Now that you're an adult, you might still feel a pang of guilt when you decline a dinner invitation in favor of a good book. Or maybe you like to eat alone in restaurants and could do without the pitying looks from fellow diners. Or you're told that you're "in your head too much", a phrase that's often deployed against the quiet and cerebral.Or maybe there's another word for such people: thinkers.

... extroverts are more likely than introverts to be killed while driving, be hospitalized as a result of accident or injury, smoke, have risky sex, participate in high-risk sports, have affairs, and remarry.

If genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration, then as a culture we tend to lionize the one percent.

If personal space is vital to creativity, so is freedom from "peer pressure".

Evangelicalism has taken the Extrovert Ideal to its logical extreme...If you don't love Jesus out loud, then it must not be real love. It's not enough to forge your own spiritual connection to the divine; it must be displayed publicly.

Introverts also seem better than extroverts at delaying gratification, a crucial life skill associated with everything from higher SAT scores and income to lower body mass index.

A more recent study, published by the Center for Applications of Psychological Type Research Services in 1996 sampled 914,219 people and found that 49.3 percent were extroverts and 50.7 percent were introverts.

In a way, education by its nature favours the extrovert because you are taking kids and putting them into a big classroom, which is automatically going to be a high-stimulation environment. Probably the best way of teaching in general is one on one, but that's not something everyone can afford.

Extroversion is an enormously appealing personality style, but we've turned it into an oppressive standard to which most of us feel we must conform.