Should we trust our MBTI results? Expert discusses why we love personality tests and if they’re useful
- Myers-Briggs Type Indicator categorises people into 16 personality types, but don’t put your complete faith in your result – these can change over time
- Every week, Talking Points gives you a worksheet to practise your reading comprehension with exercises about the story we’ve written
Personality tests may be fun, but they shouldn’t be taken too seriously. Photo: Shutterstock“What’s your MBTI?” Whether you’re meeting a new classmate or going on a date, people often use the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator personality test results to describe who they are – and figure out if you’ll be compatible. But can a single test adequately characterise your personality?
Young Post spoke to Peter Chan Kin-yan, a psychology educator, to understand just how much faith to put in your MBTI results.
According to Chan, people are often excited when their test results match their personality because it is rooted in their need to be understood by others.
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For example, on dating platforms, users introduce themselves using their MBTI test results because they want to connect with a potential partner.
“Making sense of interpersonal relationships and the feeling of being understood are the major motivations that attract many people to do the MBTI personality test,” said Chan, who is also the founder of TreeholeHK, a company that promotes psychology education.
But he noted that we should be careful not to place too much trust in these results to define us.
What is the MBTI test?
The MBTI test categorises your personality based on how you respond to a questionnaire.
It uses four categories of indicators, with letters referring to each one: extroversion (E) and introversion (I) describe someone’s attitude to interpersonal interactions; sensing (S) and intuition (N) define how people obtain information from the external environment; thinking (T) and feeling (F) explain if the person tends to make decisions based on facts or emotions; judging (J) and perceiving (P) show someone’s attitude to their external environment.
Your MBTI result has four letters, one from each category, so there are a total of 16 different personality types that people could fall under.
But to decide if this test was well-made, we must see if it is reliable and valid, Chan explained.
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Reliability is based on the stability of test results, while validity depends on whether the test can actually measure someone’s personality.
But according to Chan, the MBTI test’s questions fail to dig deep, so respondents get varying results when they take it multiple times.
Chan pointed out: “50 to 60 per cent of people have unstable results ... which is why we consider the reliability of the MBTI test as inadequate.”
The psychology educator said some respondents would find this test to be accurate to how they see themselves, but this would not always be the case.
Misconceptions about personality types
There are also widespread misunderstandings about some of the categories on the MBTI test.
For example, in the extroversion and introversion category, many people think that introverted individuals are not as good at socialising.
But Chan pointed out that being introverted or extroverted does not have a direct impact on one’s social skills.
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“Many people may ignore the fact that the dichotomy of extroversion does not only include socialising preferences but also in general how many positive emotions the person can receive,” Chan added, noting that introverts would still experience positive emotions, such as happiness and hope, just comparatively less so than extroverts.
He explained that introverted people might tend to feel less excitement from surprise or risk. This could affect how they interact with people since they might not be as responsive when communicating. But keep in mind that introversion and extroversion are just categories that might not fully describe the full range of people’s personalities.
Beyond the label
Instead of trusting personality tests to have the final say on who you are, Chan recommended thinking more critically about your results: how does this personality label relate to your everyday life, and does it match the type of social life you envision?
“People tend to believe the information provided by an authority ... However, they don’t really reflect on it,” Chan noted, cautioning against relying too much on personality tests.
“Personality tests, especially type-based tests, carry a message to divide people into different categories, making it seem like you are born to be that type of person,” he said. “[It’s] less likely to focus on the fact that people can actually change.”
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Chan cited American psychologist Dan P. McAdams, who claimed that personality tests are “a psychology of the stranger” as they define people without taking into account their individual histories and the challenges they face.
Thus, tests like the MBTI can only provide generalised labels that may not always be applicable.
Chan warned against relying on personality tests to understand who you are.
“Treat these kinds of personality tests like a friend who tells you what they think about you. Meanwhile, you can actually have your own say,” the psychology educator said.
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