MBTI
What is your MBTI? MBTI stands for Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, a popular personality test, which is widely popular in South Korea. The MBTI is a self-report questionnaire that categorize individuals into 16 distinct “personality types “but that problem is that MBTI is pseudoscience.
The MBTI was created during WWII by American Katharine Cook Briggs and her daughter Isabel Briggs Myers, inspired by Carl Jung’s 1921 book Psychological Types. The some of the problems with MBTI are:
Inconsistent Results: Up to 50% or more get different result when retaking the test (sometimes within weeks), suggesting the “type” isn’t fixed, as the test claims.
Lack of Scientific Basis: There is no data or research done, Isabel Myers and Katharine Briggs developed the MBTI on their interpretation of Carl Jung’s theories rather than empirical studies.
No Predictive Power: Studies indicate that the MBTI is not effective at predicting success in various jobs, despite its widespread use by organizations for hiring and career development.
Dichotomous Typology: The MBTI categorizes individuals into 16 distinct types based on four binary dimensions, such as introvert versus extrovert. However, this simplistic representation oversimplifies human personality. For example there is a new emerging personality type an ortrovert which is neither introvert or extrovert.
[QUOTE] “The Myers-Briggs test has no scientific validity. About half the people who take it twice end up in entirely different categories the second time around. That's because human beings just don't fit consistently into the categories the Myers-Briggs people imagine are real. The test has almost no power to predict how happy you'll be in a given situation, how you'll perform at your job, or how satisfied you'll be in your marriage. Myers-Briggs relies on false binaries. For example, it divides people into those who are good at thinking and those who are good at feeling. But in real life, the research shows, people who are good at thinking are also more likely to be good at feeling. As Adam Grant, who writes about organizational psychology, once put it, the Myers-Briggs questionnaire is like asking someone, "What do you like more, shoelaces or earrings?" and expecting that question to produce a revealing answer.” - David Brooks, “How to Know a Person”
It is easy to ask people their MBTI and feels that we know them or even know ourselves, but it can pigeonholes others and ourselves into the “MBTI personality types.” Instead of taking the shortcut, we should seek to know others by spending time with them, sharing our lives, hearing their stories, asking questions, so that we can to love one another.
Let us remember these scripture passages as we come together:
Hebrews 10:25
Not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.
1 Thessalonians 5:11
Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing.
Hebrews 10:24
And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works,
If you insist on doing a personality test, look into the big five personality trait model or five-factor model (FFM) sometimes called by the acronym OCEAN or CANOE, which is the most common scientific model for measuring and describing human personality traits. The book “How to Know a Person” by David Brooks is a good book to read.
Blessings,
Pastor Kyu