The Myers-Briggs personality type test is a popular test to determine one’s relative personality profile. It’s not a hard science: few people are exact matches of the 16 different personality types.
But many do put a lot of stock into this and quite a few theories abound about which personality would make an ace poker player.
Poker requires a sharp intellect, plenty of self-discipline, a good grasp of psychology, and a good understanding of risk and reward. These four skills do not help much if the player isn’t aggressive, though. Aggressiveness comes more easily for some people than for others but luckily this is something that the player can improve on with some practise.
There are other skills that are also quite important: money management, being able to change strategy, and observation skills.
Of all the 16 personality types, INTPs (Introverted, iNtuition, Thinking, Perceiving) are by far the most likely to become good at poker. There are a number of reasons for this, same as there are a number of reasons why they might instead get distracted by the next shiny thing.
INTPs are perfectly suited to playing online poker for hours. This advantage helps because playing poker online tends to be a solitary activity. An extrovert would probably not enjoy spending this much time alone, even though it’s in a semi-social environment.
Poker is a game of strategy and strategical thinking is another area that many INTPs excel in. Players who understand the game tend to fare far better than the ones who only have a superficial understanding of it. INTPs used to be the irritating kid in primary school who always asked ‘Why?’ so they have another advantage over other players.
The third reason why an INTP is more likely to become the next World Poker Champion has to do with their flexibility. They find it easier than most other personality types to shift their strategy when they have to. Another advantage they have is the ability to play more than one game at any given time. This may have something to do with their prowess at keeping 23 Chrome tabs open at any given time.
Author bio:
Piggs Peak Poker wrote this article about the different personality types online poker strategies.