Just curious

[Stryyke]

What do you guys think of things like the MBTI? Think there's anything to that? Or is it just another hoax like astrology?

[T-Mick]

I never get the same result twice. I have borderline personality disorder though (self diagnosed)

[Flickerdart]

What do you guys think of things like the MBTI? Think there's anything to that? Or is it just another hoax like astrology?

Read the Wikipedia article on it. Essentially, the test is pop-psych nonsense that bears little resemblance to the actual, real science it's "based" on.

[Ninja_Prawn]

I think it's hilarious fun and I love obsessing over it (that may be a function of my type; I'm extremely INFP), but I don't believe it has much scientific validity or real-world utility. If a company required it as part of their recruitment process, I'd give them some side-eye.

[Stryyke]

You know, about 20 years ago, I had a company require one of these tests. They didn't hire me because I apparently have "homicidal leanings." What can you do? I only ask because I took one of those goofy tests, and the results were eerily accurate. I came out INTJ.

[Ninja_Prawn]

I apparently have "homicidal leanings." ... the results were eerily accurate.

:eek:

Abandon thread!

[Stryyke]

Hatchet job LOL

[veti]

I've never seen a MTBI test output that had a "homicidal leanings" flag, but I guess you can add any amount of drivel to it if you're so inclined.

I think it's reasonable fun, and - like most "personality tests" - can, under the right conditions, give some insight. But I wouldn't use it for employment screening, because the results are not sufficiently specific or objective to base decisions of real importance on them. (Well, maybe if you had nothing else to go on. But I can't imagine how you'd engineer that situation to begin with.)

Where I might, just possibly, use them in employment is in assigning people to teams. But only because those decisions would be temporary and easy to reverse. In that scenario, it might make a fun experiment and keep the personnel officer happy for a few weeks, and be worth trying for that reason if no other.

[Aedilred]

You know, about 20 years ago, I had a company require one of these tests. They didn't hire me because I apparently have "homicidal leanings." What can you do? I only ask because I took one of those goofy tests, and the results were eerily accurate. I came out INTJ.

I think that, to an extent, the results are always going to be "eerily accurate" because they're written broadly to encompass a wide variety of people. Most people probably aren't going to lean strongly one way or another in most of the categories, so they're going to see elements of themselves in whatever result comes up.

It's the same principle as with horoscopes. The results are designed to apply to as many people as possible, and so when they come out looking accurate for an individual that's basically just confirmation bias.

[Errata]

Well it's not very scientific, but still not quite as nonsensical as a horoscope. The horoscope categorizes people into arbitrary personality types based on when they were born, which is a terrible basis that conveys no actual information about those people's personalities. The personality test categorizes people into arbitrary personality types based on a self-assessment of those people about the same attributes that it's trying to discern. It's not necessarily a very meaningful classification system, but at least it's based on some sort of pertinent information rather than being completely random.

I do question what "homicidal tendencies" has to do with it. There are other types of personality assessments that do try to look for red flags of possible personality disorders, but those are entirely different tests from the MBTI. There are no "wrong" personality types in the MBTI system. None of the 16 types are objectively bad. There isn't a "likely murderer" MBTI personality type. Some employers might think certain personality traits are better for the job they're hiring for, but then there are other jobs that might be better suited to the opposite. Some employers do screen for dangerous or unstable employees, but they do so using a different test.

Perhaps they mix up the questions and slip the other test in there so you don't suspect what they're looking for? Not sure, I've never applied for a job that gave a personality test.

[Ninja_Prawn]

I do question what "homicidal tendencies" has to do with it. There are other types of personality assessments that do try to look for red flags of possible personality disorders, but those are entirely different tests from the MBTI. There are no "wrong" personality types in the MBTI system. None of the 16 types are objectively bad. There isn't a "likely murderer" MBTI personality type. Some employers might think certain personality traits are better for the job they're hiring for, but then there are other jobs that might be better suited to the opposite. Some employers do screen for dangerous or unstable employees, but they do so using a different test.

Perhaps they mix up the questions and slip the other test in there so you don't suspect what they're looking for? Not sure, I've never applied for a job that gave a personality test.

Yeah, I think most companies that do this have a battery of tests, some of which do look for red flags (I've heard that the Rorschach blots can point to homicidal tendencies specifically). Also the way HR departments interpret results is complete nonsense. My dad had his pay cut a few years ago because he had the 'wrong' MBTI type - apparently they were looking for one specific type who all got rises, and everyone else got a cut. Seems to me that that approach would be actively harmful to the company; a team with a good mixture of types ought be the best in most cases (even if you don't believe the MBTI holds water, you ought to be able to get behind that); but that's HR for you. The average HR person is not a scientist, which causes problems when they try to apply scientific (or pseudo-scientific) processes. I was just reading about (https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/mar/21/all-mapped-out-using-satnav-switches-off-parts-of-the-brain-study-suggests-navigation) how this is a problem in journalism, too.

[Aedilred]

As best I can tell, the average HR person is trying to justify their job. This generally involves doing "analysis" of employees which in turn requires those employees to do more "work". If they're doing stuff like making everyone do a psych-profile or the like that suggests that they've just run out of other things to do; most likely they haven't really given any thought to the results or what they mean, they just want to look like they're contributing something to the organisation.

I say this having worked in HR.

[GloatingSwine]

I think it's reasonable fun, and - like most "personality tests" - can, under the right conditions, give some insight. But I wouldn't use it for employment screening, because the results are not sufficiently specific or objective to base decisions of real importance on them. (Well, maybe if you had nothing else to go on. But I can't imagine how you'd engineer that situation to begin with.)

If you want to use the MBTI test in employment, it's not a screening tool. It's a tool to help you manage people by knowing a little bit about how they're likely to behave in response to certain types of task or objective, eg. how detailed/specific a brief they're going to need.

[Brother Oni]

Interestingly my company went through the Belbin Team Role Inventories test (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Team_Role_Inventories), which while having some similarities to MBTI pigeonholing of people, it's a behavioural analysis to help team management not a personality test.

[Ninja_Prawn]

Interestingly my company went through the Belbin Team Role Inventories test (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Team_Role_Inventories), which while having some similarities to MBTI pigeonholing of people, it's a behavioural analysis to help team management not a personality test.

Oh yeah, I remember that one. I did it on an engineering course in the summer before my last year of school (I guess Americans might call it a 'camp'?), and my strongest roles were plant and specialist, which seems about right. I thought it was a bit of a weak test though; a lot of the questions felt like they would be easy to 'game' and the fact that I was rated well above average at everything except shaper seemed rather fishy.

[Knaight]

What can you do? I only ask because I took one of those goofy tests, and the results were eerily accurate. I came out INTJ.

Read the other 15. Writing up test results with categories that fit people is easy, it's writing up test results where the category you get sorted into fits you and the others don't where things get harder. I've had to take a few of these, and I'll read as either INTJ, ENTJ, INTP, or ENTP. All four of those fitting is expected when right on the border, but if the test is actually valid then the -SF- category should be an awful fit, as I score extremely strongly on the NT. So, lets try ISFP, on the basis of it's the first one in the list I clicked. I'm using the OPP (https://www.opp.com/en/tools/MBTI/MBTI-personality-Types/ISFP) test results, largely based on what comes up in google first (which is how these often get selected). ISFP specific things listed:

"ISFPs enjoy providing practical help or service to others, as well as bringing people together and facilitating and encouraging their cooperation."
"Because they tend to be less assertive than some types, ISFPs may have less influence in the workplace, and their concern for others could prevent them from making tough decisions. They sometimes put off making decisions, in the hope that a better opportunity will come along."
"ISFPs are typically cooperative, modest and adaptable and also gentle and loyal."
"ISFP people enjoy working at something that is personally meaningful. They like to work in an environment with supportive co-workers who care about one another, and may shy away from outright competition."
"ISFPs are likely to be attracted to jobs in healthcare, service industries and clerical professions."

A bit of rephrasing and the check to fit:

We've got liking being helpful. That fits me fine, probably because it fits most people.
We've got not being influential, procrastination, and an aversion to tough decisions. Those also fit, but it's not like those are rare traits.
We've got a bunch of positive traits that people like to claim, one of which is seriously just not being violent. Most of these fit just fine.
We've got enjoying working at things that are personally meaningful, and enjoying working with non-hostile co-workers. Again, this fits just about everyone. Shying away from outright competition is a bit rarer, and I don't fit that one - it's also prefaced with "may".
Then we have the job list. It's a really broad category - I don't have an attraction to service industries or clerical professions, but healthcare includes pharmacological research, biomedical device engineering, and a whole bunch of cool stuff. It's one of three, but that's usually enough to get counted as a hit in these sort of things.


This fits just fine. It's part of a broader trend too, I can read all 16 and all of them fit, which makes the test pretty meaningless. If just looking at one though, the way that one fits can make it seem like a legitimate test. After all, it sussed out some personality traits, right?

[Ninja_Prawn]

This fits just fine. It's part of a broader trend too, I can read all 16 and all of them fit, which makes the test pretty meaningless.

You say this, but I find the opposite. When I read through the types, I keep thinking "well, that's not me" to almost all of them. There are one or two that sort of halfway fit, and one that fits very well. Perhaps there's something that matters in the way they're actually phrased, rather than the core meaning?

[Red Fel]

I think it's reasonable fun, and - like most "personality tests" - can, under the right conditions, give some insight. But I wouldn't use it for employment screening, because the results are not sufficiently specific or objective to base decisions of real importance on them. (Well, maybe if you had nothing else to go on. But I can't imagine how you'd engineer that situation to begin with.)

I'm with Veti on this one. I wouldn't say I swear by it, but everyone in my immediate family knows theirs, and it's a pretty good starting-off point for insight into yourself. It gives you something to think about when trying to figure yourself out. Are you a "thinker" or a "feeler," and how do you think/feel about that? Does this test suggest things in you you like, or want to change? Do you look at your results and say, "You know, that makes some sense?"

Would I ever use it as a prospective employer? Hell to the no. Profile tests like this are only a slice of the pie that is a person. A tasty, meat-filled person. What's more important to me would be (1) your resume and past experience, (2) your recommendations, and (3) whether I want to punch you in the face after spending five minutes in the same room with you. Whether you're an "introvert" or "extrovert" by MBTI standards is so utterly irrelevant to your value as an employee that if someone actually suggested using this as a screening tool, I would want to punch them in the face after spending five minutes in the same room.

So, you know, my default setting.

Now, as a prospective employee, that's a different matter. When I was much younger, having just graduated university, I went to see a vocational guidance counselor. Insert Monty Python reference here. He subjected me to a battery of tests, which I think included the MBTI. Like the MBTI, they were mostly pop-sci stuff, minimally scientific at best. But they painted a broad picture - how I felt, how I liked to work, what skills and values I had, what made me feel accomplished, and so forth. I was able to look at this (unscientific, but useful) image that these results painted, and conclude what work would make me feel satisfied, wouldn't overtax me, and would let me achieve my aspirations in life.

Do I think the tests were infallible and gospel and changed my life? No. Could they have been wrong, or steered by the person administering them? Maybe. But I found them helpful.

[Stryyke]

This fits just fine. It's part of a broader trend too, I can read all 16 and all of them fit, which makes the test pretty meaningless. If just looking at one though, the way that one fits can make it seem like a legitimate test. After all, it sussed out some personality traits, right?

Gotta say I disagree. I guess if you boil each of them down to a single sentence, you are probably right. That's pretty dishonest, though. I've read half a dozen of them, and only 1 really fit, and 1 other kinda sorta fit if I looked at it just right.

Mostly it's going to boil down to how honest you are with yourself. People who go into it deciding to answer in the "correct" way, will obviously think it's BS.

I'm not saying there is anything to it, in terms of utility; but the fact that it gets info from you means that it should reflect your personality, but will inevitably be subject to mood changes and personal bias. It can't be trusted because of that, IMO. The only real way to remove personal bias and mood changes is to have someone follow you around 24/7 for a period of time.

It was pretty creepy, though. The first time in my life that I ever felt anyone understood anything about me, was a stinking test. Blah.

[Asmodean_]

It's definitely on the lower end of the horoscope-therapist spectrum.

[Honest Tiefling]

10 bucks says that even if it had some use in the Westren world, it'll crash and burn hard when applied to a non-Western audience.

If someone DOES have a captive non-western audience (or more likely, heard of someone applying it) I'd like to see the results because I think it'll end in hilarity.

[2D8HP]

I've found that how I do on "personality" tests greatly changes depending on how tea I've had recently.

I've also taken some Employee "personality tests" of a hundred questions which laughably amounted to "Will you steal from us?", and "Are you going to punch anyone?".

I guess they weed out people who are honest about their dishonesty and violence!

[veti]

As best I can tell, the average HR person is trying to justify their job.

If that's true in the HR department, it's probably true in the rest of the company as well.

That's what we call a "badly managed company".

[Ninja_Prawn]

I've found that how I do on "personality" tests greatly changes depending on how tea I've had recently.

It's true. Ninja_Prawn after a chai latte is a different beast to Ninja_Prawn after a peppermint tea. :smallwink:

[Honest Tiefling]

It's true. Ninja_Prawn after a chai latte is a different beast to Ninja_Prawn after a peppermint tea. :smallwink:

REAL Tea has stimulants. *Aggressively drinks tea.*

[Brother Oni]

Oh yeah, I remember that one. I did it on an engineering course in the summer before my last year of school (I guess Americans might call it a 'camp'?), and my strongest roles were plant and specialist, which seems about right. I thought it was a bit of a weak test though; a lot of the questions felt like they would be easy to 'game' and the fact that I was rated well above average at everything except shaper seemed rather fishy.

I agree it's easy to game if you're only using your own answers, but we did questions for every other person in our team and both the team perspective and the individual perspective were combined into a single report (mine has personal, team and overall scores).

The problem with 'gaming' your answers is that it's highly likely that you get stuck in a role that you're not good at or dislike - I scored very highly at Monitor Evaluator, Specialist and Completer/Finisher. Being a Resource Investigator and talking to external customers isn't my strong suit and the only experience I have with being a Co-ordinator is with the military, which isn't really applicable to civvie street.

[Errata]

I guess they weed out people who are honest about their dishonesty and violence!

They usually throw in some trick questions, so if you're stupid and trying to make yourself sound as good as possible, you'll trip yourself up with obvious lies that you may think are the answer they're looking for. And if you're stupid and not trying to make yourself look good, you might not realize the severity of some of the things you're admitting to. Basically, if you're stupid and untrustworthy, you might actually get caught. And if you're not, you're probably not planning to shoplift at your near minimum wage job.

[Jay R]

Most such tests and measurements have a small amount of truth to them. But like D&D alignment, they are so grossly over-simplified that they wind up having very little relevance.

Like dividing the world into "good guys" and "bad guys", dividing it into the 16 MBTI categories is (nearly) meaningless. The world's population is nearly 7,500,000,000 people. So those categories have an average of over 460,000,000 people each.

Any personality description that includes over 460 million people is leaving out almost everything that defines who those people are.

And even if you only care about those attributes, they aren't binary. It's not true that half the people are all equally extroverted and the other half are all equally introverted. It's not true that all the extroverts are all extroverted in the same way. None of them are equally extroverted now as they were a couple years ago. They aren't equally extroverted in all situations, or even over the course of a single day. Trying to turn a very complex continuum of many different aspects into a pair of categories is leaving out virtually all aspects even about that continuum.

It's a fun game to play, and might reveal a small amount of information. But don't assume you share any personality traits with somebody else in the same classification.

[Ninja_Prawn]

And even if you only care about those attributes, they aren't binary.

Strictly speaking, the Myers-Briggs test does capture this. Each category is scored (out of 100, I think?) so you can come out on the borderline of some or all of them. That's partly why some people find several of the 16 types fit them.

And the test doesn't really claim to describe your personality either - it looks mostly at cognitive processes: how you receive and interpret information and so on, which is only one part of personality. Moreover, your type only tells you your primary mode of thinking; the one you use by default when you're happy and comfortable. People can learn (or be forced) to access other modes of thinking, and the extent to which a person does so has a big impact on their overall personality.

[Crimsonshadow97]

Most of my friends have taken it and find it to be fairly accurate, even so I doubt it has serious statistical power. At worst it's an out of control facebook quiz, at best it tells you what you already know in a quantitative way.

[Monolilith]

I like the consensus that it's fun but unscientific, but I find it specific enough and bearing enough differences between types to be way more useful for things like writing than the arguably-similar alignment chart is. After all, what character is going to be as intricate and confused as an actual human being? Certainly not any of mine, it'd take a lifetime to figure out that many facets, and maybe a few months to a year to make enough for said character to be effective!

Anyway, I think it's pretty interesting, and it makes life more interesting to take it with a grain of sugar AND one of salt. But maybe that's my INFP talking. :smalltongue:

[robnar]

I like the way my company uses it. We did MBTI as part of leadership training, talked about the results in a group, and then talked about the way that certain leadership decisions could affect people of different personality types.

They acknowledged the squishiness of the test, but point out that it might offer some insight if you're trying to build a team and want some insights into what kind of personality conflicts you might need to plan how to prevent or mitigate. For example (trivial example) managing a team with a bunch of ENTJs is different than managing a team with a bunch of ISFPs.

This obviously doesn't apply to all situations - the test is not appropriate for informing hiring or career decisions - but in a company with a lot of people who are assigned to teams as needed, it can be useful.

I'd taken it before as a facebook test, and it was fun, but never thought about other uses for it.

[Liquor Box]

We use more thorough personality tests, individually administered by external providers, for employment screening. But we use the Myers Briggs within the team as a tool to understand how each other thinks and works.

I think it is interesting, and somewhat useful, but I wouldn't hold it above my own subjective assessment of a person (or myself).

I am an ESTJ.

[Sermil]

As part of a leadership class at work, we took one of those tests. To show off how different people were, we lined up in order, from most introverted to most extroverted.

Mind you, this was a bunch of computer programmers. This wasn't a random sample of people, this was mostly computer programmers.

I was still on the 'most introverted' side of the line. That's right, I'm introverted even for a computer programmer.

At least for that particular issue? Ya, the test was 100% correct.

[Ninja_Prawn]

useful for things like writing

But maybe that's my INFP talking. :smalltongue:

INFP, represent! *high five*

Good point about fictional characters; they tend to be more simplistic and consistent in their behaviour than real people, so the test works better for them. I've read some really good metas based on MBTI analysis of characters in TV shows, for example.

[Bohandas]

Based on the timeline in it's wikipedia article it appears to have been created solidly within the era when psychology was mostly voodoo.

It's probably still better than standard job application personality screenings though, which have the appearance of being some kind of joint venture between Cosmopolitan magazine and the Church of Scientology

[warty goblin]

Whenever I take one it tells me a lot of nonsense, and that I'm introverted. Since I make two phonecalls a week, and can happily go days without seeing anybody, this is not a revelation. I suspect any person paying the remotest attention would pick up on this after about six minutes of my company.

Really it seems far more like some sort of attempt to sell me crap so I can learn about myself than anything else, and the chances that they contain useful information at an individual level seem deeply suspect. Their observations are based on a bunch of agree/disagree statements, and as such are drawing on very lossy data. Compared with, say, asking somebody I know to describe me, its utility seems deeply suspect. I suppose you could say that it's objective in some sense, but then it's also got these ridiculously flattering descriptions at the end, because it needs to be popular in order to sell itself, and nobody pays to get told they're a puppy-kicking blight on the planet.


Maybe it has some interest at a population level. The individual random effect is gonna be much larger in magnitude than the very simple fixed effects it can measure though.

[Cipojo]

I completely enjoy it, but I don't think it is a complete hoax I think that people definitely put some actual work into it, but either way it is mostly just a time to time thing for me I don't ever really think about it too much :smalltongue:

[Ninja_Prawn]

it is mostly just a time to time thing for me I don't ever really think about it too much

Fun fact: psychologists thing about the Myers-Briggs every 7 seconds.