The term profiling has been used (and abused) a lot. In the last few years with the help of movies like “Silence of the lambs”, it has been closely linked with criminal profiling. The recent love affair from the public with serial killers has only strengthened the trend. The net result of this however, is that the public either sees this as voodoo or a clever sleight of hand. Another part of the public (usually male teenagers) believe that they too can be “profilers” and start making predictions based on their “profiling instinct”.

Because it is very hard to give an accepted notion of profiling we will give you the definition of this web site. Consider it no better or worse than other versions, but you have to know how we operate.

Profiling, for us, means using statistical research and observation done by various experts to explain human behavior.

On this website, we will use profiling in it’s narrowest sense. Profiling, for us, means using statistical research and observation done by various experts to explain human behavior. For example, if we tell you that kids who have been spanked are more likely to have behavior problems, we are not just saying it because it somehow makes sense to us. It is because somebody went into schools and interviewed the kids with behavior problems. From those interviews you gather datas on which you can see correlations (a correlation is just to what extent percentage wise you can predict behaviors). So if you read this website figuring that your opinion is as good as mine you are probably right. Just remember that what you read here is not my opinions nut real data painfully gathered through years of reading on statistical research. Any of the claims made here is backed up by research, some of which I would like, not to be true because it does not reflect well on my personal life. Sadly you cannot bend research to validate your personal life (although some people seem to have a good time trying).

So if we can give you a lot of information, we can not always explain why because profiling, by its very nature, is much more a matter of observing than commentating. The natural tendency is to extrapolate on the observation to fill in the blanks. Be very careful about that urge because your analysis will be done through the set of values of your personal history and moral values. That is called a bias and after a while it gets presented as a fact and this, is not profiling.

As you can see this site does not concern itself with classical psychology where we try to treat people with different psychological approaches to cure or explain an unwanted mental state. While this side of psychology undoubtedly has its merits and usefulness, we feel it simply is not the goal of this website.

One last important thing to say is that profiling usually has a tremendous impact on us because you cannot argue with statistics (though you can argue about what actions to take about those same statistics). Sometimes you will learn things that you did not wish to know and this information can potentially be emotionally painful. It has been the case several times for this writer.

Profiling our readership

What does our typical reader look like:

• You are more likely male than female. This is because we are online. If this were a book the ratio would be reversed.
• While we are on this subject, you read a lot. Ten percent of the population picks up a book and reads to the end. You are among them.
• Your combined income for the household is over 100 000$ placing you easily in the richest quarter of the population.
• You have a university degree. You were good in school and your children are (or were) equally good. You obviously take it for granted and you would make a funny face if we congratulated you on it.
• You think of yourself as tolerant and if you had to describe yourself politically you would reluctantly describe yourself as a moderate liberal.
• Family values are important to you but oddly you never had to work very hard at it and secretly you wonder “what all the fuss is about”.
• You drive Japanese or German cars; if you were just a bit richer you would buy a Volvo and sometimes do. If asked, “cars don’t matter to you”.
• You read bedtimes stories to your children and were read to, yourself when you were little.
• You eat well enough. You even buy and eat a lot of fruits and vegetables. You would like to practice more sports but your children are pretty active.
• You manage your weight pretty well even if you could lose a few pounds. If you are a woman those pounds have been lost many times. By the way, your teenage daughter is statistically at great risk of developing anorexia.
• You think you know better than most people and you usually do.
• You do not smoke and very few of your friends do. You are not tolerant toward smoking.
• You have a job with responsibilities and often are the superior of someone. You are also very often a teacher or an engineer.
• You are willing to pay for something that you cannot hold in your hands (lucky for us)
• You like watching movies but not the big commercial ones.
• You like to think that you cannot be put into a category. You are a unique individual or so you like to think.
• You will agree with any statistics that make sense to you but will easily dismiss the ones that do not fit in with you what you think.
• You have traveled in other cultures or have tried to learn about them.
• You own a house. The decoration is not stuffy and you can withstand a healthy dose of chaos.
• Although you sometimes feel it will be barely adequate you have more money committed for retirement than the national average.

Face it! You are a yuppy!