Research on MBTI type and dissociative disorders?

[ubiquitin]

Is anyone aware of research that studies how MBTI type or Jungian types would be expressed/observed in a person who also is on the dissociative disorder spectrum?

While I realize MBTI considers itself invalid for individuals with psychiatric illness, that would mean it is technically invalid for about 18% of each year, thus is a bit of a weak argument from an exploratory perspective that assumes innate personality type at birth as MBTI does. The question would be what would one observe in a given MBTI type after developing a dissociative disorder?

(As an aside, these disorders can contain a very wide range of severity, from common things like absentmindedly driving home from work to very severe multiple personality disorder. This book is a very good discussion of how the continuum is seen and how those in the middle look-sort of fragmented in personality but still very aware of a single self)

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Oh-the book: The Stranger in the Mirror: The Hidden Epidemic - Kindle edition by Marlene Steinberg M.D., Maxine Schnall. Health, Fitness & Dieting Kindle eBooks @ Amazon.com.

 

[Eric B]

I've never really heard of a study on types and dissociative disorders, but I've always correlated the types with the classic temperaments, based on the five temperament; three areas of need system known as the Arno Profile System.

In one of their counselor manuals (my wife had gotten a license to use it for awhile) there was a case study of someone with DID, and they gave each personality an APS Response form, and got different temperaments:

Using my correlations: (APS initials: G=sanGuine, S=Supine, other three [M,C,P] are simply first letter, _c=Compulsive variant, _P is Phlegmatic blend; combos are Inclusion-Control-Affection, with type corresponding to Inclusion [Interaction Style] + Control [Keirsey temperament])

G-P-G (ENFP) [initial test]
Gc-GP-Gc (ESFP)
Mc-Cc-Mc (INTJ)
Mc-S-Mc (INFJ)
Mc-P-Mc (INFJ)

Continuing therapy, they eventually determined the true temperament:
G-C-P (ENTP)

When you consider the notion that "dissociation" is the normal separation of our "complexes" (ego states), and so multiple personalities are just complexes that have differentiated too greatly, then it makes sense they might have different types. (The complexes associated by Beebe with the eight function stack for each type basically use their associated function-attitude as their own "dominant").

 

[dougvincent1138]

I've never heard of such a study either, but I came across your question when I was trying to find out the same thing. I have a very personal interest in wanting to know about this. You see, I have dissociative identity disorder myself. I can tell you that we do, in fact, have different MBTI results. We found that out by having several of our parts/alters take the test. Unfortunately, when I signed up on this site, it would only let me put in one MBTI type. I guess that's understandable, since sites like this aren't really built for people like us! So I put in "my" type. My name is Leyna, a female part within a male body, and I am the one of "us" who is most fascinated with the MBTI and psychology in general. I think that comes from the fact that when we were misdiagnosed for nine years, I felt like our therapists were being more confusing than helpful a lot of times, so I felt the need to become our own therapist in a sense. At the time, we only knew about Doug and myself. We know now that we have 70 parts/alters. So far 16 of us have taken the MBTI (or at least a simplified online version of it) and we have 11 different types out of those 16 parts. We have more in the Diplomat category than any other category, so we think that means that if we had not become DID, we probably would have been one of the types in that category. Feel free to ask me more questions if you are interested in knowing more about DID or me/us specifically. I really enjoy teaching people about DID, since unfortunately all most people know about it comes from movies like M. Night Shyalaman's "Split", which are horribly inaccurate and downright slanderous. So I hope you will ask me questions. Have a great day, and hope to hear from you soon! - Leyna