The Myers-Briggs Personality Test Is Pretty Much Meaningless • Hacker News Board

Re: The Myers-Briggs Personality Test Is Pretty Much Meaningless

#231

Post by Xcelerate » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 5:20 PM UTC

This is a subject I spend a lot of time reading about. It's interesting because I think the field of psychology is going to have a bit of a (computational) overhaul soon as we acquire more data about people and develop new models of behavior. I wouldn't be surprised if machine learning ends up revolutionizing psychology twenty years form now.

A few points:

- Science is concerned with making accurate predictions about the future

- Predictions range in quality: QFT can predict the gyromagnetic moment of the electron to 12 decimal places, but psychiatrists still have trouble figuring out which medications serve as effective antidepressants (nothing against them — it's a complex subject)

Also, good science is able to find correlations between things, and these correlations allow you to improve your predictions. How much of the variance in a dataset is explained by a given model? In this sense:

- Astrology has almost zero predictivity (I say "almost" because there are extremely weak, but non-zero correlations with the month that someone was born in)

- Myers-Briggs has weak, but non-zero predictivity that is still much higher than that of astrology

- Big Five has weak, but non-zero predictivity that is slightly higher than Myers-Briggs

- The field of psychology has weak, but non-zero predictivity (http://www.nature.com/news/over-half-of-psychology-studies-f...)

- The field of biology has adequate predictivity

- The field of particle physics has extremely high predictivity

See where I'm going with this? The math may be hard, but quantum mechanics is actually pretty easy as far as accurately predicting the future goes. Understanding the human brain is a far more difficult task than making sense of C* algebras.

There's been quite a few studies on Myers-Briggs, and I think it has more value than the Smithsonian article gives it credit for. That said, I think Big Five has much less value than most psychologists give it credit for.

In terms of determining the eigenfactors of personality, something recent like this goes much further than Big Five:

http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/doi/pdf/10.1176/ajp.161.10.1...

Re: The Myers-Briggs Personality Test Is Pretty Much Meaningless

#232

Post by marcosdumay » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 5:21 PM UTC

77pt77 wrote: post #164

amelius wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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> MBTI has predictive power; for starters, it is used by companies to test if a person is fit for certain tasks. This is a null argument. Unless you show that those predictions actually assess whether someone is fit for those tasks this is absolutely content free.

That kind of makes sense, in a kafkan way, in a society so full of preparatory courses that will teach you how to do a test (instead of the contents of the test), or how to perform in interviews.

Re: The Myers-Briggs Personality Test Is Pretty Much Meaningless

#233

Post by triplesec » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 5:22 PM UTC

david927 wrote: post #193

triplesec wrote: post #13

It's basically horoscope for geeks More articles https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/give-and-take/201309/go... Edit: http://www.forbes.com/sites/toddessig/2014/09/29/the-mysteri... And the Guardian article https://www.theguardian.com/science/brain-flapping/2013/mar/...

I think your missing the point. Do you know what flavor of ice cream you like? I think you do -- and why not know that about yourself? Everyone is some range of introverted to extroverted, for example. It's their preference, such as the flavor of ice cream they like. It can change often, under circumstances, or even not be present, of course. It's not set in stone; it's just a preference. It doesn't define you; you d…

I'd prefer a questionnaire which provides the benefits of self-questioning towards better self knowledge and actualisation. This can be done without MBTI which adds pseudo-science on top of any questioning it might provide, which falsely formalises bull and fossilises fake intellectual structures into public consciousness.

The scales are unsound. They actively direct people away from curiosity in discovering other structures which are less wrong.

Re: The Myers-Briggs Personality Test Is Pretty Much Meaningless

#234

Post by TheSpiceIsLife » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 5:22 PM UTC

whitehouse3 wrote: post #223

TheSpiceIsLife wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your comment works surprisingly well like this: As an individual (Taurus) thoroughly interested in astrology, I often see this discussion brought up. As a short rebuttal, I feel as though many of those who tout astrology as a comprehensive personality test fail to understand what astrology attempts to identify. While the "value-add" is more subjective, I'm going to go ahead and say it's not as useless as this article…

No, that doesn't work at all. OP is saying that he draws conclusions about someone's personality based on the Meyers-Briggs type with which they identify. That logic doesn't apply to the zodiac because your star-sign is based on your birthday. People don't lie about their birthday to become a Virgo. But they might fudge the answers to the Meyers-Briggs survey so they appear more "introverted" and "thinking". If you c…

That logic doesn't apply to the zodiac

Sure it does. I've met people who will say things like "My sun sign is Virgo, but my personality is dominated by my Sagittarius moon", and then later say something like "I'm going through Saturn return, no wonder Pisces is such an influence".

If you compare someone's self-view ("I'm an Aries!") with their behavior (definitely a Gemini), you can draw conclusions. It's standard practice in astrology.

Re: The Myers-Briggs Personality Test Is Pretty Much Meaningless

#235

Post by grandalf » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 5:25 PM UTC

analog31 wrote: post #174

grandalf wrote: post #41

I've found that Meyers Briggs feels accurate to people whose classifications don't fall right on the margin. If two of the letters fall close to the margin, parts of the description will feel a bit inaccurate. In my opinion, the Meyers Briggs is useful mainly because it can help people become more self-aware and more empathetic toward others. I've observed that in a group of 15 people who just got their Meyers Briggs…

In my opinion, the Meyers Briggs is useful mainly because it can help people become more self-aware and more empathetic toward others. Could this be the placebo effect? I once read a comment, that all self-help methods are successful, simply because they make you self conscious. The personality test gives the impression of being a carefully developed machine that can peer into your soul. Does it need to be real, in o…

> On the other hand, in a workplace situation, the defensive ones are simply not thinking tactically.

Haha absolutely true. It puzzles me that anyone would react that way.

Your points are totally valid. For me, the interesting part was reading my own results and thinking about my reaction to them, and watching people I know pretty well reading and reacting to theirs.

Also, the way the results are framed teases apart some of the more "identity-oriented" aspects of peoples' personalities and validates them as legitimate rather than (perhaps) annoying quirks. I think this can lead to empathy.

So I don't really think it matters how psychologically real the assessment is, so long as it's interesting, relatively repeatable, and useful in the sense I mentioned. Just my opinion though. In the workplace I've used it before alongside a few other metrics (like DISC and one other private one) as part of a fun "learn about each other" exercise. I would not use it for hiring decisions or as part of any kind of official HR oriented policy.

Re: The Myers-Briggs Personality Test Is Pretty Much Meaningless

#236

Post by TheSpiceIsLife » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 5:28 PM UTC

gnaritas wrote: post #227

TheSpiceIsLife wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your comment works surprisingly well like this: As an individual (Taurus) thoroughly interested in astrology, I often see this discussion brought up. As a short rebuttal, I feel as though many of those who tout astrology as a comprehensive personality test fail to understand what astrology attempts to identify. While the "value-add" is more subjective, I'm going to go ahead and say it's not as useless as this article…

They are not remotely comparable, Meyers Briggs is descriptive, Astrology is prescriptive and it's the prescriptive part that is nonsense. There is no connection to your personality and your birth date. Meyers Briggs is a classification system that groups similar personalities, it does not prescribe what your personality is or should be.

Astrology is prescriptive

If you disregard the people who claim astrology is prescriptive, and pay attention to only those aspects of it that describe tendencies - all the most convincing astrology nuts I've met do this - it can be quite... warming.

Re: The Myers-Briggs Personality Test Is Pretty Much Meaningless

#237

Post by oldmanjay » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 5:29 PM UTC

bunderbunder wrote: post #224

n-exploit wrote: post #24

As an individual (INFJ) thoroughly interested in Myers-Briggs, I often see this discussion brought up. As a short rebuttal, I feel as though many of those who tout Myers-Briggs as a comprehensive personality test fail to understand what the Myers-Briggs attempts to identify. While the "value-add" is more subjective, I'm going to go ahead and say it's not as useless as this article claims. While I don't think anyone (…

As a conversation piece, sure, it is an interesting framework. As a tool, though, its utility remains doubtful. Its test-retest reliability is very low, meaning that, if you give the same person the test at two different times, you're likely to get two different results. This strongly suggests that, while the test might capture aspects of a person's personality, it's also functioning like a glorified mood ring. Witho…

Seems like a great tool for a science that draws conclusions first and looks for evidence later, as I've been led to believe has been happening in psychology.

Re: The Myers-Briggs Personality Test Is Pretty Much Meaningless

#238

Post by grandalf » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 5:29 PM UTC

Bartweiss wrote: post #126

grandalf wrote: post #41

I've found that Meyers Briggs feels accurate to people whose classifications don't fall right on the margin. If two of the letters fall close to the margin, parts of the description will feel a bit inaccurate. In my opinion, the Meyers Briggs is useful mainly because it can help people become more self-aware and more empathetic toward others. I've observed that in a group of 15 people who just got their Meyers Briggs…

> I've found that Meyers Briggs feels accurate to people whose classifications don't fall right on the margin. If two of the letters fall close to the margin, parts of the description will feel a bit inaccurate. Unfortunately, the traits investigated by the MBTI seem to be normally distributed. So as true as this is, it still means that people who are decisively placed on all four axes are the exception rather than t…

True, in my case I'm close to the P/J line and the E/I line, so there are aspects of the ENTJ, INTJ, and INTP that ring true to me, but in spite of that the ENTP description tends to feel more accurate.

Nonetheless, one meets a lot of ENTJs and INTPs and understanding some of the subtle differences between those and ENTP has helped me understand my differences and similarities with those people better.

Re: The Myers-Briggs Personality Test Is Pretty Much Meaningless

#239

Post by grandalf » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 5:30 PM UTC

imagist wrote: post #153

grandalf wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it isn't going to tell you anything you don't already think. Well, if you take a 2000 word write-up about your own type, there may be some thought-provoking generalizations either about your own type or about patterns that are consistent when people of different types interact... things which derive from what you believed about yourself but are consequences of the MBTI's generalizations about human interactions. Bu…

> Well, if you take a 2000 word write-up about your own type, there may be some thought-provoking generalizations either about your own type or about patterns that are consistent when people of different types interact... things which derive from what you believed about yourself but are consequences of the MBTI's generalizations about human interactions. Right, but how many of those generalizations are actually verif…

I don't know whether they are verified. Not sure how much it matters though, if the goal is to foster self-understanding and communication between people with different personalities. Obviously it would be great if there were research offering a more robust version of all of that.

Re: The Myers-Briggs Personality Test Is Pretty Much Meaningless

#240

Post by Xcelerate » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 5:32 PM UTC

ivraatiems wrote: post #12

This is not a new finding. MBTI has never really been a serious psychological tool. In fact, a lot of the personality assessments used in business are really just woo - MBTI isn't even the worst. It at least is internally consistent. For a real personality exam with actual use in psych research, check out the Five Factor metric.

Five Factor is not much better than MBTI. See http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/doi/pdf/10.1176/ajp.161.10.1... for better (and more recent) research on the subject.