How accurate is the Myers-Briggs Personality Test?

A lot of psychologists and psychiatrist say that the Myers-Briggs Personality test is one of the personality tests that they can rely on. This is true for the past years. As more and more people have started to look into the various personality tests, they have decided that this test is not as accurate as they would like.

There are some personalities that are not tackled in certain tests. It should be remembered that in order to know the personality of a person, there are various factors that should be considered. People’s thoughts, emotions, responses, and behaviors will determine the type of personality that people have. These are things that the Myers-Briggs Personality Test will not fully tackle.

At the simplest possible level, the accuracy of the Myers-Briggs personality test can be said to be good if it is seen to be returning results that suggest it is testing what it says it is testing: i.e. after taking the test and receiving the results, the tested individual recognizes the resulting profile as true of his personality. This is 'face validity'. In respect of reliability, when people are re-tested with the same instrument, three to four of the type preferences remain the same 75-90% of the time.

However, there is fairly wide criticism of the Myers-Briggs claiming that there is no evidence of its accuracy, mostly in the popular press. There are some groups, such as children, where reliability is low but the test would not be recommended for such groups. If a personality test is to be used (and it must be questioned whether this is essential) then the Myer-Briggs is regarded is as accurate as any other such test. Best to think of it as an indicator, a way of thinking about personality.