7 ms·

I'm sick of this Myers-Briggs pseudo-science showing up everywhere. It's unethical to sell a discredited theory of the world for monetary gain. It's like Dunge

by llamaz 11y ago

I'm sick of this Myers-Briggs pseudo-science showing up everywhere. It's unethical to sell a discredited theory of the world for monetary gain. It's like Dungeons and Dragon - people identify with their type/class, except people take MBTI more seriously than they do D&D.

B-Con 11y ago
There do seem to be patterns in personality, and I have found MB to be very helpful in getting a high-level overview of another person's general approach to the world. Reading the descriptions and discussing it with people led to a lot of "you think that way?" sort of moments from both sides. Very informative. I've found almost no helpful science on personality categorization (Big 5 is minimally helpful), so until there is I find this a useful starting tool. As a side note: The most misunderstood aspect of MBTI is that it's purely a system for categorizing high-level approach toward action and information in life. It's not what you must do, will do, can do, can't do, etc. It's only about certain aspects of outlook on life.
Swinx43 11y ago
I completely agree, this type of snake oil entrepreneurship is really getting on my nerves. It seems that peddling pseudo science is a very lucrative business opportunity and as such there is no small amount of people willing to jump on it. Another thing that truly gets me annoyed is the listing out of all these "things" that an author has been, none of them the reader would know if they have actually been any good at it. I could list a myriad of things "I have been" and make me look like a renaissance man except half of them I have been not even average at.
lmm 11y ago
It's not pseudo-science. It has been validated, and has good test-retest reliability by psychological standards (numbers off the top of my head but it's something like 80% immediately, and something like 65% after five years) - so it's measuring something, and that something is reasonably stable. What is true is that there's no bimodality in the distribution - each factor is a bell curve - and so talking about E/I is similar to talking about above-average IQ/below-average IQ rather than talking about the numbers. But it's not pseudo-science.
- shubhamjain 11y ago
  How has it been validated? Vox did an article on how it is based on unproven theories [1]. A proper validation in my impression would be if people are misattributed their personalities, will their psychological reaction to the result be different? Frankly, I don't think anyone should be excited by any test that says something positive about you. The big test is when it says negative things. For me, seeing all the personalities description, I can vaguely relate to all of them - a perfect showcase of Barnum effect [2]. [1]: http://www.vox.com/2014/7/15/5881947/myers-briggs-personality-test-meaningless http://www.vox.com/2014/7/15/5881947/myers-briggs-personalit... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barnum_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barnum_effect
  - raverbashing 11y ago
    Rhetorical question: is eye color scientific? Do you believe in eye colors? Saying that MB is "not scientific" is laughable. It is a measure. Probably more scientific than deriving a measure called QI from 20 random questions You can of course question if conclusions based on each MB type are scientific. The personality descriptions for the most part are just concluded from the measure (which of course have some variance between people, it's not a cookie cutter approach) and of course some people have a different measure in each axis. If the descriptions fit you you're probably in the middle, because some of them certainly don't fit me From the link you quoted: "The characteristics measured by the test have almost no predictive power on how happy you'll be in a situation, how you'll perform at your job, or how happy you'll be in your marriage." Apart from the 1st measure, I wholeheartedly agree. But that's not how it should be used "Actual data tells psychologists that these traits do not have a bimodal distribution. Tracking a group of people's interactions with others, for instance, shows that as Jung noted, there aren't really pure extroverts and introverts, but mostly people who fall somewhere in between." Correct. And people may be more introverted or extroverted in some situations. But it still measures if a certain person is more introverted than extroverted Now the warning about taking it as a clear-cut indicator of performance in a certain job or position is definitely correct
    - rimantas 11y ago
hanyoddha 11y ago
I wouldn't really call it pseudo-science. For long I really did think there was something wrong with me for not being able to choose what I wanted to do in life, since I enjoyed doing a lot of things. It would also be a major cause of depression for me. But it's only when I took the test that I figured out that there are so many out there who are facing similar day-to-day challenges like I am. There's comfort in knowing that. I'm also a part of the closed community ENFP group on Facebook and people really do have the same problem. Multiple careers, lack of clarity and focus.
- kybernetikos 11y ago
  The fact that these personality profiles can help people realise both that there are others like them and that different people may have different motivations and challenges is enormously useful and a valid insight. That does not mean that the profile itself is not pseudoscience though.
- shubhamjain 11y ago
  I am sorry but there is no reason to believe how a particular trait which troubles almost everyone can be based on a certain personality type. There are lots of take-an-interest-in-everything people out there who can't decide what they want to do, even though being particularly good at lots of things. I am not denying why this question might trouble you, it has troubled me for a long time myself but being a so called INTJ-type, I can't say if the personality-bucketing is the reason you should nail it down to.
  - fidrelity 11y ago
    What was your personal solution if I may ask?
    - shubhamjain 11y ago
      I am pretty happy that I am a generalist. I have been passionate about lots of things from front-end development, linux kernel internals to online marketing (although, I am pretty bad at that) and I believe, that's the reason I can suggest ideas to marketing people who don't know enough technology and to programmers who don't know enough marketing. However, I have learnt to separate facts from knowledge. Reading books about marketing will mostly give you facts without context but if you to talk to people who do marketing or try to raise a blog to several thousand subscribers, you will gain a lot of knowledge. Doing a lot of things, in my experience will give you more perspective and experience than anything else and frankly, there is enough time in the world to do that.
jiiam 11y ago
In Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup, I'm a SpWz of Gozag. In D&D, I'm a utility/crowd control generalist Elf Wizard. In real life I never bothered to check. It's not like I'll get any free spell out of it.
maus42 11y ago
I knew some people who took the DnD ability score classification seriously, and had trouble accepting anything different (some other tabletop RPGs who dared to have different list of abilities...) because they were not "real". (Okay that "some people" was actually me as kid.)
- jiiam 11y ago
  I know some adults who often say something and then continue "But I can't lie, I'm a paladin".
  - k__ 11y ago
    I liked the alignments. Never played DnD, but after reading the definitions, I and my friends found myself to be "chaotic neutral" :D

by llamaz 11y ago

B-Con 11y ago

There do seem to be patterns in personality, and I have found MB to be very helpful in getting a high-level overview of another person's general approach to the world. Reading the descriptions and discussing it with people led to a lot of "you think that way?" sort of moments from both sides. Very informative. I've found almost no helpful science on personality categorization (Big 5 is minimally helpful), so until there is I find this a useful starting tool. As a side note: The most misunderstood aspect of MBTI is that it's purely a system for categorizing high-level approach toward action and information in life. It's not what you must do, will do, can do, can't do, etc. It's only about certain aspects of outlook on life.

Swinx43 11y ago

I completely agree, this type of snake oil entrepreneurship is really getting on my nerves. It seems that peddling pseudo science is a very lucrative business opportunity and as such there is no small amount of people willing to jump on it. Another thing that truly gets me annoyed is the listing out of all these "things" that an author has been, none of them the reader would know if they have actually been any good at it. I could list a myriad of things "I have been" and make me look like a renaissance man except half of them I have been not even average at.

lmm 11y ago

It's not pseudo-science. It has been validated, and has good test-retest reliability by psychological standards (numbers off the top of my head but it's something like 80% immediately, and something like 65% after five years) - so it's measuring something, and that something is reasonably stable. What is true is that there's no bimodality in the distribution - each factor is a bell curve - and so talking about E/I is similar to talking about above-average IQ/below-average IQ rather than talking about the numbers. But it's not pseudo-science.

shubhamjain 11y ago
How has it been validated? Vox did an article on how it is based on unproven theories [1]. A proper validation in my impression would be if people are misattributed their personalities, will their psychological reaction to the result be different? Frankly, I don't think anyone should be excited by any test that says something positive about you. The big test is when it says negative things. For me, seeing all the personalities description, I can vaguely relate to all of them - a perfect showcase of Barnum effect [2]. [1]: http://www.vox.com/2014/7/15/5881947/myers-briggs-personality-test-meaningless http://www.vox.com/2014/7/15/5881947/myers-briggs-personalit... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barnum_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barnum_effect
- raverbashing 11y ago
  Rhetorical question: is eye color scientific? Do you believe in eye colors? Saying that MB is "not scientific" is laughable. It is a measure. Probably more scientific than deriving a measure called QI from 20 random questions You can of course question if conclusions based on each MB type are scientific. The personality descriptions for the most part are just concluded from the measure (which of course have some variance between people, it's not a cookie cutter approach) and of course some people have a different measure in each axis. If the descriptions fit you you're probably in the middle, because some of them certainly don't fit me From the link you quoted: "The characteristics measured by the test have almost no predictive power on how happy you'll be in a situation, how you'll perform at your job, or how happy you'll be in your marriage." Apart from the 1st measure, I wholeheartedly agree. But that's not how it should be used "Actual data tells psychologists that these traits do not have a bimodal distribution. Tracking a group of people's interactions with others, for instance, shows that as Jung noted, there aren't really pure extroverts and introverts, but mostly people who fall somewhere in between." Correct. And people may be more introverted or extroverted in some situations. But it still measures if a certain person is more introverted than extroverted Now the warning about taking it as a clear-cut indicator of performance in a certain job or position is definitely correct
  - rimantas 11y ago

hanyoddha 11y ago

I wouldn't really call it pseudo-science. For long I really did think there was something wrong with me for not being able to choose what I wanted to do in life, since I enjoyed doing a lot of things. It would also be a major cause of depression for me. But it's only when I took the test that I figured out that there are so many out there who are facing similar day-to-day challenges like I am. There's comfort in knowing that. I'm also a part of the closed community ENFP group on Facebook and people really do have the same problem. Multiple careers, lack of clarity and focus.

kybernetikos 11y ago
The fact that these personality profiles can help people realise both that there are others like them and that different people may have different motivations and challenges is enormously useful and a valid insight. That does not mean that the profile itself is not pseudoscience though.
shubhamjain 11y ago
I am sorry but there is no reason to believe how a particular trait which troubles almost everyone can be based on a certain personality type. There are lots of take-an-interest-in-everything people out there who can't decide what they want to do, even though being particularly good at lots of things. I am not denying why this question might trouble you, it has troubled me for a long time myself but being a so called INTJ-type, I can't say if the personality-bucketing is the reason you should nail it down to.
- fidrelity 11y ago
  What was your personal solution if I may ask?
  - shubhamjain 11y ago
    I am pretty happy that I am a generalist. I have been passionate about lots of things from front-end development, linux kernel internals to online marketing (although, I am pretty bad at that) and I believe, that's the reason I can suggest ideas to marketing people who don't know enough technology and to programmers who don't know enough marketing. However, I have learnt to separate facts from knowledge. Reading books about marketing will mostly give you facts without context but if you to talk to people who do marketing or try to raise a blog to several thousand subscribers, you will gain a lot of knowledge. Doing a lot of things, in my experience will give you more perspective and experience than anything else and frankly, there is enough time in the world to do that.

jiiam 11y ago

In Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup, I'm a SpWz of Gozag. In D&D, I'm a utility/crowd control generalist Elf Wizard. In real life I never bothered to check. It's not like I'll get any free spell out of it.

maus42 11y ago

I knew some people who took the DnD ability score classification seriously, and had trouble accepting anything different (some other tabletop RPGs who dared to have different list of abilities...) because they were not "real". (Okay that "some people" was actually me as kid.)

jiiam 11y ago
I know some adults who often say something and then continue "But I can't lie, I'm a paladin".
- k__ 11y ago
  I liked the alignments. Never played DnD, but after reading the definitions, I and my friends found myself to be "chaotic neutral" :D