I had no real idea what this was, but I was skeptical (and still am) about anything that splits people into only sixteen types. Red flags went up and I smelled snake oil. There's still a strong whiff of that around here, several minutes after I closed the page. It said I'm ISTP. I don't really know what that means, but it puts me in with Clint Eastwood, Frank Zappa, and John Glenn. And President Zachary Taylor - when did he take this test? Anyway, woohoo. Some of the questions are nearly identical, and are just phrased using different words. This is clearly intentional - loaded language will influence how we answer questions. But it could also mean that there's a cultural bias built into the test; certain words may have one connotation in California and another in New South Wales, for instance. I got the impression, as well, that I might have answered some of the questions differently had they been asked in a different order. This may also be intentional on the part of the test makers. I have serious doubts about the scientific validity of this thing. I'm too busy doing other things (read: lazy) to research this further, though - that, too, might be a characteristic of ISTP people.
INTJ Introvert(44%) iNtuitive(50%) Thinking(38%) Judging(56%) You have moderate preference of Introversion over Extraversion (44%) You have moderate preference of Intuition over Sensing (50%) You have moderate preference of Thinking over Feeling (38%) You have moderate preference of Judging over Perceiving (56%) Me to a T.
Probably not, which is why the caveat when I labeled myself as such. There is however, evidence of the actual rational thinking, that is success. Not success like Bill Gates, but rather success like the fact we put Curiosity on Mars, success like medical breakthroughs and quantum computing. Using the scientific process, understanding how the brain sorts and organizes incoming data, one can develop rules for addressing the evidence we encounter in a rational way. If one believes they are rational, but they are not, you see unsuccessful conclusions like superstitions and attributing false causal relationships which are really only coincidental. It's flu vaccine season so I'll reuse an example I used above. You get a flu shot and you get sick. An irrational person has that personal experience (personal experience has very strong effect on belief), they assume causality without considering other possibilities. They adopt the irrational belief flu shots make people sick. A rational person has the same experience, getting ill after a flu shot. But a rational thinker knows the brain evolved to see patterns and attributing causality to correlation is something the brain does by nature. We know this so we can compensate for it, reminding ourselves it's a single observation. To know if there is causality we need more data. So researchers set up randomized controlled trials, using flu vaccine, a different vaccine and a placebo (more recently they also try to add a no treatment arm). Turns out illness after a flu shot is no different than illness after a placebo. To make a long story short, it turns out we give flu shots when respiratory viruses peak every fall. It's not the vaccine, it's the season. Now an irrational thinker will dig in, "yes but I never got sick in years past therefore it's the vaccine" or perhaps, "well it could be I'm different and they make me ill" and, "but they made me sick three years in a row" and so on. This person of course, believes they are rational. Only one conclusion is right, so only one person is actually rational. The other cannot see that they are irrational, but there is a means of determining who really is rational: the success of applying the scientific process to thinking.
Just to be a bit more charitable, and accurate (I think), it is rational for the person to believe they got sick as a result of the flu shot. It's wrong, but it's rational. An irrational person would say something like this: 1) I got a flu shot; 2) I got sick; 3) therefore, my sickness was caused by the full moon rising in the constellation Libra during a Year of the Horse. It's rational to perceive a cause-and-effect relationship. That relationship may not truly exist, and the real cause of the sickness may lie elsewhere, but the perception of it is still rational. Way back in the dim and distant past, it was rational to think the Earth was flat. There was no evidence that it wasn't, and it kinda seemed to be. This belief was wrong, of course, but to claim it was irrational is to claim that every last person in the world at the time was irrational and in need of serious brain adjustments. Their problem (if you could call it that) wasn't irrationality, it was lack of evidence. Of course, when sailors circumnavigated the globe and proved the Earth was round, it became irrational to believe it was flat. It's rational to change one's mind when confronted by new evidence.
On topic: I did the test and became INTP. In your example the irrational thinker can still be correct I'm pretty sure any serious medical researcher would testify to that. Some medicines are believed to have a "certain reaction" in 1 out of 100 000 people or even in less than one in a million. Medical companies testifies to that possibility. Maybe I'm missing your point but the irrational thinker has "the benefit of doubt" on his/her side even with "randomized controlled trials" (unless you include a whole lot of people, a whole lot). I think it would be very irrational to drop the idea that it could be the drug after 3 years getting the exact same reaction when taking it. Personally I don't think having an idea is irrational. The thoughts along the lines: "well it could be I'm different and they make me ill" can be correct, maybe you should learn more about medicines/biology before passing off that possibility and label such thoughts as irrational.
The example I used was intended to illustrate the difference between rational and irrational thinking. You could certainly argue that a person was thinking rationally if they lacked knowledge about the brain's natural processes, seeing patterns which then leads to false conclusions about correlation and causality. Knowledge gaps are a different issue and it would result in a different discussion. A rational person (critical thinker) would still be rational despite knowledge gaps. We could, of course, get into a meaningless semantics argument about what is and what is not rational. The problematic words in a discussion like this are 'beliefs', 'rational' as you say, 'truth', and so on. So consider the example was merely illustrative, not absolute. From my perspective, none of us interprets the Universe exactly right, our brains filter everything we encounter/experience. You can't get around it. I try to get as close to seeing the 'real' Universe and stand by 'success'* as an objective measure that I am on the right track. *Success as in the conclusions lead to successful scientific outcomes, not success as in love and money.
This is getting too far off topic for the thread. Large sample sizes and meta-analyses of combined studies can detect extremely rare events. A few people do indeed react to influenza vaccine with fever and malaise, more so in young children, but it's very rare in adults except sore injection sites. By far the vast majority of people who believe a flu shot made them ill are attributing the wrong causality to an association. It is interesting though, to note just how powerful personal experience is when forming beliefs. A sample size of three with no controls for other variables is insufficient to draw the conclusion you suggest. But look how tempted we are to see it as a valid conclusion. Beyond that, it's off topic.
@GingerCoffee - I agree that you are overanalyzing this. The questions are pretty basic and they're not that hard to understand. They aren't random or meaningless. People tend to fall on different parts of a spectrum. It's not very common for someone to fall on both ends of a spectrum. You can't really be an extrovertive introvert. You either don't mind speaking to large groups of people, or you dislike it. You either take command or follow. If there was a personalit trait for 'makes thing unnecessarily complicated', I think you'd fit.
I'm fascinated by the fact people believe the questions are answerable. At least two of us don't. I cited specific examples of why I found such ambiguous questions unanswerable. Perhaps the fact other people had no such trouble is a matter of our being different personality types.
Be aware that @GingerCoffee is a nurse practitioner and has been for decades. She's well aware of the medical science involved here.
I talk about possibilities not about absolutes like you. I said "I think it would be very irrational to drop the idea that it COULD be the drug after 3 years getting the exact same reaction when taking it.". So my conclusion that it "could be the drug" is wrong, ok lets pretend that. And drop the discussion there. Nurses (in general) don't know a lot about medical research or drugs (they don't even write out drugs because they know to little to do so). Usually they are involved in a static activity such as "operating a X-ray machine" or takes some other test, they don't put diagnoses on people either for a reason.
ISTP is what I am right now, but it would probably be different if I were to retake it tomorrow. Far too many factors come into play when answering these questions, IMO.
INTJ over here. I think that's the same result I got when I took the real test 7 years ago. By the way, I'm not sure why there's so much arguing going on. Take the test or don't take it. Simple as that. Let's not make an argument out of every little thing.
It shouldn't be an argument, but some people choose to see an argument everywhere they look. Most people see a question like, 'I would drive drunk.' YES/NO and they would pontificate about the miniscule conditions in which they would answer contrary to common sense. It's assumed that the questions are generalizations, and should be treated as such. You're not supposed to think of loopholes to answer contrary to your own general tendencies. Do you get excited easily? Well, do I get excited when there's a sale at my favorite restaraunt or does it take a job promotion or a financial windfall? Either people don't know themselves enough to take the test, or they are nonconformists who like to debate everything. The whole thing is just silly. Just answer the questions.
Got to go agree with Ginger about the questions not being answerable (though I wish she hadjust admitted she was wrong about wave particle duality in light instead of conceding "arguable" just to save face). For instance, the question about being big picture vs details is such an old school way of looking at things. Like I already said, mastery requires attention to both big picture and details. Rather, I think the question should be "are you more focused on trivial or non trivial subjects?" How someone is feeling on any given day is most likely trivial, though I would count this as a "big picture" concept. However, a detail in their day, like them seeing a raccoon in broad day light, might be significant enough for you to care about. In terms of science. Let's say I want to make a sensor that has X sensitivity. OK, maybe it's been done before, but I've altered my process a bit. The outcome isn't interesting, but the individual details are. On the other hand, let's say I take tried and true instrumentation, and use it to prove something entirely different. Now, it's the big picture that's interesting, not so much the details. And of course we have cases we're they're both important. Big picture vs little picture way of thinking becomes even more foggy if we use it to interpret intelligence. Let's take two people. A is a big picture thinker. He has a vague understanding of what it is his team wants to achieve, and he could give you a very crude idea of it in about one sentence. B is a god damn sleuth. He understands every little detail, it's significance, how the details work together, and uses these details to achieve the goal. Now, let's switch things a little bit. A is a big picture thinker. He understands where the project is going, what it is trying to achieve, how it can get there, what the potential pitfalls are, what instrumentation is being used. He doesn't know the exact model number of the instrumentation, because he deems it trivial. Small picture person B only knows exactly what he's told. He can't really tell you why he's doing it, or how exactly what he's doing is working to achieve the goal. He can recite to you the model number of the instrumentation used, but put him on an analogous system, with only slightly different controls, and he's lost. I'd say the four people in the two scenarios are all different. Person A in scenario 1 is a sloth, and most likely at least one of your managers. He thinks he knows the big picture, but he's never really solidified it . The big picture in his mind is foggy and full of holes. Person b in scenario 1 is a detective. He's got a keen eye and actively searches for detail. Person A in scenario 2 is a leader. He has a clear vision and path. Person B in scenario 2 is just a monkey. Now, we COULD call person A in both scenarios big picture thinkers and person B in both scenarios small picture thinkers, but that's only one way of classification. Personally, I think person B in scenario 1 and person A in scenario 2 have much more in common. They are smarter.
Edited to clarify*: @JJ and thirdwind Discussing problems with the theory is not arguing for the sake of arguing. But again, interesting that some people are uncomfortable with benign conflict. I'd wager that was related to personality type. *Sorry, I hate it when your post looks like it is a reply to someone else's.
Oh dear, I don't have time for another PM Conversation. I wasn't disagreeing with you, I just didn't want to get off on a side track discussion about the inadequate conceptual models we use to understand quantum mechanics. The observations are indeed repeatable and observable, but the models are imperfect.
Like I said before, if you have a problem with the test, don't take it and move on. This online test is not the real thing; it's simply an approximation of the results you would get if you took the real test, so of course there are going to be problems with it. In fact, if you look hard enough, every test out there is going to have some sort of problem.
