Are you an Enforcer like Rick Grimes? A Soldier like Carl? Or a Provider like Beth? Maddy Vonhoff over at GeekPup has created a chart that could help match you up to your Walking Dead counterpart.
The Walking Dead has brought in more than 20 million viewers at its peak, making it one of the most popular genre shows of our time. Every week, fans follow the ever-growing (and shrinking) cast of characters through a zombie-infested world as they cope with not only the immediate dangers of their new life, but also interpersonal and emotional issues that are still relatable even against a post-apocalyptic backdrop.
It should come as no surprise, then, that the show’s cast of characters spans the entire breadth of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). When Mandy couldn’t find a MBTI chart for the diverse cast of characters online, she decided to (in her words) “dust off [her] psychology degree” and give it a go herself. The result is an impressively detailed analysis of more than a dozen of the show’s major characters.
The MBTI takes into account four different aspects of people’s personalities, assigns two possible values to each, and creates a code for each personality type. The first letter refers to Extroversion or Introversion; the second, Sensing or Intuition; the third, Thinking or Feeling; and the fourth, Judging or Perceiving. All told, this creates 16 unique four-letter codes that can help define not only an individual’s personality, but also what sort of role in life they’d excel at or lean toward.
Mandy admits that there’s only so much one can do when making an MBTI chart for fictional characters. They can’t, for example, take the test themselves, so the creator of the chart has to do their best to observe each character carefully and choose for them. But when a show follows its cast as closely as The Walking Dead does, a savvy viewer — especially one with a degree in psychology — can turn out some pretty cool results.
It’s a bit of a relief to know that, whether you’re an introvert or an extrovert, you’ve still got a chance at lasting a while in a zombie outbreak! Tough types populate the entire chart, with Rick, Michonne and Carol included on the Introvert side of the scale and Daryl, Maggie and Carl planted firmly on the extrovert side.
Does this mean that you’re doomed to the same fate as your MBTI twin should the zombie apocalypse ever happen? There are definitely some cases where that would be a relief. But if you’re an ESFP, you may have cause to worry: according to Mandy’s chart, the ESFPs of the world didn’t fare so well as a whole.
Even if you’re not preparing for an outbreak, this could also explain why we feel drawn to certain characters. Give it a try. Is your favorite character also your MBTI match? Or are they your exact opposite — maybe someone who acts the way you wish you could in a crisis? Either way, it could very well change the way you watch from week to week.
There is also an older version from the earlier seasons of the show.