| Primary Functions (Strengths and Motivations) | Shadow Functions (Sources of stress) |
| Ingrained: Introverted Thinking (Ti) | Extraverted Thinking (Te) |
| Associative: Extraverted Intuition (Ne) | Introverted Intuition (Ni) |
| Exploratory: Introverted Sensing (Si) | Extraverted Sensing (Se) |
| Regulatory: Extraverted Feeling (Fe) | Introverted Feeling (Fi) |
The ITN is always looking to gain a better understanding of the world and forming internal models that is consistent with the world he or she occupies. A fresh internal model is formed every time new information presents itself and then it is revisited often to make sure it is consistent with existing understanding. New information is gathered by looking for new patterns in daily experiences. Looking for and forming new patterns is one of the most interesting activities for ITN as well as the most preferred way of interacting with the world.
ITN’s exploratory is made up of Si. Which means ITN’s maps of do’s and don’ts are strongly inscribed in memory. When ITN encounters a new problem or information, it is quickly compared with all past experiences of similar sort and best strategy, which is often made of logic and intuition, is picked. When a strategy involving logic and intuition cannot be picked, the ITN mostly sets it aside and hence routine maintenance tasks might be avoided again and again, making ITN incapable of addressing these type of tasks. So the exploratory of ITN works in a way to pick working strategies from memory as well as pushing routine tasks into oblivion.
Regulatory of ITN is made up of Fe, which is used to fine tune the other functions in a way that is admirable. Here Fe is not used as a function on its own, so doesn’t help in empathy or understanding people’s intentions, but works merely to tweak other functions in order to be a bit more people oriented. The ITN does this by picking a noble cause or a difficult theoretical problem where his abilities can be quite useful as well as can bring fame or reputation upon completion. However, after ITN solves the difficult parts, the fun in intuiting and discovering them goes away and might find it difficult to complete the project.
The ITN finds it difficult to execute tasks that are theoretically significant or lacking in novelty. He generally also has issues with aggrandization and has a rebellious and independent nature, making him hard to be part of a team which doesn’t have a tailor made role for him. He has problems with maintenance type of tasks and also in recognizing and providing empathy. But his gifts in understanding logic and detecting patterns make him a great problem solver.
Type codes in other systems: INTP (MBTI), INTj (Socionics)