Differences between Personality Traits and Personality Types

Kevin Lilly holds a master of business administration in international management from the American Graduate School of International Management. A former senior vice president at MiMedx in Marietta, Georgia, Kevin Lilly supervised the recruitment and retention of the sales department's top talent. He is interested in topics such as personality profiling.

Although personality traits and personality types are often assumed to be the same, they are not the same thing. While personality traits are distinguished behavior patterns, a personality type is a collection of various personality traits. Put more simply, personality traits make up the personality type.

Personality types are a more holistic description of people's behaviors, while personality traits are more specific descriptions. To better appreciate the difference between the two, personality types could be seen as the climate, while personality traits are the specific weather elements. Personality types can only be evaluated over a long time, while personality traits can be observed within a short time.

Although there are many theories about personality types and traits, there is a consensus on the characteristics that describe people's personalities. Some of these traits are agreeableness, openness, and introversion or extroversion. It is the combination of these traits that result in personality types such as sanguine, melancholic, or phlegmatic.

According to Myer Briggs theory, it is possible for individuals to predominantly exhibit a particular personality type and still display signs of other personality types. It is equally important for individuals to know that while certain personality types are better suited to certain tasks, none is superior to the other.