Poll: What are the Meyers-Briggs personality types of HN?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=943722

by hop • 17 years ago

58 78 17 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

hop4• 17 years ago

Hyperlink to the test - http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/JTypes2.asp

jpeterson5• 17 years ago

I'll go with an option not on the list: "useless", as are the results of all these personality tests. The whole notion that you can absolutely quantify something as nebulous and volatile as personality is absurd; the idea of doing so within the constraint of four axes is down right laughable.

Seriously, these things are the real-life equivalent of a silly Facebook quiz.

edit: Having looked over the questions in the linked quiz, my answer to most all of them was "it depends". I guess this means I have no personality. :)

aikiai2• 17 years ago

M-B is actually quite interesting to me. It is a very well defined personality type system, and I've found the results of tests to often be insightful.

The test does not claim ANY kind of "absolute quantifification". That would be claiming that there are only 16 personalities in the world, which, as you note, is absurd. It is merely an attempt to define a few of the dimensions that make up a human personality, and provide a framework for talking about how those different dimensions interact.

If you aren't interested in this, it's your business. But you should really reflect on where the attitude of "this is too nebulous and volatile" a subject to study and try to quantify, and decide if that's really how you want to react to things that are too big and complex to be immediately understood.

If you really think the test is bullshit, then why am I, and the vast majority of the respondents on the previous poll (linked above/below) NTs, also know as Rationals? Seems odd, considering the figure I've heard quotes Rationals as 10% of the US population. Unless, of course, these results are revealing something specific about this population in particular?? Hmm.

branden5• 17 years ago

MBTI is more complicated than that. Those four preferences interact to form a fuller picture of the personality type. Regardless of whether you choose to view it as informative, it certainly has more depth than a Facebook quiz. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myers-Briggs_Type_Indicator#Typ...

Personality is indeed a complicated thing, and MBTI respects that. It's understood that only the person in question can decide what their type is, since so much about it is below the surface of what another person can observe. It's only a tool for analyzing and understanding certain parts of your own personality that most people share, that can vary widely, and that tend to face one of two directions.

Knowing my type (INTP) has been pretty valuable to me. It's given me a clearer understanding of the preferential basis for some of my attitudes and behaviors, and it helped me accept my introversion as a natural part of who I am. Looking at the previous HN poll (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=204240), there's a strong presence here of types that are uncommon in the general population. At the very least, that correlation is pretty interesting.

jpeterson5• 17 years ago

Those four preferences interact to form a fuller picture of the personality type

I don't know what this means, and to be frank, it sounds like a lot of gobbledy-gook. The whole point of categorizing is that the categories should convey some information about the thing categorized. The point I'm making here is that these personality categories don't even come close to this. The problem is that personality is an extremely complicated concept, and one that is prone to constant change. I seriously doubt that you could say something meaningful about a subject's personality with 10 axes, let alone four.

To illustrate this, ask yourself two basic questions of these test results:

    1) Are the conditions and results repeatable?
    2) Can you use them to make any meaningful prediction of behavior?

My contention is that the answer to each is a resounding "No", and hence the results are essentially useless.

Ixiaus3• 17 years ago

I up voted for your anti-herd thought. Even if it is a bit invidious for those that find value in it.

The Myers-Briggs typology based on Carl Gustav Jung's work, is in my opinion, an accurate and useful tool for generalizing intelligence types.

You are correct, in contending, that quantifying the psychic whole of a person to an absolute degree is absurd because the psyche of a person is constantly evolving. The MBTI type only seems to shift in a minor way, though, despite gnostic shifts in the psyche.

I can account for this. I was typed as an INTJ early in life when I mostly just built stuff, didn't socialize much, and sandboxed in my own mind; throughout life I've experienced many things and people that would be considered "outside" the profile of an INTJ. Those experiences didn't change my typing, they only made it more potent.

Instead of a socially inept introvert, I became a socially adept introvert. Instead of being intellectually rigid and intransigent, I became intellectually focused and discerning. My type hasn't changed at all, despite traveling through India, experimenting with psycho-active drugs, and working for soul crushing corporations.

I'm supporting your statement that it isn't necessary, because it isn't. At all. However, is it useful? Fun even? Yeah. It is.

I view Astrology in a similar light. Your "sun sign" is just a "blueprint" upon which your living of life molds and evolves (another discussion though).

wisty• 17 years ago

It does describe a few of axes of your personality, but it's not that great. It's not like they are really poles - you don't get many total introverts or extroverts, people sit on a continuum. A normally distributed attribute is a lousy way to categorize people.

Introverts are people who tend to think before acting (which makes them more shy), and extroverts act before thinking (which makes them less shy), but those aren't the only factors in social adeptness. A polite introvert who can make good jokes will have more friends than the extroverted class bully.

The main value of MB is that it's value free. It's easy to talk about introversion-extroversion, sensing-intuition, thinking-feeling or judging-perceiving; it's hard to say people are lazy-hardworking, boring-interesting, smart-dumb, or brave-cowardly.

richardw4• 17 years ago

That was exactly my response when a psychologist friend of mine told me about the M-B tests. Then we did a test at work and the result was surprisingly accurate. I know you think it's a waste of time but maybe try it out anyway.

Also, as with many of these things: "the map is not the territory". Use any insight it gives, ignore what it doesn't.

araneae7• 17 years ago

I generally think so, but I was sitting at a table with my friends in a bar once, and we discovered that all of us were INTPs. The more different people are from my personality type, the more difficulty I have communicating with them. Sometimes I feel like we're not even the same species, as they offer me homeopathy for a burnt finger, or tell me they're psychic with a straight face.

gcheong• 17 years ago

What are the M-B personality types of the people you have most trouble communicating with?

keltecp11• 17 years ago

I 100% disagree... I found it to be extremely accurate. Like Scary Accurate.

m_eiman2• 17 years ago

You mean scary accurate like a horoscope?

A basic problem with this kinds of tests is that it's too easy to interpret the results to fit a very wide range of personalities - just like a horoscope will fit just about everyone who believes in them.

But they're still fun, and might give a hint about some general tendencies.

xenophanes4• 17 years ago

Derren Brown did a magic trick where he gave people scary accurate statements of their personality. At least that's what they thought: they were all given the same text.

david927• 17 years ago

You're confusing this with a lot of the garbage out there. This is based on Carl Jung's work and is absolutely valid. It's not "quantifying" personality; it's helping -you- understand yourself better. That's it.

Everyone is a combination of these things. The most introverted person in the world is sometimes extroverted, and the opposite as well. My wife is introverted around friends but extroverted at home; I'm extroverted with friends but introverted at home. You're answer "it depends" is absolutely valid and yet doesn't invalidate any part of Meyers-Briggs. You don't like to be pinned down and that's fine, but you have preferences, and that's all it's asking. You may be able to write with both left and right hands, but which one do you sometimes prefer? And if you prefer that, you might also prefer 'x'.

If you give it a chance, you might be surprised to learn something new about yourself.

quan• 17 years ago

here's the link to the exact same poll: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=204240

outotrai• 17 years ago

Sorted results of that poll (as of 9:30 PM EST 11/15/09):

  INTP - 207
  INTJ - 188
  ENTP - 76
  ENTJ - 57
  INFP - 41
  ENFP - 30
  INFJ - 27
  ENFJ - 16
  ISTP - 12
  ESTJ - 11
  ISTJ - 11
  ESTP - 4
  ESFJ - 3
  ESFP - 2
  ISFJ - 2
  ISFP - 2

Gambit89• 17 years ago

Wow, the pattern seems to be, in decreasing order, NT, then NF, then ST, then SF. That by itself isn't surprising given the nature of HN, but what is surprising is that each of the 4 groups are grouped off perfectly. I wonder if it'll be the same this time around (my guess is no because it was probably a coincidence). Isn't there a name for the psychological bias where the results get screwed around if you know in advance what it should be?

quantumhobbit• 17 years ago

not unexpected results for hn but the NT groups are supposed to be the least common in the general population less than 4% if I recall.

fuzzmeister• 17 years ago

While I've heard many people dismiss such personality tests, I found that the description of my role variant (INTJ, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mastermind_(Role_Variant)) described me extraordinarily well. I'd be interested to hear whether other people think the same thing about their respective personality type descriptions.

branden5• 17 years ago

Reading the description of my type for the first time after eye-rolling my way through a test was a bizarre experience. Its accuracy made me suspect that there was something to it.

celoyd• 17 years ago

I think they’re mainly dismissing their big-picture usefulness, not whether they describe you well.

You could also group people according to eye color, and tell people with blue eyes that they probably have light-colored hair, but it wouldn’t necessarily be helping them understand themselves better.

(I’m undecided about how useful these tests are. Just trying to clarify why people might dismiss them.)

jpeterson5• 17 years ago

Not to belabor the point here, but I think you're falling for the old horoscope trick. These categories are so broad, and the concept of personality so amorphous, that you would probably find that most of them describe you "extraordinarily well".

branden5• 17 years ago

Have you actually read the descriptions? They are concrete and specific. They don't leave much room for overlap. For example, compare http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ENTP#ENTP_characteristics and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ENTJ#ENTJ_characteristics

richardw4• 17 years ago

So then the same people that 'fall' for this test should be the ones who fall for horoscope tests?

With such a lot of intellectual suspicion, I'd guess you're an INTP or similar ;)

DenisM• 17 years ago

As an example:

  If you're pretty add 1, otherwise add 0.
  If you're smart add 10, otherwise add 0
  If you're kind add 100, otherwise add 0

  Result of the test: if you have accumulated 111, 
  you're known among your friends as a beautiful,
  big-hearted genius.

unperson• 17 years ago

Sure, if you're only reading a paragraph or two about a given personality type, it might seem like the words would apply to anyone. In my experience (and most others it seems), if you take the test honestly and actually read several page reports explaining intricate details of the personality type, you would be very suprised how accurate it is. If you're expecting to learn what your favorite ice cream flavor or movie should be, then of course you will end up disappointed about how 'broad' it is and that it didn't describe you in that manner of detail.

metra• 17 years ago

Of course it describes you extraordinarily well you Mastermind, you!

tokenadult2• 17 years ago

Obligatory references on the subject of the unvalidated Myers-Briggs Type Indicator®:

http://www.skepdic.com/myersb.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myers-Briggs_Type_Indicator#Cri...

http://www.psychometric-success.com/personality-tests/person...

"Overall, the review committee concluded that the MBTI has not demonstrated adequate validity although its popularity and use has been steadily increasing. The National Academy of Sciences review committee concluded that: ‘at this time, there is not sufficient, well-designed research to justify the use of the MBTI in career counseling programs’, the very thing that it is most often used for."

http://www.indiana.edu/~jobtalk/HRMWebsite/hrm/articles/deve...

http://www.amazon.com/Cult-Personality-Testing-Miseducate-Mi...

I found my type to be dead on accurate.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forer_effect

http://www.skepdic.com/forer.html

hop4• 17 years ago

RE: Forer

Looking at all the other types, ENTP fits me like a glove. I could see where the forer affect would apply to vague, subjective descriptions - like a horoscope or palm reader, but my personality traits, as quoted by wikipedia --

ENTPs are frequently described as clever, cerebrally and verbally quick, enthusiastic, outgoing, innovative, flexible, loyal and resourceful. ENTPs are motivated by a desire to understand and improve the world they live in. They are usually accurate in sizing up a situation. They may have a perverse sense of humor and sometimes play devil's advocate, which can create misunderstandings with friends, coworkers, and family. ENTPs are ingenious and adept at directing relationships between means and ends. ENTPs "think outside the box," devising fresh, unexpected solutions to difficult problems. However, they are less interested in generating and following through with detailed plans than in generating ideas and possibilities. When ENTPs are used correctly on a team, they offer deep understanding and a high degree of flexibility and problem solving ability. The ENTP regards a comment like "it can't be done" as a personal challenge, and, if properly motivated, will spare no expense to discover a solution.

Is like none of the other personality types and fits me well. Truthfully, it was quite amazing the first time I read an ENTP description.

Confusion2• 17 years ago

Hey, that sounds exactly like me... except that I'm sized up as an INTJ. Guess I'm an EINTPJ.

Seriously: the Forer effect applies. These descriptions are vague, because people attach entirely different meanings to the terms used. For instance, everyone thinks they are clever, flexible, loyal and resourceful, when compared to others. 80% of a class thinks they belong to the best 20% of the class. This is exactly the same.

hop4• 17 years ago

Around 75% of CS majors are INTJ. Certainly there are an infinite number of personalities, but this sizes them up pretty well.

JCThoughtscream• 17 years ago

The problem with any personality indicator is how rapidly results can change. I fluctuate between INTP and INTJ depending on time of year or who I had to deal with the day prior - and depending on specific social context I am very, very much E.

As a general indicator, sure - it confirms our own self-conceptualization, and can give general guidelines to others as to how we'll respond to stimulus. But the stress is on /general/. Its predictive ability leaves much to be desired.

salvadors2• 17 years ago

Grouping by the letters slightly hides that each is a continuum, from P to J, from I to E, etc. Lots of people also fall around the middle of some of these.

justcoldwater• 17 years ago

The MBTI is meaningless. http://scienceblogs.com/cortex/2009/10/the_personality_parad...

araneae7• 17 years ago

All that says is that behavior is highly context dependent. No one is disputing that. However, twin studies have shown us that despite that, personality characteristics are highly heritable. This suggests that despite differences in behavior due to context, there are genetic and thus pervasive personality traits that are fairly immutable.

xenophanes4• 17 years ago

Twin studies have not shown that. Please cite it and state the definition of "heritable" used in the study you cite (in general, they do not use the definition one might expect).

Also, going from "genetic" to "immutable" is a non sequitur, and is not supported in any way by twin studies. It sometimes turns out that genetic features (such as hair color) are not so hard to change after all (e.g. with dye).

nkurz2• 17 years ago

Do you suppose there might be any selection bias as to which 'personality types' are more likely to know what 'personality type' they are? And which ones are eager to take a test to find out, and rush back to be counted? And any bias as to whether they report back accurately?

tokenadult2• 17 years ago

Exactly.

Anyway, this kind of voluntary response poll would have exactly NIL value in answering the question that appears to be asked here, which is, what Myers-Briggs types are there on HN? The people who come forward to answer the poll are not a random sample of the tens of thousands of people who read HN.

http://mathforum.org/kb/thread.jspa?threadID=194473&tsta...

http://aurora.wells.edu/~srs/Math151-Fall02/Litdigest.htm

http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/5168/

araneae7• 17 years ago

I don't know much about the other types, but INTPs are the "scientist" type and as such are obsessed with data. We love polls. The demographic survey on HN had me salivating.

hop4• 17 years ago

Looks like NT's dominate Hacker News. Its interesting because they(we) take up such a small relative percentage of the population. From a study here - http://www.infj.org/archive/typestats.html, the breakdown for a whole population --

INTJ - 2.1%

INTP - 3.3%

ENTP - 3.2%

ENTJ - 1.8%

Total - 11.4%

So this small percentage of the overall public dominates about 75% HN, as the votes tally up. People here are about 7x more likely to be of the intuition not sensing and thinking not feeling personality types. Also, if you look at all the NT's on the right side of that link, males are about 2x more prevalent than females to be NT's.

bbest86• 17 years ago

This whole discussion seems to be missing a large part of MBTI's value. MBTI is not just about knowing yourself, but also understanding how other people in a group might be feeling/reacting, regardless of whether or not that reaction is indicative of their personality all of the time.

I've found that an understanding of MBTI has helped me immensely when facilitating or leading groups. Knowing that there will be some people that are most creative when brainstorming on their own (often introverts) and some that are most creative when working in groups (often extraverts) means that I give time for both in any session I'm leading. If I'm running a meeting that is going to go over time, but is producing good results, I'll ask everyone if they are ok with going over time and will set a new time limit. Before I knew about MBTI and realized that people with a J preference (unlike myself) often disengage from any process that doesn't appear to have a defined ending, I was losing out on the contributions from all Js in any meetings gone over time.

Those are just a few examples, but hopefully they show that MBTI isn't just about 'knowing your type'. People will act with preferences on either side (I lean a little bit to the I side, but often play the role of an E depending on the group I am in) but understanding how all of these preferences play out in groups gives you a much better chance of getting the best contribution from everybody on the teams you work with.

araneae7• 17 years ago

I'm happy to see INTPs (of which I am one) neck to neck with INTJs. I took a software engineering class once that claimed that 80% of programmers are INTJ, and it made me feel like perhaps my temperament was a letter off for this sort of thing... but perhaps not, after all.

oomkiller• 17 years ago

Wow, looks like most of the 2% of the population of ENTPs is on here :) Never met another one, at least that I know of. Cheers!!

rw• 17 years ago

I have found that when ENTPs meet, we have a very productive and exciting sense of camaraderie.

ankeshk• 17 years ago

To all the skeptics about MBTI: isn't it weird that the best copywriters out there study and apply MBTI in their work?

People who write sales letters that are mailed a few million times, or who write copy for the 30 minute infomercials - use MBTI constantly. Before writing down a single word, they do research:

Step 1: Which MBTI profile dominates this particular products usage? (For HN - it would be NT)

Step 2: What do these people look for - to make a decision?

Step 3: How do we give this information to them?

When millions of dollars are spent on persuasion, people bet on writing for specific MBTI profiles - and not for the general audience. They realize that MBTI is not perfect. But it is a good framework none the less.

Its like being left handed or right handed. Being left handed doesn't mean you won't use your right hand at all. It just means that you prefer using your left hand for most tasks. And so it is with MBTI. Finding your specific type doesn't mean you don't have other types in you. It just means that you prefer one type over 15 others for most things. And it would be smart of me to focus on that one type to persuade you.

known• 17 years ago

I'm in INTJ. Does this test identify a sociopath?

ZeroGravitas• 17 years ago

You should have your INTP badge revoked if you believe in the blatant quackery of Myers-Briggs.

Just read about its history and development. You don't need to read the criticisms to see it's bunk.

arnorhs• 17 years ago

I have to question some of the questions, like this one: "37. Often you prefer to read a book than go to a party"

So, the question seems to be finding out if you like to do stuff on your own, rather then going to a party, but it mentions something specific: a book

My answer: Well, no. I don't like reading books that much. However, I prefer reading hacker news, rock climbing, programming, designing, working on some music, etc.... But I wouldn't read a book over going to a party.

ebrenes• 17 years ago

From what I remember about the MBTI test is that an introvert will prefer activities that do not involve other people. So even if you don't particularly enjoy reading books the general discomfort of being in a party will outweight your lack of enthusiasm for reading.

In a well administered test though, one of these questions shouldn't significantly impact the final outcome as other questions with different wording will also be used to help gauge your disposition.

diN0bot• 17 years ago

> "Interested to see what the cross section of hackers and entrepreneurs that read HN are. I found my type to be dead on accurate."

"i am large. i contain multitudes."

as with a horoscope, you're more likely to agree with an assessment than disagree. i'm both shy and outgoing, a follower and a leader, logical and emotional--depending on the situation. the complexity and variety is amazing. i expect nothing less of humans.

Poll: What are the Meyers-Briggs personality types of HN?

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