quiet People", not the “Power of Introverts'.
(Side Note: I suspect – though I have no proof of this – that the meme is titled this way because to call it the “Power of Introverts” would be too-closely a rip-off of the 2012 Bestseller “Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking”, from which many of the ideas in this meme are related…)
A centerpiece of the meme uses INTROVERT as a very superficial acronym to claim that introverts are: Insightful, Nurturing, Thoughtful, Reflective, Observant, Visionary, Engaged, Reserved, and Tranquil.
The trouble is that, at best, there is mixed evidence for each of these characteristics being linked to introversion. And in some case a preliminary review of peer-reviewed literature suggest data that is outright contradictory.
I conducted a basic search for each adjective and its relationship to introversion:
Insightful: There is some evidence that introverts may be more insightful in certain contexts.
Nurturing: There does not seem to be evidence to suggest that someone who is introverted is any more likely to be nurturing.
Thoughtful: An aggregated analysis of four papers suggests that “introverts may often be more thoughtful than extroverts, as they tend to be more conscientious, successful in academics due to concentrated thought processes, and have a positive correlation with thinking.” That makes intuitive sense and is apparently not just face-valid.
Reflective: In some ways yes, in some ways no. This is probably quite hard to measure. There is actually evidence that extroverts do appear to have higher self-awareness which presupposes some reflection, albeit just self-reflection.
Observant: The evidence is thin however at present is seems like the opposite is true: extroverts are more likely to be observant than introverts!
Visionary: There is no meaningful evidence that introverts are any more visionary than anyone else. My guess is that the meme author just needed a positive-sounding word that started with the letter “V” to fit the acronym. V is a tough letter for acronyms.
Engaged: There is no solid evidence to support the idea that introverts are more engaged.
Reserved: Unsurprisingly, introverts are more likely to be reserved than extroverts. Almost by definition. So yes, this one is legit. However, there are many circumstances in which Reserved is not always a positive characteristic (the Hogan Development Survey highlights Reserved as a possible derailer), so its inclusion in this pro-introvert meme is interesting.
Tranquil: In a similar vein, there is a link between introverts and tranquility.
Some of these do have mild correlation with introversion… which means they are also, by association, correlated with ‘Quiet People’. But many do not! And thus, the core problem here is that while we might expect a ‘Quiet Person’ to be more thoughtful, reflective, nurturing, etc., those characteristics really have nothing to do with introversion or ‘quietness’!
Think about it practically: you probably know plenty of Quiet People that are hardly people you would describe visionary, engaged, or insightful.
Or consider the opposite: You probably know plenty of highly-extroverted people who are extremely reflective, observant, insightful, nurturing, engaged, etc.
There is just no guarantee whatsoever that a given Quiet Person will have more of these characteristics than a Loud Person! And that is the fundamental issue with this meme: just because someone is quiet has almost no relationship to these other qualities.
This continues in the ‘Strengths of Quiet People’ section. Just because someone is quiet does not mean they are any of the eight strengths listed. Are all quiet people innately deep thinkers, empathetic leaders, focused workers, effective listeners, calm under pressure, observant (yes, Observant appears here again, which is a clear indicator of the need-to-fill-space aspect of this meme), independent, and prudent? Of course not.
Once again – you can probably name plenty of extroverts (and an equal number of introverts, too, to be sure) that embody these strengths.
The meme is all over the place. Conflating concepts when convenient, reusing ideas when convenient, and taking face-valid associations (quiet people = thoughtful) for scientific fact. While we might casually use these adjectives interchangeably in everyday conversation, creating a Cheat Sheet that attempts to distill evidence-based research should actually rely on evidence and research.
This meme was made to go viral on LinkedIn. And I’m not against the underlying idea! But in attempting to oversimplify complex concepts it reifies a lot of sloppy thinking that we could do without. #junk.