My previous post portrayed personality types as a trustworthy way of determining one’s character, but after further research, I realized this wasn't the case.
You've probably taken the Myers-Briggs test in school or just online for fun. It divides humans into 16 personality types, (for example INTP – Introvert Intuitive Thinking Prospecting) and people use this test to make important decisions. The fact is that this theory is very unreliable, hasn't even been created by scientists and uses a lot of scientific jargon just to appear more realistic and truer.
All this mess began in 1921, when famed psychologist Carl Jung had a theory. He surmised that human beings could be broken down into eight different personality types (explained in the previous post). There was just one problem. This theory was proposed before psychology used rigorous scientific methods, like data or controlled experiments, so the eight types were just guesses of the psychologist. He ended up discarding the idea, when a few years later he wrote: “Every individual is an exception to the rule... This kind of classification is nothing but a childish parlor game”. The credit goes to mystery novelist Isabel Briggs-Myers and her magazine writer mother, Katherine Cook Briggs. Without any scientific training, these two writers took theories from one of Carl Jung’s non-scientific books and came up with their list of personality types, which they consequently published in 1944.
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| Creators of Myers-Briggs Type Indicator |
Today, the test is shunned by the scientific community. There are even psychologists (for example Carl E. Thoresen) on the board of the company that owns the Myers-Briggs test who’s admitted publicly that if he used it in his own research, his academic colleagues would question his work. The main problems found in the official test is that it incorrectly assumes that personality is fixed. For example, nearly half the people who retake the Myers-Briggs type indicator are placed into a different personality category. The truth is that there’s no evidence to support the 16 categories created by the MBTI, it’s not more than a well-marketed way to perpetuate stereotypes. People only believe it’s claims and results because of the Forer effect, which is a psychological phenomenon where people will believe a vague description of their traits if they’re told it’s tailored to them. It’s the same reason why people believe in zodiac signs, fortune tellers and other forms of pseudoscience.
To conclude, the real danger is related to the individual lives and their careers or relationships being at stake from the outcome of these tests. 2 million people a year take the Myers-Briggs test, and even though there is no enough evidence showing that it’s effective at predicting job satisfaction or compatibility, it’s been used to make hiring and training decisions in over 10000 American companies, 2500 colleges, and even the US State Department. Without trying to sound too alarmist, this test may be discouraging people from pursuing their passions or desired careers.
References:
Joseph Stromberg and Estelle Caswell (2015) retrieved from: https://www.vox.com/2014/7/15/5881947/myers-briggs-personality-test-meaningless
Team Technology, 2018: https://www.teamtechnology.co.uk/mmdimanual.htm
Image from: https://allthatsinteresting.com/myers-briggs-test
Image from: https://allthatsinteresting.com/myers-briggs-test
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