What is the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) test?
You may have heard people referring to themselves as these random letters before; INFP, or ESTJ, amongst many. These combinations of letters are in reference to the MBTI which tells us a specific personality type. You may be wondering what the use of this information is. How can we use it to our benefit? What do these letters actually mean?
There are 16 possible personality types one can be. The first letter is either an E or an I, relating to whether you are more extroverted or introverted. The second being N or S, being more intuitive or sensing. The third is F or T, meaning feeler or thinker; and the last being J or P, judger or perceiver. The test works by asking about certain scenarios and having you answer how you would respond to the situation. Everyone fits into a category although the degrees of one of the traits may vary. Due to this, one’s results may differ after a substantial amount of time as the person is growing and changing and their responses may change too.
So who created this test, and why? The original creators of the MBTI were Katharine Cook Briggs and her daughter, Isabel Briggs Myers in the early to mid-20th century. It all began with Isabel’s at-the-time fiancée, who Katharine noticed saw the world very differently. She was inspired to research personality type theory and come up with a literature review of her findings. Another important person in this narrative is the Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung. When developing her idea, she stumbled across Jung’s published ‘Psychological Types’ which she found to have many similarities with her theory, except Jung’s paper was far more developed.
Nowadays, the MBTI test is used by people from all different walks of life. Whether it be a school student trying to figure out what their future might look like, to firms seeing the valuable assets of their employees, we can learn a lot through the results of the test. Each personality type is different in their own ways with many people having come up with good descriptions of the skill sets one may have. It may tell you if you are a good leader, or if you talk to people easily, or even if you are the more creative type of person. Sometimes it can be hard to conclude for ourselves what our personality is like, the MBTI generalizes our strengths and weaknesses and helps us look for our valuable assets to help us be successful.
A common use of the test is in the workplace. Companies often make their employees take the test to understand how to best respond to their workers and to utilise their personalities to maximise efficiency and minimise conflict. By learning how one is likely to react/respond to a situation, it can become much easier to prevent conflicts and assign people to projects that suit their talents.
You yourself may have taken this test before, and it can actually be very useful to students like us who are making decisions that will affect our futures. Many websites have adaptations of the tests which can help tell you which occupations may be suited to your personality. If you have good leadership skills, certain jobs like CEO, managers, etc. would come naturally to you and be easier for you to excel at. They may influence your subject choices and maybe how your future will go.
If you haven’t taken the test, you should give it a go. You never know what information you will learn about yourself and how you can use it to get the most out of your life.
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