Our temperament is a combination of two things, our emotions, and our biochemical personality. Emotions are usually defined as perceived feelings in a given situation which obviously is a temporary phase- what really matters is our brain’s response in the given situation.
Now, one thing that has really intrigued me is the fact that brain function and its response despite being automatic have some sort of dependence on the human itself. It’s fascinating the way humans are designed to have unlimited potential in that tiny size (compared to the brains of elephants of course) and yet so underutilized in life.
The balance of certain biochemicals is key to optimizing brain health and bodily function. The path to wellness starts with your brain chemistry. The book The Edge Effect by Dr. Eric Braverman published in 2004 highlights some of these biochemicals in greater detail.
Our brain chemistry influences four main domains of health, temperament, memory, personality, and physical well-being. The four main biochemicals that help figure out our brain function are Dopamine, acetylcholine, GABA, and serotonin. Both excess or deficiency in any of these biochemicals leads to dysfunction causing either physical illness or mental disability.
Temperament and personality
The combination of all four biochemicals combined helps determine our temperament and our overall personality. Let’s create some code words for each of these biochemicals to understand better, Dopamine is social and outgoing, acetylcholine is spontaneous and fast-acting, GABA is calm and steady, and Serotonin is happy and has a sense of accomplishment.
Now, you can’t really choose the personality of one over the other, we need all those biochemicals to work in harmony for our advantage but personality is usually something we are born with. It is controlled by a small network of genes and DNA that we get from either of our parents.
Nothing can be done to change that, however, if done right these biochemicals can help you build a life with both mental and physical well-being.
Figuring out the personality type based on your brain chemistry is really important to optimize brain and body health. You can download and take the test for free at https://advancedpsychcare.tripod.com/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/braverman.test.pdf
One thing you’ll notice while taking the test is that some questions resonate with you at much deeper levels and that most probably is your brain personality. After finding out your dominant brain personality, you’ll notice certain deviations from the normal.
These deviations are mostly indicative of a deficiency. Now the deficiency could be in your dominant biochemical or any other biochemical. The deficiency will ultimately show itself in the form of a mental or physical disability.
A pilot study done in 2014 tried to find a link between Sasang constitutional medicine, which is a unique form of Korean medicine, and the Braverman Nature Assessment. Sasang constitutional medicine classifies people into four categories, Taeyangin, Soyangin, Taeeumin, and Soeumin, based on differences in organ function. Each function is based on four emotions, sadness, anger, joy, and pleasure.
These differences in the functions lead to different physiological and physical traits and may cause particular diseases according to the four functions. The study found that Soyangin is very similar to the dopamine type, Dopamine Nature showed a strong relationship with the Yang constitution (which is characterized by outgoing and active personality), and Taeeumin is similar to the GABA type[1]. It’s fascinating how centuries-old medicine still finds its way into modern-day science.
Personality and Exercise behavior
There’s a strange link between personality and exercise behaviors, where some people are naturally athletic, eat healthily and live a physically active life out of intuition, while others struggle to even move at all. On the other hand, people who eat healthy out of intuition, therefore, need less exercise while people who eat unhealthily and crave sugar, salt, and fatty food based on their genetic makeup need more exercise than just mild yoga and stretching.
A study done recently attempted to find the link between Personality and Exercise behavior with the help of the Braverman Nature Assessment. Now, the book clearly shows that GABA is the most common personality across the population and the rest are almost equal in number.
The study presented the hypothesis that Dopamine personality (Reward Seeking) will most likely be the most active in terms of exercise, but the results were quite the contrary. The results showed that Serotonin personality (Sense of accomplishment and delayed gratification) was the most active in exercise participation, followed by Dopamine and Acetylcholine personality while GABA personality was the least active among all groups[2].
In Conclusion, your temperament, and personality is depended on your brain chemistry, and with the right tools and lifestyle and diet, and environmental changes, you can tap into your greatest potential while maintaining a healthy mind and body. The formula is pretty simple, find out your dominant personality, find out your deficiencies, and make it right.
References
[1] S. Lee, J.-S. Yu, and S. Lee, “A Pilot Study of Psychological Traits in the Sasang Constitution According to the Braverman Nature Assessment.,” J. pharmacopuncture, vol. 18, no. 4, pp. 32–37, Dec. 2015, doi: 10.3831/KPI.2015.18.035.
[2] B. M. Rosicky and E. E. Hall, “Using Personality and Temperament to Predict Exercise Behavior: A Pilot Study of the Braverman Nature Assessment,” Int. J. Exerc. Sci., vol. 15, no. 5, pp. 341–357, 2022.
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