Common DISC Styles Around the World

Adam Stamm

Managing Partner: Online DISC Profile
Adam Stamm was first certified in DISC in 2018. Over the years, he has helped develop new DISC Products and other personality-based tools. He is a Managing Partner of Online DISC Profile, Chapter President of the Association of Talent Development, and lives in Philadelphia, PA (USA).

DISC Assessment Results Across the World

Each year, millions of people worldwide complete a DISC Assessment. DISC is a popular tool for developing greater self-understanding and improving any type of interpersonal relationship. When someone completes a DISC Assessment, they learn more about their personality and behaviors.

Recently, we worked with Assessments 24×7 to examine if there are changes in trends of DISC Styles throughout different regions, just as there are changes in culture worldwide.

It’s easy to recognize that there are many cultural differences. Koreans, for example, have different cultural norms compared to Italians. However, we often think about these cultural norms from the context of food, language, or societal perspectives.

DISC, on the other hand, measures a person on two specific dimensions:

DISC Assessment results around the world pace
disc styles accross the world task-people

On the vertical dimension, DISC measures a person’s energy level, risk appetite, and pace range.

On the horizontal scale, DISC measures whether a person is focused on the task or the person/relationship. It can help identify how skeptical or agreeable a person is.

The DISC Basic Assessment is offered in 26 different languages. We worked with Assessments 24×7 to extract assessment data from each language and identify the percentage of each style based on each language and culture. This data was placed on the DISC Around the World Map.

When we reviewed the data presented on the DISC Around the World Map, we picked out a few interesting insights:

  1. The D Personality Type is under-represented in most cultures.
  2. Most cultures identify with the C-Personality Type.
  3. Indonesia and Spain are almost opposites in terms of their DISC Personalities.

It’s important to note that this data was collected based on language preferences and not necessarily based on the location of where someone took the assessment.

The D-Style Is The Most Under-Represented DISC Style

The D-Style is one of the most identifiable styles, yet it is also the rarest DISC Style.

Surprisingly, only 12 percent of individuals across the 26 available languages identify as a D Personality.

In our DISC Training Workshops, we often hear from participants that they want more tips on how to better work with people with this style. The data suggest that many people have fewer opportunities to work with this style than the other DISC Styles. 

In Japan, for example, only 5% of respondents identified as a D-Style. This under-representation means that people have fewer chances to learn how to work with the D-Style. Those with the D-Style might feel misunderstood because they are!

The C-Style Is the Most Represented DISC Style

Susan Cain’s bestselling book Quiet argued that introverts are misunderstood and underrepresented in positions of power compared to their extroverted counterparts.

The DISC data worldwide shows that the C Personality Type ranks globally as the top identifiable DISC Style. While introverts might be under-represented in positions of power, they are not under-represented worldwide.

People identify as a C-Style 32% of the time. The next highest style was the I Personality Type, at 29% of the time.

 

Spain and Indonesia: Total Opposites?

One of the more interesting data points we found was how different certain countries were. 

Overall, countries had similar rankings of DISC Styles. We found that generally, the styles were ranked in the following order:

  1. C-Personality Style
  2. I-Personality Style
  3. S-Personality Style
  4. D-Personality Style

However, a few countries were very different from each other.

Spain and Indonesia provide a prime example. In Indonesia, 18% of the population identified as a D-personality type, and 8% identified as an S-personality type.

These numbers are reversed in Spain with 17% identifying as a S-Style and 9% identifying as a D-Style.

What cultural insights did you find interesting in this data? We would love to hear from you what you found.

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