Navigating Typology Criticisms: Insights for Practitioners and Enthusiasts

Episode Title: Navigating Typology Criticisms: Insights for Practitioners and Enthusiasts

Description: In this episode of Beyond Personality Types, hosts Olivier Caudron and Linda Berens delve into the common criticisms of personality assessment tools like the MBTI. They discuss issues of scientific validity, cultural bias, and misuse of typology systems. Learn strategies for ethical application and accurate self-discovery to enhance your practice. Perfect for personality type practitioners and enthusiasts seeking to use these tools effectively and responsibly.

Keywords: MBTI, personality typology, Linda Berens, Olivier Caudron, personality assessment, scientific validity, cultural bias, ethical use, self-discovery, personality type practitioners

Duration: [00:26:11]

Release Date: 01/08/2025

Linda Berens  [00:00:00]:
You're dealing with people's lives. Once people say that they have a type preference and if it doesn't fit them and they act it out, then they're going against the grain of their nature.

Olivier Caudron [00:00:13]:
Hello, and thank you for tuning in. Today, we are diving into why the Myers Briggs Type Indicator, MBTI, among other assessment tools, gets some criticism. If you're a personality type practitioner or a type enthusiast, you'll want to pay attention. We'll discuss the biggest criticism of these tools, from questions about their scientific grounding to worries about cultural bias. Linda will share her insights on how these assessments can be misused and misunderstood and strategies for addressing these issues. We're here to help you navigate these challenges so you can use these tools more effectively and ethically. Whether you're looking to enhance your practice or just curious about the debate, this episode has got you covered.

Olivier Caudron [00:01:07]:
Let's get started and make sense of these controversies together. While personality assessments like MBTI, Enneagram, and Big 5 have gained immense popularity, they have also faced scrutiny for their accuracy and effectiveness. Critics argue that these tests are too simplistic, culturally biased, and lack scientific validation. However, proponents of personality typology argue that these assessments offer valuable insights into human behavior and can improve self awareness and relationships. Linda, why do you think approaches like personality typology are criticized lately?

Linda Berens  [00:01:58]:
Actually, that's a long standing thing. They've been under criticisms almost from the time I've been involved in type, which goes way back to 1976, if I remember right. But there is. And part of that is because there are some people who misuse such instruments like using them for hiring or firing or deciding who to marry. Those are actually illegal to use them for those kinds of things, especially hiring and firing. There's some good reason for that. And there's also criticisms about the accuracy of them. So they'll say, well, I took it 2 years ago when I came out x y z, and then the next time I took it at a, b, c.

Linda Berens  [00:02:44]:
There's another piece of that is that people don't like to be categorized. They don't like to be boxed in, and they have sort of an assumption that these instruments or tests are going to give them an answer that is then when somebody else knows about it, they will limit them or that they will self limit. So that's my sense of a couple of reasons why that criticism is there. It's true to some degree. People do misuse them. Even well trained practitioners sometimes use language that inadvertently leads to their misuse.

Olivier Caudron [00:03:21]:
What do you mean?

Linda Berens  [00:03:23]:
Well, just to take the Myers Briggs because I know that's the one that this particular podcast will focus on, at least the Jungian theory. In my day, they were qualifying programs that I taught for the Myers Briggs type indicator. They're now called certification programs. They're different than when I taught them, but there were certain best practices. And sometimes, people will say, you're a this. You're an extrovert. You're an introvert, for example. And sometimes they don't watch the tone.

Linda Berens  [00:03:54]:
And so sometimes even though they've taken training, the practitioners may inadvertently not set the stage for it to be the person's choice about how how to behave, like the framing that you give for the Myers Briggs, for example, should include all kinds of things that that make it safe to answer those questions, ensuring confidentiality and some other ethical things. Even practitioners who go through that, they get into a habit to saying, oh, well, I'm a t and and you're an f, and so that's why we do these things, when that may have nothing to do with that. We might do these be different in our perspectives because of your profession and my profession, or from your culture, which might be more collectivist and mine might be more individualist. And then the mindset of the receivers, the people that are used to that, they will tend to do the labeling many, many times. And then it's not easy for the facilitator to correct that because then you don't wanna make people wrong.

Olivier Caudron [00:05:02]:
Mhmm.

Linda Berens  [00:05:02]:
It still persists, so I think there's some legitimacy to the criticisms. But most of the time, the criticisms are made where people don't really understand.

Olivier Caudron [00:05:13]:
My experience with, for instance, the Myers Briggs, the MBTI, I took it 6 years ago or more. I took it but through a book. That book was helping for career. Be sure that you are in the right career. At that time, I was, coaching people to find a career. So the book was very helpful. That was my first introduction to the MBTI approach. So I got a result, and then I went online, and I had another result.

Olivier Caudron [00:05:49]:
But I said, oh, it's not a problem. But 2 years later, I took the test again, and I came with another result. That's why I started looking to understand why I was always coming up with another result. Is it me the problem, or is it the system? As you said, that even though I was not with a practitioner, I was doing all by myself. It was very frustrating. Yet that's great because that allowed me to meet you and work with you. That's good. That's very positive. But that's one problem, relying on the results of a test to know who we are.

Linda Berens  [00:06:33]:
Well, there are all kinds of variables with that. One of the variables is the instrument, the construction, and the validity studies that are done, and validity studies are very difficult to do. You can do validity studies by comparing it to another instrument, but to really get a best fit study, there has to be a process where the practitioner helps the person actually verify the fit through narrative descriptions, not just a few bullet points and their own expertise. In the old days, when I was doing those MBTI trainings and I was training other practitioners to do this, first of all, we emphasized the framing and the setup. The framing is the instructions you give somebody ahead of time. So I give them a framework, and I I use this in the training of there's your core self, your developed self, and your contextual self in those concentric circles, and you're all of that. What we're looking for with this is who are you at your core. So not thinking about your particular role or job or any particular behaviors.

Linda Berens  [00:07:45]:
Those days I was using the instrument. So I would say reproach these things from how you've been over your lifetime, if you can have that frame of reference. And then there's all this other ethical stuff about it's important that you let people know that it's confidential, that you do a feedback session with them. So the fact now that it's all over the web, it's not really the Myers Briggs that's all over the web. But I think there is a version where you got a result. Right? Yeah. So there are other instruments. I've heard that one of the instruments that's very popular, I'm not gonna name it.

Linda Berens  [00:08:21]:
I've heard that it is actually not based on Jungian theory. It's based on the big five, but it uses the four letter type codes and presents some descriptions that people relate to. So different instrument construction, how they're doing it, that can be problematic. In the very beginning of my work doing these MBTI qualifying programs, we were introducing Temperament from what I learned from David Keirsey alongside the Myers Briggs to be used with that because it does relate. There are 4 temperament patterns, and there's 16 personality type patterns in those patterns, 4 of each. Right? It was useful. But we didn't have an instrument to get a data point, so we did a self discovery process. In the process of doing

Olivier Caudron [00:09:08]:
David Keirsley was prominent American psychologist, author, and professor. Keirsey's research into human behavior led him to a fascinating discovery, the patterns of 4 temperaments in historical literature. This unique perspective sparked his interest and set him on path of revolutionary work. In the nineteen fifties, he started applying his theories as an educational psychologist developing techniques in training and coaching. In 1978, he published his groundbreaking book, Please Understand Me, which introduced the Kiersey Temperament Sorter to the world. His most significant contributions to the field of psychology was combining the 4 temperament types with Isabel Briggs Myers' Jungian model of 8 function types. This integration resulted in a more comprehensive set of temperaments that encompassed the 16 personality types.

Linda Berens  [00:10:12]:
Discovery process. In the process of doing that, we had to explain the 4 temperament patterns, like, now call them essential motivator patterns. And then people just had to say, well, this is what fits me. And then we would do an activity, put people into groups, but we also linked it to the type code. And what we found was that those weren't matching up. If I can tell a story, that's helpful. One of the first Myers Briggs type indicator trainings I did with Margaret Hartzler, Margaret and Gary Hartzler's qualifying program. I did those with them for a long time.

Linda Berens  [00:10:48]:
We put people into temperament alike groups.

Olivier Caudron [00:10:52]:
Gary Hartzler started his work in type as manager and organization development consultant in 1976. He was on the founding board of directors for the Association For Psychological Type. Gary co developed the function skill development assessment, a tool for individuals to self assess their level of development of each of the 8 Jungian functions. Gary had authored or co authored books and many articles on the use of type and type development. Margaret Hartzler began her work on type in 1977, doing research for her master's and PhD that involved type. In 1983, she formed an organization with her husband, Gary Hartzler, and Kathy Myers that developed and offered the 1st publicly advertised professional MBTI qualifying program. She designed and delivered a variety of training programs using type and has authored or coauthored books about how to use type theory. One of their most famous books is Functions of Type, Activities For Developing the 8 Jungian Functions.

Linda Berens  [00:12:12]:
I did those with them for a long time. We put people into temperament alike groups. I can't remember what the assignment was, but they were doing a report out. And this one woman went to what we now call stabilizer, the s and j in the type code. There was a group with SP preferences and NT preferences and NF preferences. That's how we group them. And she was doing the report out, and the group from the SP, which we call improviser, Keisey called it artisan, there was someone in that group, the SP preference, questioned her about it and and questioned the group. And they said, was she the most talkative or takeovers? I don't think they said take over the group, but something to that effect.

Linda Berens  [00:12:57]:
They said, well, yeah. So, basically, she's a very animated active person. That doesn't mean that those with the stabilizer s j pattern can't be animated, but there was something different about her. And I had just said to her early on, well, did you ever look at ESTP? And she said no. I didn't tell her to do it, so she just said no. And so she looked at it over lunch. And actually, we did this program where they had to present their type to the group after lunch. And so she was prepared, turned on a dime, figured it out, did the most entertaining set of stories really about what it was like to be her growing up, which did not fit that pattern that those with SJ preferences had.

Linda Berens  [00:13:49]:
After that, I kept seeing over the all of the years that I did MBTI qualifying programs, time after time, I didn't collect data, but I would say 40% of the people came in, and they changed something by the end of the class once they got clearer. Well, of course, they had 5 to 6 days with me or with us, the facilitators, and lots of activities. They had some statistics, tests and measures stuff as well, but they had a more experiential diving deeper into it. After that, I realized that the instrument themselves had a bigger error rate than we thought it did.

Olivier Caudron [00:14:26]:
How do you realize that?

Linda Berens  [00:14:28]:
Those people would identify with something different. And then eventually, what's now called the Myers Briggs company, the publisher developed a new instrument because you, with instruments, you have to update and do new studies all the time. They took a bunch of different practitioners and had them give the Myers Briggs, and then they would do some verification of their type. And then that was reported in percent agreement, which is not a very good statistic because it can't prove anything with it. It's just numbers. Mhmm. But it still provided some data. And even with 2,000 people, they came up with, I think, about an average of 80% accuracy.

Linda Berens  [00:15:13]:
May have been less than that.

Olivier Caudron [00:15:14]:
80%, Linda, is already a lot.

Linda Berens  [00:15:18]:
Yeah. And that, you know, the range of things was 20% with one group of people that best agreed with best fit. And then some others, it was higher. That data supported my belief that very often the instrument results are inaccurate.

Olivier Caudron [00:15:36]:
What should be the percentage to have an accurate instrument?

Linda Berens  [00:15:41]:
I would say you're dealing with people's lives.

Olivier Caudron [00:15:45]:
What do you mean?

Linda Berens  [00:15:46]:
Once people say that they have a tight preference, and if it doesn't fit them and they act it out, then they're going against the grain of their nature, and so it can do harm. I would like to see a higher accuracy rate. It may have been less than 80%. My sense is it's about 40% wrong, 60% right. Now there are so many instruments that are out there online that aren't really put through a rigorous validation process. And when you take an instrument in a context like a work context, it may feel like your job is at risk. So there are all these other variables.

Olivier Caudron [00:16:27]:
Got it. Yeah. In my case, each results and the report I was getting was, of course, explaining a part of myself. Yeah. It shocked me more because I had a different result each time, and that led me to think that I was the problem, not the system.

Linda Berens  [00:16:49]:
Exactly. That too can happen. And now there's much more type awareness. So if people just accept that result, then other people are likely to treat them differently and make assumptions about who they are. Then it can have an effect on your relationships. Other thing I wanted to say is that it ain't easy. Because in my experience and based on a variety of opinions of people, I guess, in some research, type patterns do tend to stay the same over time, but you can't use an instrument to assess that, if that makes sense, because of the error rate. You'd have to have an instrument that already had a pretty high rate of agreement.

Linda Berens  [00:17:34]:
But the thing is that when people are younger, their self awareness may not be to the point where they can answer those questions. As people grow and develop, they develop different sides of themselves. My premise and my strong belief is that the personality type patterns stay the same over time, but how they express look different. So when you take an instrument, you're responding in a particular context based on where you are at the moment, and it may pick up a variation of where you are at the moment, or it could just plain be inaccurate.

Olivier Caudron [00:18:12]:
And yet they ask you to relax before answering to think if it happened often in your life. They invite you to be very careful.

Linda Berens  [00:18:26]:
Right.

Olivier Caudron [00:18:26]:
And there are more than 90 questions or sometimes it's more than 120 questions. Mhmm. That's strange that the context is so present, influencing so much who we are even if we are answering more than a 100 questions.

Linda Berens  [00:18:48]:
Some of that comes from not thinking about the pattern, but thinking about the process. I only know of one assessment that's online called personality wizard that was designed to look at patterns, and I still think there's still gonna be an error rate. I learned this from Fritjoff Capra, a physicist, multidisciplinary systems thinker. He said to understand the living system, you have to look at the pattern of the system and the processes, which are the activities that help maintain that pattern. When people are taking an instrument that asks e I questions and s n questions, you're only looking at that variable. So at the moment, you may be developing a function that in your pattern or for whatever reason is an extroverted function. You might come out with an extroverted score as opposed to an introvert. More points on the extrovert than the introvert side.

Linda Berens  [00:19:49]:
So there are all of these variables. The challenge is, how do you set the frame? And that's what's really, really important for any instrument or even self discovery experience like we use for it to work. Setting the frame includes setting safety, confidentiality. It includes that sense of what are you going to do with the instrument? Think about yourself and don't think of yourself in particular context like at work. Think of yourself at home, at work, at play, or wherever it might be, how you've been over time, but all of these different things that you can say to try to help create a frame of mind. And one of the things that I know is that a lot of times, and I think those validation studies were done in business settings. So you're working. And maybe the practitioner didn't set the stage very well, didn't have put enough emphasis on it.

Linda Berens  [00:20:48]:
So we tend to take that as the right answer and it might not be. It's mostly, it's just the sample, but then you're looking at parts and the parts are incomplete. And they find us in medicine all the time. You can't just look at a problem with the heart without looking at a problem that's going on based on what's going on in the liver. Mhmm. Because the liver manufactures some things that land in the heart. And they're discovering more and more and more these days about holistic medicine that it isn't just the parts. It's the whole.

Linda Berens  [00:21:23]:
And that whole of the living system is more than the body, and we're so adaptable. Although some of us feel like others aren't adaptable, but we are, of course. We grow and we develop. Mhmm. And if we're in a stage of development or we're in a in a context where who we are was not allowed to express. This is the case of many women who score thinking or report a thinking preference on the Myers Briggs or many men who report a feeling preference on the Myers Briggs. We'll always have to take an instrument results with a grain of salt. It's a data point.

Linda Berens  [00:22:02]:
It's a single data point.

Olivier Caudron [00:22:04]:
Does it mean that we have to get rid of MBTI, DISC, Big Five, all those tools?

Linda Berens  [00:22:14]:
Well, this kind of gets to the approach for assessment that we have developed at InterStrength. I don't use them. I've too many times had to fight against that digging in, oh, well, I'm a this, I'm an INTP or I'm an INTJ. When after all these years of doing workshops where each of the 16 types presented themselves to the group, and I got to see these types holistically, and then I've had enough in my other trainings and practices to see them more holistically. We've had this experience when we worked for University of Toyota. Mhmm. My colleague said that we would do the 4 temperament thing, and then we had a temperament of instruments that we had created, which we stopped using after this experience. People would identify and say this fits, and they're in there with their peers, so they got feedback as well after a whole half a day.

Linda Berens  [00:23:10]:
At the end, they got the instrument results, and so she would pull people and say, okay. Where'd you land? So many people changed just because the test gave them a different result. That's the challenge. So I just stopped using it, but I'm not working in an environment where it's demanded. I guess I'd find a way if I needed to.

Olivier Caudron [00:23:33]:
Nowadays, as you said, we can go online. There are so many tests. How long does it take to do the self discovery process?

Linda Berens  [00:23:43]:
If I'm doing a 1 on 1 session, I need about 90 minutes and my booklets with the descriptions. And so after about 90 minutes of asking some questions, listening for a variety of things, noticing how they approach in the whole session, really. I usually am able to get 2 or 3 descriptions and have them read the descriptions. So 1 on 1, that works. If I'm doing group work, like a team or in an organization Mhmm. I want to do about 2 hours having people try on the essential motivators, for example, or 2 hours for interaction style at a minimum. In business, when I was doing in person, it wasn't 2 hours. It was a half a day was a minimum that I would do.

Linda Berens  [00:24:34]:
And in a half a day, people can try these on and see what fits and get some useful information.

Olivier Caudron [00:24:42]:
As we conclude today's episode of Beyond Personality Types, it's clear that while personality typology systems like MBTI and others are valuable tools for understanding human behaviour, we must use them with caution and deep understanding. Linda has highlighted key criticisms such as the potential for misuse, cultural biases and issues with accuracy. For practitioners and enthusiasts like us, the lessons are clear. Emphasize ethical usage, provide proper context and always pair instruments' results with comprehensive, reflective processes to ensure accurate self discovery. Remember, personality typology is more than just labels and letters. It's about understanding the holistic patterns of who we are and how we navigate our world. If you encounter someone questioning the scientific validity of the MBTI, rather than trying to convince them, share your own experience and how the descriptions resonated with who you are and that it was way more than what we can find on the internet. Also, we must acknowledge that, unfortunately, a few people might have misused site assessments and hurt others.

Olivier Caudron [00:26:11]:
However, most of us are cautious and use all the tools wisely. The fact that you are listening to this episode today is proof of your willingness to do good around you.