Is MBTI scientific?

          Have you heard of MBTI? Do you know what your MBTI type is? MBTI is an abbreviation of Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, also known as 16 personality Types (TalentLyft, 2023). The Mbti test was first administered by Catherine and her daughter, Isabel, and later used by the psychologist Carl Jung to distinguish between introverted and extroverted personalities (Simkus, 2023). Mbti is judged by four letters derived from eight words: introverts, extroverts, sensors, intuitives, thinkers, feelers, judgers and perceivers. Introverts and extroverts are grouped together, S and N are grouped together, T and F are grouped together, and J and P are grouped together. The test taker's result will consist of one of the letters from each group. If a test taker's result is infp, then his corresponding characteristics are: introvert, intuitive, feelers and perceiver.

          People have made a simple generalization of these eight words, and they can measure your personality traits with just a few questions:

    1. Which of the following will make you feel energetic?

     I: Being alone. E: Interacting with others

    2. When you study you focus more on understanding

    S: the practical use of this thing N: the principle of this thing

    3. When you see a friend crying you will

    T: Ask him why he is crying and comfort him

    F: You also want to cry

    4. You are about to go on a trip, you will

    J: Make a detailed travel plan

    P: No plans, play everywhere you go

         Combine your four letters and you will get the personality traits that belong to you. mbti was originally applied to give people to find their suitable career, but with the development of society it also has a lot of drawbacks, many people think that the mbti test is not scientific and accurate (Indeed Editor Team, 2023).

          First, the mbti lacks reliability. mbti developers Catherine and Isabel are a mother and daughter without any psychological training, which may make the test not stand up to scientific scrutiny. Some people may find that the results of the mbti change with each test. For example, the first time it is infj, the second time it becomes isfj, and in some cases, the results of the first and second times are even completely opposite. This could possibly be due to your level of exhaustion, focus, and the emotional impact of the moment. In psychological experiments, a test that lacks credibility is not a scientifically meaningful test. Credibility in psychology is divided into two categories one is reliability and the other is validity. reliability means that the results of the test are stable and validity means that what is measured is what is intended to be measured (Cherry,2023). A test with high reliability should have the same results no matter what is measured today or tomorrow, or wherever it is measured. The mbti falls far short of this goal, as it has no way of measuring the inherently stable personality traits of a person.

          Second, the mbti is a self-reflective, self-report mode test, so the tester is able to decide where the answers go. However, people can sometimes have difficulty making objective self-assessments (Dunning et.al, 2004). We may not fully understand ourselves, or have a false perception of ourselves, and these factors will affect the accuracy of the mbti test results.

         Thirdly, there are many external factors that can affect people when they take the mbti test. When people take the test, if they have a direction in mind that they want to achieve, then the choices they make will unconsciously converge in that direction. If a person wants his results to be extroverted, then when choosing, he will want to choose words like "likes to make friends," "loves to be around," and "talks well in a crowd" as the answer. Because he thinks that being outgoing will give him more social recognition or make him more likely to be accepted by companies. On the other hand, each set of mbti questions will have wording bias on the questions. This means that each respondent has a different understanding of the words that appear in the questions, which can lead to different results for people doing each set of questions. Cultural bias is also included in the test. People of different cultural groups and ethnicities have different interpretations of the subject matter (Study.com 2023). The type of person cannot simply be summed up by these eight words, it also includes your perseverance, your attitude towards people, etc. Sixteen personalities do not sum up all the personality traits of a person.

          Despite these disadvantages of the mbti, why do many people still want to believe in it? The main reason is that people are eager to understand themselves: how they are different from others, whether my personality and behavior are consistent, etc. mbti does provide a perspective for people. In addition, mbti enables people to quickly label themselves and others, which is a quick way to get to know others.

          The negative effects of mbti on people should not be overlooked. If you trust it blindly, you will justify your failures and believe that you are the person described in the mbti. Mbti limits people. It also has the potential to bring about employment discrimination, such as some companies preferring to hire candidates with a particular mbti (Song, 2022). Using unscientific tests to take employees is clearly an unreasonable way to go. Some people will prefer to tolerate huddles with similar types of mbti to their own and reject other socialization.

           The mbti is better used as a recreational test than a formal assessment, used to provide a path to understanding oneself. But it is not advisable to be convinced of its results. Because people's personalities are constantly evolving and changing, and personalities are likely to be influenced by their surroundings, we need to confront our personalities with a developmental perspective, and also use other more correct methods, such as asking parents and friends, to understand our true selves.

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