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III. MYERS-BRIGGS TYPE THEORY

One of those influenced by Jung's work was Isabel Briggs Myers. During World War II, she and her mother, Katherine Camp Briggs, formalized the four aspects of personality uncovered by Jung. They then proceeded to gather data to determine whether or not her formalization (and, as its basis, Jung's enumeration of primary behavioral preferences) was justified.

The first step was to establish a notation for expressing the two possible choices for each of the four preferences. The eventual solution was an ordered string of four characters.

In the first position was the preference for socialization or solitude. These were called "Extraversion" and "Introversion," and were represented by the letters "E" and "I," respectively.

In the second position was the preference for the source of perceptions, called "iNtuition" and "Sensing." Intuition was represented by the letter "N" (since "I" had been taken by Introversion); Sensing was represented by the letter "S."

In the third position was the preference for the decision-making process, either Thinking ("T") or Feeling ("F").

And in the fourth and final position was the preference which guided the choice between decision-making and perception, either Judging (represented by "J") or Perceiving (represented by "P").

Thus, four preferences with two choices each led to a complete system of classification with sixteen possible combinations:

To test whether each of these sixteen "types" constituted a unique human personality style, and more generally whether or not the entire system was adequate in practice, the researchers developed a written questionnaire. Individuals could read a question which specifically tested on one of the four preferences, then mark the answer which best described them.

For example, consider the question: "When you're feeling some stress in your life, where would you rather to go to unwind? 1) your favorite pub, or 2) a quiet room of your home." This question helps determine whether the respondent more usually prefers extraversion or introversion; other questions work in the same way.

To help eliminate assessment error, the researchers tried to identify several different ways in which each preference is expressed through typical behavior. Then they translated those behaviors into questions. By testing each preference with many different questions, the accuracy of results was improved.

Years of further testing and refinement followed. Many of the results can be found in one of the first books produced on what is now known as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, Gifts Differing, but their overall import is to show very high levels of correlation between the sixteen Myers-Briggs types and actual personalities.

III. Myers-Briggs Type Theory

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