One out of every three people you meet is an introvert, and these people are overlooked in a culture that favors extroversion. Quiet points to the hidden and often-undervalued strengths that introverts possess.

John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress was a common book in colonial New England. It was a guide for how to keep to the straight and narrow amidst life’s dangers, toils, and snares. The how-to literature kept a religious flavor as America grew and became its own nation, but the language became less celestial and centered more around the cultivation of virtue during the 1800s. America underwent yet another shift at the beginning of the 1900s. Cultural historian Warren Susman referred to this shift as one from a Culture of Character to a Culture of Personality.

Seeming has become more important than being, virtue has been replaced by salesmanship. It is no coincidence that this altered cultural emphasis from character to personality gained momentum in the wake of the Industrial Revolution, the age of advertising, and growing celebrity that actors enjoyed in the 1920s and 1930s. With a burgeoning concern for self-image and salesmanship came an eruption of anxiety-related disorders and obsession with appearance and performance, which advertisements ruthlessly exploited throughout the 1940s, 50s, and onwards.

Dale Carnegie, author of the perennial bestseller How to Win Friends and Influence People, was the son of poor pig farmers before he became a persuasive public speaker and influencer. With the new emphasis on performance and putting your best social foot forward, public speaking became a skill that the average citizen and politician alike sought to cultivate. People in the 1800s praised qualities like honor, duty, integrity, reputation, manners, and work. Since the early 1900s, Carnegie and his performance-oriented ilk gained a following, and those sought-after traits became (and remain) “magnetic,” “charming,” “irresistible,” “energetic,” “interesting,” and so on.

In the early 1900s, psychologist Carl Jung saw the introvert’s situation as a precarious one: the introvert lived in a world with a diminishing appreciation for solitude and deep thought. It didn’t matter how virtuous or bright you were if you kept to yourself and lived a relatively anonymous existence.

In the United States, there has been a strong anti-intellectual current since the country’s infancy. Intellectualizing was passé, something better left to Old World aristocrats. Americans prided themselves on being people of action. In the John Quincy Adams – Andrew Jackson presidential race, the Jackson campaign wielded the power of action over thought with the pithy slogan, “John Quincy Adams who can write / And Andrew Jackson who can fight.” It was the fighter—not the writer—elected to the office of president.

Oddly enough, the former Yale president in the 1950s showed a similar anti-intellectualism. He declared that the university was looking for the more well-rounded, “gregarious” individuals and had no interest in the “‘brilliant’ introvert.”

Understandably, such a cultural ethos can leave the introvert feeling out of place, but there is comfort in remembering there are valuable qualities that introverts possess—even if those qualities are sometimes overlooked by broader culture.

Tony Robbins is the modern face of self-help and the exemplar par excellence of the very enviable Extrovert Ideal. He has been a consultant for over 50 million people. His has worked with numerous high-profile politicians, athletes, and celebrities like Tiger Woods, Bill Clinton, Nelson Mandela, Margaret Thatcher, Mother Teresa, and Princess Diana. He is a leader in the $11 billion per annum self-help industry. He himself brings in an estimated $80 million every year.

If you pay the $895 and participate in his four-day, fifteen hours a day Unleash the Power Within seminar, you get a feel for the ideal self being promoted. The conference aims to help its participants conquer fears, become more energetic, and build momentum in their lives. The ethos of the conference is lively, with lots of dancing and Top 40 hits over state-of-the-art sound systems. All the people working the event are friendly—ecstatically so. Everything is well-choreographed, the transitions between sections are seamless, and the lighting exquisitely accentuates Robbins’ enthusiastic facial expressions.

Like many other self-help writers and speakers, Robbins presents salesmanship as a virtue. It’s about presenting your best self to others. In one session, Robbins has his audience introduce themselves to the person seated next to them in two different ways: first, as someone with no confidence or hope for life. The second time, he instructs them to introduce themselves as if their neighbor was someone with whom they hoped to do business. They had the next five seconds to make the best impression possible, or they wouldn’t close the deal. The point of the exercise was that physiology influences psychology: step into the posture and mentality of a confident, energetic person and the behavior and emotions will follow. When we feel better, we will be able to sell ourselves better.

By the end of the day, people are unconsciously mimicking Tony Robbins’ persona, from his expressions and intonations to his gesticulations.

The Tony Robbins ethos calls to mind the aforementioned Culture of Personality qualities that elevate showmanship and salesmanship; characteristics like “magnetic,” “attractive,” “dominant,” “forceful,” and “energetic.” If you recall the qualities that people sought to cultivate in the late Culture of Character like duty, honor, integrity, citizenship, and manners, we can see how Robbins’ devotees are more likely to gravitate to the Personality list than the Character list.

Abraham Lincoln was not merely appreciated for his winsome communication, but admired for his humility and mild manner. He was not the life of the party, and political psychologists agree that Lincoln was an introvert. Still, he was viewed as a wise and judicious leader.

Would someone with Lincoln-like qualities have a chance in today’s political arena? Tony Robbin’s off-handed remark during the seminar that he’s considered running for president was met with roaring applause. In the Culture of Personality, the Abraham Lincolns—not the Tony Robbins—would have a difficult time garnering votes.

Is there any place for introverts in leadership? If you go to Harvard Business School, a place that prides itself on preparing leaders, you begin to wonder. The program was founded in 1908, just three years before Dale Carnegie began his public speaking courses at the YMCA. Just about all the students there are good-looking, fit, friendly, and motivated. When the author visited, the students themselves described how people in the program were together all the time; it was viewed as strange not to go out with fellow students at night. It seemed they could barely go to the bathroom without bringing friends.

There are no introverts to be found here. Harvard’s leadership model is predicated on extroversion, on being vocal, assertive, and quick on your feet.  It doesn’t lend itself to the more deliberate, deep thought that introverts tend to favor. For the HBS faculty, if students leave HBS without deep friendships with each other and an extensive social network, the program has failed them.

In an interview with one Quinn Mills, professor in Harvard’s School of Business, he affirmed the importance of being vocal and assertive, that this is a necessary component of leadership. Sociability and verbal skills are thought very highly of in American business culture. But schmooze isn’t always tantamount to talent. A famous UC Berkeley study of political talking heads revealed that their predictions on matters of policy and economy were accurate less than half the time. In other words, a coin toss would have been a better guide.

While Quinn Mills stands by the HBS philosophy,  he does concede that there is such a thing as “winner’s curse.”  When two companies are both trying to acquire a third company, they bid and counter-bid until the company to be bought is priced far higher than its actual worth, but it’s become a point of pride and ego and as the more domineering extroverts tend to dig in their heels. The “win” came at an exorbitant cost. Getting good at getting your way has its own pitfalls.

The loudest voice isn’t necessarily the smartest or most accurate voice. Studies have revealed the more talkative person in a group is typically seen as smarter, more capable, even more attractive. Other studies demonstrate that this is a misconception. There is no correlation, for example, between extroversion and SAT and other intelligence test scores.

Jim Collins, in his book Good to Great, points out that, contrary to popular belief, it’s usually not the charismatic leaders who save mediocre or dying companies. Charismatic individuals tend to marginalize individuals and groups and have difficulty suffering second opinions. The defining qualities that helped CEOs take companies from good to great were not charisma and charm, but profound humility and a strong professional will. Such leaders are more likely to prioritize a company over their own ego. Charles Schwab and Bill Gates are just a few examples of exceptional—and introverted—executives. Buddha, Gandhi, and Mother Teresa are examples of notable leaders from other fields.

Introvert and extrovert brains are structurally different; these differences make introverts more sensitive to danger and more risk-averse but also less allured by the promises of reward. Introverts tend to be high-reactive personalities, easily affected by experiences, both positive and negative. It takes less stimulus to overwhelm them. Some children are like dandelions, which can sprout and thrive anywhere, while many introverts are more like orchids, who grow strong and blossom beautifully in a nurturing environment.

Part of the reason for this sensitivity (and a generally lessened sensitivity among extroverts) relates to the interplay between the “old brain” and the “new brain.” The “old brain” refers to the more primitive portion of the brain driven by emotion and instinct. The amygdala and the nucleus accumbens (or the reward center) are well-connected here. The introvert’s amygdala is usually more sensitive to fear, which makes them more risk averse. They have impulses to go for a reward, but it’s more likely to be tamped down by the more primal amygdala, as well as the “new brain,” the portion of the brain where rational thought takes place. There’s a tug-of-war match waging in each of us between the old brain and the new brain.

In addition to risk aversion, introverts process the neurotransmitter dopamine differently than extroverts. When an extrovert’s reward center is activated, the activity tends to be more intense. On average, the extrovert’s pleasure center—the medial orbitofrontal cortex—is bigger than the introvert’s. Basically, introverts don’t feel the dopamine-induced buzz as much as the extrovert, and are thus less susceptible to the old-brain urges.

On the face of it, people might conclude that introverts are weaklings or at least missing out, that they’re afraid to risk and unable to have a good time. A culture full of marketing slogans like “Just do it” and colloquialisms about asking forgiveness rather than permission will applaud the individuals who “go for it.” The costs of “going for it” can be high, however. The extrovert’s old brain tends to override the more rational, new brain (the neocortex). This could mean a good time, or it could mean running into problems that could have been readily avoided. Introverts tend to be more disciplined and diligent. They are more likely to delay gratification, a trait linked to higher SAT scores, income, and healthier body mass index. And because they’re not as wired for reward, they are less likely to be bought or lulled by promises of pleasure.

Some financiers and economists attribute the 2008 crash to a string of impulsive decisions. Power was in the hands of a few overly aggressive risk-takers. What could have been avoided if they had listened to quieter voices alerting them to very real threats, to those who took the brain’s warning cues seriously instead of rashly overriding them?

So before going green with envy over the extrovert’s dopamine uptake, bear in mind the cost. The bigger buzz and lessened fear response might help explain why extroverts are more likely to be hospitalized, to have an affair, to try their hand at a high-risk sport, and be killed in a car crash.

For Chinese high school students, there is a higher premium placed on humility, altruism, and diligence in friendship. American adolescents, by contrast, tend to value sociability, vivacity, and cheerfulness. The Chinese prefer depth of relation; Americans, ease of relation.

In a culture where extroversion has become the ideal and confidence is prized more highly than humility, it is easy for introverted children to feel stifled and misunderstood—at home, in the classroom, or at recess.

If you are a parent or someone who spends considerable time with children, there are several ways to support the introverted child. For example, don’t just tolerate or accept your introverted children—cherish them. Sometimes there’s a poor parent-child fit, where both parents are highly social and like to go out, and their child does not. Sadly, some parents will mistake their child’s introversion for deficiency and damage their child by trying to snuff out features that are actually pretty basic to the child’s personality. More than accept their child’s differences, parents must come to cherish those differences.

If you are a parent and you see some of these tendencies in your child, do what you can to encourage those tendencies. If a child is hesitant to step into a new experience, it’s best to open up the doors to them gradually. Invite them to walk through, but never force them to do so.

As alluded to in the aforementioned orchid hypothesis, introverted kids—orchid children—can grow up to be even stronger and more resilient than children with the extroverted dandelion constitution if they are planted in a nurturing environment. Proponents of the orchid hypothesis argue that parents of orchid children can consider themselves very fortunate. These children tend to develop deep passions and interests, and their sensitivity can become a tremendous asset to their vocation and their relationships.

It’s also important to remember that children are not so fragile as we tend to think. Some introverted parents might be tempted to shield their children from the pain that they once experienced. Your children can take it. They're going to be fine, and if you encourage the gifts they have, they are going to do great things in this world.