December 17, 2003
More on Meyer-Briggs
Another Meyer-Briggs comment popped up on my old rant against it. Since the only way you can find it is to hunt back through the archives, I have decided to post it here. It is from a fellow named Mike. I laughed very hard when I read it, because he describes someone I know who is very into MBTI fits his description amazingly well. While I am not sure the exact etiquette of pasting an entire comment into the main body of the blog, this is so good that I am just going to do it and hope that I have not offended this fellow:
Of course Meyer-Brigss has an "elegant simplicity". There's nothing in the scales that can't be deduced form rading the questions. "Hey, according to Meyer-Briggs, I'm shy! I had *no* idea!"
The test is entire ad-hoc, has never been validated against another instrument, and has no predictive value whatsoever. It has a great pseudo-intellectual appeal, though. I've noticed that it appeals to people who are very rigid and lack creativity- the sort who are good at cataloging data but aren't very good at coming up with original ideas. It's also popular with the sort of person who likes to brag about their Stanford-Binet test score.
(I have a *little* bit of knowledge about this sort of thing... a Master's in psych and most of my PhD work)
Posted by erik at December 17, 2003 1:48 PM | TrackBackSentimentality is a defect, but so is rationalism, or hardheadedness. There's also no excuse for acting reasonably without emotion.
I still think personality profiling has value as a tool in discernment, and for knowing yourself. It's also a useful check on thinking of our personalities as a blank slate.
Posted by: Joe Marier at December 21, 2003 9:32 PMJoe,
I have asked myself the same question. It seems to me that classifying personality types is often an easy way out: oh, I am an I, so I should just accept that I am not the social type. I have found that it appeals to those with a latent puritanism, as it is the secular version of predestination. The particularly pernicious pairing is the Thinking/Feeling one. There should never be an excuse for people to react emotionally without reason. Sentimentality is a defect, not just some innate character type.
Posted by: Erik Keilholtz at December 20, 2003 12:15 AMI like classical personality profiling (sanguine, choleric, phlegmatic, melancholic). If you can't remember which is which, it's quite simple.
Sanguine=Gryffindor
Choleric=Slytherin
Phlegmatic=Ravenclaw
Melancholic=Hufflepuff
Here's the question: Is personality classification possible? If so, would it, or does it, have value?
Posted by: Joe Marier at December 19, 2003 9:22 PMOK, I am not the Psychologist/Testing Expert of the country, but my father is and while he totally puts me to sleep when he starts talking scales and validity, I do know Meyers-Briggs has no value.
Posted by: Pansy Moss at December 18, 2003 8:59 AM