According to Project Evolove’s Instincts Theory, there is a very interesting theory relating to the idea of “instincts”. According to them, there are 3 types of “instincts”, secure, social and sexual. These three instincts can create dual combinations that manifest with qualities of the two instincts, creating up to six different combinations.

The Instincts

According to the summaries of each instinct, this is the information listed:

Secure

Those with the Secure Primary Instinct are concerned with “nesting and nurturing.” They are focused on protecting the self, ensuring that its physical needs, comfort, health, and self-sufficiency are met. They are keenly aware of their environment, such as its temperature, safety, and cleanliness. They are inclined to make their surroundings healthy and comfortable. They need personal space and privacy, even with their loved ones.

Sexual

Those with the Sexual Primary Instinct are devoted to transmitting something meaningful to future generations, whether it is their genes or their ideas. It also means they wish to become “one” with another entity, which they achieve by seeking intense, original experiences that fully engage them. This tendency manifests as their intense desire to form intimate, one-on-one connections with people and as their passionate pursuit of hobbies and interests. Without satisfying these desires, they feel incomplete.

Social

Those with the Social Primary Instinct seek to adapt themselves to meet the needs of their groups or communities. They are very generous with their time and often sacrifice their own needs to advance the group’s priorities. They wish to increase their inclusion and status within a group, for they see their social status as a marker of their level of contribution. They enjoy being involved in other people’s lives. Quick to see people’s positions and relationships, they can navigate the social circle to obtain protection and influence.

Now how can we apply this new information in the context of what we already know?

In the context of MBTI, being secure-sexual or social-secure or any of those other combination would explain the huge differences between personality types that are the same, excluding factors such as age, development and environment. The sexual-social INTJ would be heavily invested in imprinting their passions onto the world in a way that will offer them social recognition while the sexual-secure INTJ would look deep within themselves to find inspirational value that others can’t help but be attracted too.

In the context of a person being “hot” or “cool”, this may also be a way to describe how these differences are manifested. A “hot” person may in fact have a sexual instinct variant vs a “cold” person who has a secure instinct variant.

Also, this may explain why some people with a certain MBTI type can seem amazing to us while another person with the same MBTI type can be unbearable to us. It could very well be possible that the social-secure ESFP annoys the sexual-secure INTP because of how inauthentic they may seem vs a sexual-social ESFP who the INTP feels is “being more true to themselves”.

Project Evolove implies that these instincts develop from our innate sexual natures. This would also imply that our sexual natures are separate from that of our personality types that would be measured by MBTI and enneagram, but is somewhat influenced by our MBTI type. This could also bring up the question on whether our sexual instinct types influence our MBTI or enneagram personality types, or whether it is the other way around.

If you’d like to read more about this idea, check it out here at this website, which also happens to be a dating site too revolving around MBTI and similar ideas.