In case you still wondered about joking patterns in this household, with someone downstairs in the study, the other at her place of writing, a.k.a. “the bed,” here is last weekend’s exchange (my part in blue.)

What are we talking about? The Myers Briggs Personality Test, which became a topic of interest with us after discovering some of its history. You might have heard about the test, for all I know you might have taken it during your life time. It is one of the most used personality tests in the world, taken by about 2 million people annually and generating income for the industry to the tune of $20 million a year. Fortune 100 companies, universities, hospitals, churches, and the military all use it.

Before I list what the test claims to measure, let me put it as gently as I can: the test is completely useless. In contrast to what is claimed by the industry that makes money off it, it does not predict how you’ll feel or perform or handle situations or fare in career choices. It does not reliably assess who you are – the results from taking it are inconsistent across time for the majority of people, even if they space session only a month apart. Importantly, it ignores the complexity of human personality by forcing you into categories rather than allowing for measurement along a range or a continuum.

In other words, you are asked to make binary choices along 4 dimensions: are you an introvert or an extrovert, someone who intuits or senses, a perceiver or a judger, do you think or feel. The answers push you into discrete categories, and all have some positive slant (you’re a thinker, an explorer, a dreamer – never a sadist or a narcissist or some such) – one of the reasons people are happy with the test. They also feel that the test must be accurate because after all it spits right back at you what you just reported – hey, they got you right!

These binaries are artificial, of course – none among us is only thinking or feeling, judging all the time or any other of these variables. Psychologists, with rare exceptions, look at personality (and test it accordingly) along a continuum, considering a  five-factor model that measures people’s openness, conscientiousness, extroversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism — factors that do differ widely among people, according to actual data collected and that are predictive for performance.

Here is the simplest example I can come up with to explain the difference between being put in a category vs. on a continuum. Take three people, their height being 4.9, 5.1 and 6.2 ft. respectively. If I artificially set a cut-off at 5.0 and everybody above it is tall and everybody below is short, then 5.1 and 6.2 are grouped together as tall people. Yet you surely agree that 4.9 and 5.1. have much more resemblance to each other than 5.1 and 6.2. If measured on a continuum the appropriate placing relative to each other is maintained. You can find a short, fun podcast on the personality test topic here.

What is fascinating about the Myers Briggs is its history, though, laid out in detail in a book about the mother daughter pair who invented the test in the 1920s. The mom, Katherine Cook Briggs, a homemaker, was an ardent fan of psychologist Carl Jung; her daughter, Isabel Myers Briggs wrote detective novels (with intense racist premises, no less) and was eager to bring her mother’s insights about Jungian psychology (not exactly shared by Jung himself who always warned of putting people into too neatly designed categories and refused to help the mother/daughter pair) into the mainstream and use it as a tool for “personology” as they called it. Neither had scientific training. Their work took off in the mid 1940s and has been mainstream in hiring decisions across the nation ever since. Here is a trailer for an HBO documentary on the politics (and dangers) of personality testing. Not sure I could stomach watching the whole film, given my current desire to avoid any more bad news….

And since you are dying to know: I am (for now – the assessment would likely change 4 weeks from now) a

As the testing site told me: “Few personality types are as creative and charismatic as Campaigners (ENFPs). Known for their idealism and enthusiasm, these personalities excel at dealing with unexpected challenges and brightening the lives of those around them. Yet Campaigners can be tripped up in certain areas of their lives. When it comes to building relationships, choosing a career, or turning their dreams into reality, people with this personality type may need to consciously address their weaknesses and gain new skills – even as they draw on their many strengths.”

Try it out for yourself, for free and for fun, not science. And remember, YOU just told them how you see yourself, so to no-one’s surprise their echoing it back sounds like they’ve hit on something.

Music today is fittingly devoted to the Four Temperaments, (Melancholy : Sanguine : Phlegmatic : Choleric), Hindemith’s score commissioned for a George Balanchine Ballet from 1946. Here is a seductive review of what one can expect to see and hear tonight regarding this piece, if you are lucky enough to have scored tickets to OBT’s season opening. Two more performances on Saturday.

Photographs are the last of the clematis, reminding me with their gracefulness and little tutus of ballerinas.