16 types: what research says about the Jungian typology

Where the model comes from

In 1921 Carl Jung published "Psychological Types", describing attitudes (extraversion and introversion) and psychological functions (sensation, intuition, thinking and feeling). Jung worked from clinical observation, not measurement, and saw types as tendencies rather than boxes.

In the 1940s and 1950s Katharine Briggs and her daughter Isabel Myers turned these ideas into a questionnaire and added a fourth dimension (judging and perceiving). Combining the four dichotomies yields 16 four-letter codes. The typology spread through companies, schools and the internet, carried by a positive message: no type is better than another.

What the research says

The most criticized point is the idea of types itself. If people really split into two groups on each dimension, scores would form two humps (a bimodal distribution). The data show the opposite: most people sit near the middle, in a single curve (Bess & Harvey, 2002). Cutting "introverts" from "extraverts" at the midpoint puts nearly identical people on opposite sides.

That explains the weak stability of type. Reviews report that a sizeable share of people, close to half in some studies, get a different code when retaking the questionnaire a few weeks later (Pittenger, 2005). The continuous scales are more stable than the types.

There is also good news: treated as continuous dimensions, three of the four scales relate strongly to Big Five factors (extraversion, openness and agreeableness) and the fourth to conscientiousness. The model has no counterpart to neuroticism (McCrae & Costa, 1989).

Criticisms and debates

Beyond the type question, critics note little evidence that the code predicts job performance or relationship compatibility, and warn against using it in hiring (Pittenger, 2005; Stein & Swan, 2019). Supporters reply that its value lies in giving people vocabulary for differences in style. Both can be true: useful for conversation, weak for decisions.

Limitations

This is a forced-choice test with four axes. In each pair you pick one pole, so a 55% versus 45% result means a slight preference, and a handful of different answers can flip a letter. Scores are relative within each axis and have not been validated in independent samples. Don't use the code to choose a career, a partner or a job candidate.

How Ethea adapts the model

Ethea's version uses 40 pairs, ten per axis, alternating left/right position on every item. Besides the four-letter code, the result shows the percentage on each axis, so you can see whether a preference is clear or nearly tied. We wrote the texts descriptively and avoid claiming there are "right" professions for each type.

Test created by Giovanni Oliveira.

Ethea is not affiliated with the Myers-Briggs family, its foundation, or the companies that sell official instruments based on this typology.

References

Links with a DOI go to the original article. Where no DOI is given, the link opens a Google Scholar search.

1. Jung, C. G. (1921/1971). Psychological Types (Collected Works, Vol. 6). Princeton University Press. Search Google Scholar(opens in a new tab)
2. Myers, I. B., & Myers, P. B. (1980). Gifts Differing: Understanding Personality Type. Consulting Psychologists Press. Search Google Scholar(opens in a new tab)
3. McCrae, R. R., & Costa, P. T., Jr. (1989). Reinterpreting the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator from the perspective of the five-factor model of personality. Journal of Personality, 57(1), 17–40. DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-6494.1989.tb00759.x(opens in a new tab)
4. Bess, T. L., & Harvey, R. J. (2002). Bimodal score distributions and the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator: Fact or artifact?. Journal of Personality Assessment, 78(1), 176–186. Search Google Scholar(opens in a new tab)
5. Pittenger, D. J. (2005). Cautionary comments regarding the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator. Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research, 57(3), 210–221. DOI: 10.1037/1065-9293.57.3.210(opens in a new tab)
6. Stein, R., & Swan, A. B. (2019). Evaluating the validity of Myers-Briggs Type Indicator theory: A teaching tool and window into intuitive psychology. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 13(2), e12434. Search Google Scholar(opens in a new tab)
7. Hicks, L. E. (1970). Some properties of ipsative, normative, and forced-choice normative measures. Psychological Bulletin, 74(3), 167–184. DOI: 10.1037/h0029780(opens in a new tab)
8. Brown, A., & Maydeu-Olivares, A. (2011). Item response modeling of forced-choice questionnaires. Educational and Psychological Measurement, 71(3), 460–502. DOI: 10.1177/0013164410375112(opens in a new tab)
9. Brown, A., & Maydeu-Olivares, A. (2013). How IRT can solve problems of ipsative data in forced-choice questionnaires. Psychological Methods, 18(1), 36–52. DOI: 10.1037/a0030641(opens in a new tab)