Personality Types: The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is an evaluative personality tool that is widely used throughout the world today. It is important for a tool that is popularly utilized in a variety of fields and at numerous professional institutions worldwide to be a credible one. So, is the MBTI really the valid reliable personality inventory instrument it claims to be? Evaluating this tool will show that empirically sound evidence does not exist to support the MBTI as an accurate, reliable, or valid instrument for profiling one’s personality type.

The Myers–Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) enables an individual to gain a deeper insight into their inherent personality traits. For some people, they have had prior knowledge or underlying assumptions about their personality, but this test provides clearer information about each of their identifiable traits. According to the MBTI in Human-metric personality test, my scores were 22% (E) extroverted thinking more than introverted, 9% (N) intuitive as oppose to sensing, 16% (T) thinking more than feeling, and 12% (J) judging as compared to perceiving. Thus, my personality type is ENFJ. The ENFJ personality group is described as a minority group that consists of natural-born leaders, and people filled with passion, and charisma for example, Barack Obama and Oprah Winfrey; they are notable members of this group, also known as the protagonists (16personalities, 2016). The protagonists apprehend pride in providing guidance for others to improve individually and to improve the community at large (16personalities, 2016). The protagonists find it naturally easy to communicate with others and excel at communicating with other people in person (16personalities, 2016).

The Myers and Briggs Personality Type Inventory test assessed my personality type as an ENTJ, with an extravert of 72%, intuitive 38%, thinking 25%, and judging 44% (Humanmetrics Inc., 1998). A person with an ENTJ personality type is honest and has a preference for leadership. He or she is very constructive and will always follow the guidelines. Because, ENTJs enjoy order, if there is a flaw in a system, the ENTJ will implement a way to resolve that shortcoming. Additionally, ENTJs are very goal oriented, which leads them to develop long-term plans (The Myers & Briggs Foundation, 2014).

The results of my Myers-Briggs Personality type test were as follows: extrovert, intuition, thinking and judging. As I read what each category meant, I could see those characteristics within myself. I love to be around people, socializing or just people watching. I prefer things to be planned and to think of solutions outside the box. I also look at the big picture of things before making a plan of action. The following two stories display my thought process in different areas and the affects it had in my life or how I dealt with the situations.

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator Personality (MBTI) was developed by Briggs Myers and her mother Katharine Cook Briggs in 1943 during the onset of World War II (Ham, 2016). Briggs recognized the need for psychological instruments that would value human differences and utilized the C G Jungs theory in creating the MBTI (The Story of Isabel Briggs Myers, n.d). According to The Myers & Briggs Foundation (2014) Myers and Briggs initially tested a group of 20 relatives and friends. They utilized such sample, because they thought they could predict their personality solemnly on observation which by observation. The initial random sample did not truly represent a whole population, but merely were used due to availability.

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) “is an introspective self-report questionnaire designed to indicate psychological preferences in how people perceive the world and make decisions” (13). It is one of several personality assessments that is popular among modern mental health experts throughout the world. Currently, it is estimated that the MBTI is “taken by more than two million people per year and is translated into 16 languages (10). “The purpose of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator personality inventory is to make the theory of psychological types described by C. G. Jung understandable and useful in people 's lives” (4).

As I reviewed my MBTI results, most of my percentages have not drastically changed over time. This gives me continued confidence in the following MBTI results which indicate I am an ?ISTJ?: introvert (16%), sensing (9%), thinking (31%) and judging (53%) (Jung Typology Test, 1998-2017).

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) was originally constructed to serve as a personality type indicator for personnel selection purposes.Today, usage is different from when the test was originally developed. The MBTI is now used for anyone that wants to know what their results would be, whether they need it or not. The test is available for professional administration, likely for a fee, and self administration, at no monetary cost. The test results can yield sixteen different combinations of the four dichotomous categories which include: extroverted (E) or introverted (I), intuitive (N) or sensing (S), thinking (T) or feeling (F),

Psychology has aims to define, explain, and predict behavior. The field of Psychology has seen the many remarkable theoretician and practitioners. Carl Jung developed the theory on personality types. Meyers Briggs expanded those theories into an assessment known as the he Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). MBTI consists of four dichotomies that include Extraversion/Introversion, Sensing/Intuitive, Thinking/Feeling, and Judgment/Perception.

Reserved. Compassionate. Cautious. Observant. All of these words have been used to describe someone like me. But who exactly am I? I am many things, characteristics, and traits. Unique, imaginative, and creative to name a few. While I am similar to others, I’m never exactly the same; I’m never a carbon copy. I’m original.

The Jung Typology Test provided information that was, for the most part, expected.These results do seem to be an accurate depiction of my personality. This said, my belief is that the results could change depending on who I associate with at the time. This is perhaps the reason why the percentages are fairly low on the final report.

I was very happy to have been given the opportunity to take these self-assessment tests. I always had an idea as far as what my personality is defined as, but it’s interesting to see where my strengths and weaknesses are. With the Jungian Typology test I scored 59% Introvert, 34% Sensing, 19% Thinking, and 31% Judging. After receiving this score and reading how each is defined, none of this surprised me. Sharing the results with my mother, her response was, “No surprise there!” I have always tried having some understanding of my personality in hopes of finding the right career path for me. I must admit that this has opened my eyes to how detail oriented and focused I can be, especially if it’s something I care about. This can be both good

The first subset of my personality is Extraversion, as opposed to Introversion. As an extrovert, I would describe myself as social, external and gregarious. This characteristic helps me communicate and reach out to others. However, there are cons that go along

Having worked in corporate, I have completed a vast number of professional assessments over the years, including the Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), Strong Interest Inventory Assessments, DISC Profile Assessment, Gallup Strengths Finder and even the more comprehensive executive leadership assessments. In corporate, these are generally performed prior to a promotion or during integration of a merger or acquisition. Initially, my thinking was, these were worthless time wasters; so I put very little stock in any of the broad array of assessments, to which I felt subjected. Surely, proper evaluation had to be more than a game of twenty questions. Across the years, I have saved my results in a small moving box as we have relocated nationally and internationally. I gained a deeper understanding of, belief in and reliance upon the power of assessments. In the last three years, I have sifted through my individual results with a fine toothed comb looking for similarities, consistencies and an underlying foundation on which to strategize the next phase of my life based upon my foundational principles. Interestingly enough, my results across the board, have not changed throughout more than 20 years of completing these assessments. As a result, there were no surprises seeing the result of the MindTools (2015) Leadership Skills Assessment..

The Myers-Briggs Personality Indicator test gave me the personality type “ENFJ.” ENFJ stands for “Extraverted, iNtuitive, Feeling, and Judging. While reading the information about my personality type, I understood a lot of what it was saying to me. Basically, I was being told that I am someone who cares deeply for other people. I have always been like that. I think it has something to do with how I was raised. Like some people, I was raised in the church, meaning I went to church, often, as a child. Every Sunday, my dad would drag me to church and make me sit and listen to the preacher preach. Even though I despised it, I feel like it has helped me to become the person I am today.