The purpose of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI®) personality inventory is to make the theory of psychological types described by C. G. Jung understandable and useful in people's lives. The essence of the theory is that much seemingly random variation in the behavior is actually quite orderly and consistent, being due to basic differences in the ways individuals prefer to use their perception and judgment.

"Perception involves all the ways of becoming aware of things, people, happenings, or ideas. Judgment involves all the ways of coming to conclusions about what has been perceived. If people differ systematically in what they perceive and in how they reach conclusions, then it is only reasonable for them to differ correspondingly in their interests, reactions, values, motivations, and skills."

Practically, the MBTI tool classifies an individual's preferences in each of the four dichotomies in Jung's theory. This classifies an individual in one of 16 possible distinctive personality types that result from the interactions among the preferences.

Jung's four dichotomies are;

• Favorite world: Do you prefer to focus on the outer world or on your own inner world? This is called Extraversion (E) or Introversion (I).
• Information: Do you prefer to focus on the basic information you take in or do you prefer to interpret and add meaning? This is called Sensing (S) or Intuition (N).
• Decisions: When making decisions, do you prefer to first look at logic and consistency or first look at the people and special circumstances? This is called Thinking (T) or Feeling (F).
• Structure: In dealing with the outside world, do you prefer to get things decided or do you prefer to stay open to new information and options? This is called Judging (J) or Perceiving (P).

MBTI Personality-Type Coding

The 16 personality types of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator® instrument are listed here as they are often shown in what is called a "type table."

Further Reading

• IDR Labs MTBI self-examination [Tool]
• Basic MBTI self-examination [Tool]
• Wikipedia - MBTI
• Frequency of different MBTI types

Alternative models-

• Big 5 Personality Traits

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