You seemed to have missed my point. Take someone that actually is an ESFP. The smarter they are, the more likely they will be mistyped as N or T.
Why is that? Because they are using their N and T skills for their specific tasks even though their general temperament is S or F?
What I'm saying is that there's not a uniform distribution among people that are mistyped. Smarter Ss are mistyped more than less smart Ss.
Is there really any evidence for this? If this were true (which again, I wouldn't find highly unlikely), it would only mean that the Myer-Briggs test is not versatile enough to compensate for slight variances among each of the four "preferences." Again, "preference" in this case is supposed to be what your mind naturally prefers (leans towards), not what you want to be, which is what your general predilection is.
Unfortunately, most of the people that write these tests seem to have the same implicit premise as you, that N means smart and S means dumb. So they'll word the questions accordingly. This leads to smart Ss testing as N.
Don't know how to spell it out more than that.
First of all, how does this happen? I don't see that at all. What I
do see is that S is clearly inferior to N in almost all forms of reasoning apart from linear deduction when all the facts are known. That is, they can be just as proficient when it comes to
deducting information, especially when the goal and premise is clear, but they have a much more difficult time making inferences than N types.
Let me guess, you're also the type of guy who thinks that IQ tests can be inherently biased, am I right?
Don't know how to spell it out more than that.
I don't know where you got your ideas, but MBTI is about preference. Why do you think identical twins are different types?
Again, you misunderstand the way "preference" is used in MBTI.
As for identical twins, I can show you a study that has been conducted between fraternal and identical twins since they were in their infancy. The fraternal twins lived together for most of their lives, while the identical twins were separated at birth. To the surprise of the researchers, the identical twins showed closer signs of like minded thinking (most staggering was their similarity in IQ, which was as high as a correlation of .75!) while the fraternal twins living in with the same family showed a correlation of only .60. That is amazing, and further supports the ever growing theory that personality and intelligence (which manifests itself differently depending on one's personality) are much more genetic than they are influenced by society.
On that note, it is highly naive to think that identical twins share absolutely 100% of the same genes. There is growing evidence to support that they do not. And besides, nobody is discounting environmental factors. This isn't supposed to be a nurture vs. nature debate.
Here is one study:
About.com: http://www.ajhg.org/AJHG/fulltext/S0002-9297(08)00102-X
Here's another article based on this study:
Identical Twins Not As Identical As Believed
Sure, I grant that people within a type will have certain traits in common (otherwise, what's the point of typology?). Those traits usually have to do with what kinds of conversations are preferred or what hobbies people have. Or which majors people choose, or which roles they play socially.
I find it highly ironic that you accuse me of looking at the superficial aspect of the different personality types when you are clearly basing your entire argument on how the different types mingle in the world, as opposed to the driving factors behind their respective behaviors.
While it's quite possible that intelligence is correlated to these groupings,
Not just possible, probable. In the field of psychometry, behavioral psychology, and sociobiology, it is accepted by all but the most ignorant that intelligence influences many aspects of our lives, and through that we can infer that it is related to personality.
it's not like there are straight up causal links between intelligence and preference. And since accurate testing is so difficult, doing a study seems like it would get you nowhere.
Look at this article:
Personality Predictors Of Intelligence Change From Younger To Older Adulthood
The personality types described here almost perfectly match the description of N and S, which seems to be what you are clinging to for some strange reason, as I haven't necessarily specified that S and N alone play the definitive roles.
Basically, when it comes down to it, S types are better at storing and gathering factual knowledge, but N types are better at reasoning and understanding said knowledge, which is what general intelligence is all about.
So you have the final say in deciding whether someone is in a specific type?
No, the facts and empirical evidence have the final say. Honestly, are you seriously going to question my motives? You imply that you are older than I am, yet you show these reactionary fears of losing control of deciding what is what. C'mon...
Odd, because your whole stance can be explained away by confirmation bias.
Hahaha, I won't even bother defending myself against that. Ad hominem, anyone? Red Herring?
It would have to be proven. I agree.
Too much covariance. You keep assuming uniform distributions.
Yes, I think test results mean essentially nothing. Not because I need to "have options" or whatever, but because the data is so tainted that extracting good information from it is more work than just throwing the whole thing out and starting over.
The data isn't tainted, and that was the point I was trying to make when I stated that even if the test was correct 50% of the time, we could still derive conclusions from it. I did not mean that we should ignore those who are not being classed correctly (go back and read what I have stated: that we should disregard those who don't score properly because they are not taking the test honestly), but rather those who are deluding themselves. Would you think a math test was "inaccurate" because it failed to incorporate the scores of cheaters?
You realize that the MBTI only has four dimensions, correct? You can't take ALL of the attributes and compare them, or you're not using MBTI (which I would approve of actually). If you want a full comparison between two people, MBTI is a pretty bad tool. It's only useful for quick, shallow categorization. And it is quite good for what it does. It just loses power when you try to go more in depth in personality psychology.
Once again, if you are going to question the validity of the test (which I don't disagree with in some areas, primarily due to the fact that it allows for preference in your definition to occur, as I've stated several times now), there is no point in discussing this. Prove that the test is showing such large disparities between actual personality and scored personality, or else stop using it as a defense.
According to you, most people who take the test score very differently from their actual personality, which I find rather comical. Why would that be the case? A personality test is there to measure your personality, not your "ability" to reason like an IQ test. While your personality may influence the way you reason, it certainly has no bearing on you answering the test questions truthfully.
I would say that it is people who want to deceive themselves about their real personalities that are the larger problem than the construct of the test itself.
Yeah, it wasn't a great analogy. What I meant was, if you just know that a car is an SUV and another car is a sedan, you can't possibly know which one has a higher top-speed. Because you don't know what's under the hood. You may think SUVs are slower on average because they weigh more. But they also tend to have bigger engines on average. And you can't see the engine from just looking at the outside. You can know certain things, like a sedan is probably faster around turns, and an SUV is probably better off the road.
This analogy is worse than your other one.
But in order to do a good comparison, you need much more than a few surface level factors. You need to inspect the engine, drive each one around, etc.
That is exactly what I am doing.
My overall point is this: in comparing people, if you do a dimensionality reduction FIRST and then do the comparison, you lose lots of data. In fact, that's what the point of a dimensionality reduction is in the first place. To throw out data.
I'm not making a dimension reduction, I'm making a conclusion based on given variables. Basically, I am stating facts based on what I see. If you want to question my facts, which is what you are doing, it is a different discussion.
A psychological test cannot just disregard certain people who take it. If it does, it's a badly designed test. If I wrote an experiment in my lab that only got usable data for half the participants, my professor would tell me to get my ass back to work.
See above.
I mean...getting 95+% of people correctly categorized would be enough for me. 50% is definitely not enough, and I have doubts as to whether it's actually that high.
Proof?
Sorry, that was a jab. You just remind me of a typical smart nerdy person, rejected by society, that sits in his room and categorizes people, throwing out 90% of the population as stupid. "Oh, they're just idiots, they're jealous, I don't care about them"...it resolves the dissonance in your mind from being rejected even though you're intelligent. The truth is, though, if you don't get along with 90% of people, there's something wrong with your approach.
I understand, you're a typical NP who becomes rigid and defensive when somebody begins making classifications and deductions. You question all of the details in order to avoid making it "definitive." I understand that you cannot help it, I just find the irony of it highly entertaining, especially considering the situation and the contents of your posts.
I, too, drew too many inferences from MBTI right when I learned about it. It validated tons of things about my personality. But what's the point in feeling validated? It just means you're less motivated to change your strategies for dealing with the world.
You're young, you'll figure it out.
Hah, I'm an asshole.
You think that because I'm a new member on Typology Central, that I am "just learning" about MBTI?
You're not an asshole, you're more of a clown.
