Gender Difference

In my everyday life, how much interaction do I have with others whose positionalities are substantially different from my own? How much of my interaction is socially homogenous?

Personally I don't have much interaction with people very different from myself. Most of my friends and acquaintances have similar interests to mine as well as coming from similar social, educational, cultural, financial, etc, backgrounds.

In the university setting this is especially true. Most of the people I interact with at school are white women in their early to mid 20's, having similar living arrangements, goals, and interests.

When I was out of school for a period of a few years I entered the working world, and during that time I interacted with a much more diverse cross section of society. However, I didn't become close personal friends with many of these people, although I did feel that I reached a broader understanding of human experience during this time.

When reading about the Myers-Briggs personality types 'extroverted' and 'introverted' I learned that extroverted people can more easily have a diverse group of friends. They can more easily tailor their own personality to fit the group of people they happen to be interacting with at any given time. They are more likely to have groups of friends that don't necessarily interact with eachother, often having not much in common except for the extroverted friend.

Introverted people tend to have a smaller more tight-nit group of friends that all know each other, and when they are introduced to one another are more at ease to converse about their similar interests.Of course most people are a mix of both extroverted and introverted, (extremes are indicative of a personality disorder).

In genneral most people do have a certain group of people who they identify with most strongly and consider to be their closest friends. These people are less likely to be very different from each other. However, the natural tendency to gravitate to those that we can relate to most easily, can be limiting to ones education, understanding of the world, and to ones ability to function in it.

It will take thoughtful effort and genuine curiosity to put myself in situations where I get to interact with people outside of my 'comfort zone.'