On last Friday evening, I attended a talk by Helen Fisher, an anthropologist who researches all the complexities of love, including what kinds of love there are, why people are attracted to each other, and how to keep a relationship happy.

In recent years, she was sought out by Match.com to help create Chemistry.com and develop a personality test that aimed at identifying what chemical you express the most and what characteristics accompany that chemical.

As she began flipping through slides about each chemical and the traits associated with them, I couldn't help but think of friends and family members that I thought would be in each group and how accurately they fit into them.

That's when I realized that categorizing ourselves and the people we know is extremely prevalent because it's now done through so many mediums.

For example:

Helen Fisher's Chemisty.com Personality Test

Helen Fisher's personality test is used on Chemistry.com to see which personality type you fit into most accurately and from that who you're most compatible with romantically.

Myers-Briggs

The Myers-Briggs personality assessment is used by individuals to see what kind of personality they have and what kind of careers and futures are best suited for them based on it. Many people may also judge how likely they are to get along with someone based on their code.

Zodiac Signs

Some may use zodiac signs as an indication of how likely a relationship will work out or last based on compatibility charts such as this one.

Social media sites, like Tumblr, have begun to take zodiac signs and assign things such as what the sign is most likely to do, what the sign is most likely to say, etc. Although these lists may not have much scientific backing to them, it doesn't stop people from exclaiming "That's sooo me" or "That's totally you; you're such a Taurus!" when they read them.

Memes

Tumblr has even gone a step further and has began creating a meme that consists of sort of ridiculous but overall lovable creatures with equally amusing characteristics underneath. Again, even though the characteristics are usually random and somewhat absurd, for the most part, everyone can definitely say that they identify with one more than the others.

All these means of classification, from highly scientific to absolutely hilarious, made me wonder why we love categorizing people and ourselves so much. I believe that these forms allow us to satisfy a need to understand ourselves and the people around us more. From these, we're able to learn characteristics and tendencies about whoever we choose and these traits then give us insight on why we're around these people in the first place. We get to figure out that our best friend picked the same silly figure as us on Tumblr and in turn that gives us validation that we're supposed to be best friends. Or our current significant figure and us are the most compatible zodiac signs, making us feel more in love than ever. No matter which medium we use or who we use it to analyze, there is a new sense of understanding which somehow confirms that we've made the right choice on who've we've chosen to surround ourselves with.