Myers-Briggs Theory

Not designed to be a theory of career development, but a theory of personality

The two most basic concepts are perception-judgment and extraversion-introversion.

PERCEIVING AND JUDGING
Two ways of PERCEIVING
Sensing:
· Taking in information through visual and auditory proceses along with smell, taste, and touch (direct perception)
· Prefer to observe, primarily through hearing, vision, and touch
· Focus on events immediately around them
Intuition:
· Concerns the use of the unconscious, indirect and adds ideas to external perceptions
· Perceive meanings in relation to events
· Takes intuition and goes beyond senes
· Focused on future event, not current

The Two Ways of JUDGING (After an Idea is Perceived, a Judgment is Made)
Thinking:
_ Analyzing and being objective about an observed idea or event
_ Concerned with logic or analysis
_ Tries to be objective
_ Concerned with judging fairly
Feeling:
_ Subjective reaction, often related to one’s values
_ Concerned with the impact of the judgment
_ Interested in human as opposed to technical problems

Combinations of Perceiving and Judging
Sensing and Thinking:
_ Likely to focus on collecting facts that can be verified by their observations
_ Want to see and hear what has happened
_ Choose occupations that demand analysis of facts
_ Law, business management, accounting, production, etc.
_ Practical and pragmatic
_ Rational decision-making process based on information from literature or people
Sensing and Feeling
_ Aware of the importance of feelings to themselves and others when making decisions
_ More interested in observations about people than objects
_ Medical, social work, teaching
_ Will focus more on information about people and occupations, being aware of how they’d feel in these jobs
Intuition and Feeling
_ Personal, warm, and inspired
_ Apt to take a creative approach to meeting human needs and be less concerned about objects
_ Clergy, teaching at college or high school level, advertising
_ Likely to use hunches based on what’s best for them
_ Emphasis on feeling about observations rather than weighing the observations themselves
Intuition and Thinking
_ Make decisions based on analysis
_ Enjoy solving problems, especially those that are theoretical
_ Research, computing, development of new projects
_ Likely to project themselves into the future, thinking about what types of work would provide particular opportunities
_ Clear and logical decision making for them

The Preference for Perception or Judgment
Some people prefer to make decisions based on relatively few facts (judgment), while others prefer to weigh many facts before reaching a judgment (perception).
People who have perceiving attitudes continue to take information in and do not decide.
People who have judging attitude tend to stop perceiving and make a judgment without including anymore evidence.
Judging people tend to have a sense of order in their lives, whereas perceiving people just live their lives.

EXTRAVERSION AND INTROVERSION
Introversion:
_ Making perceptions and judgments based on one’s interests in his or her inner world
_ Concepts and ideas in inner world are important
_ Enjoy thinking
_ Like to work out problems or think for a long time before acting
_ More quiet, not necessarily due to shyness
_ Activities where there is time for concentration
_ Science, accounting
Extraversion:
_ Based on outer world
_ People and objects in outer world
_ Like to take action
_ Want to work with people or things by talking and interacting
_ Speak directly to an individual
_ Verbal and physically active
_ Activities that provide contact with people
_ Sales and business, social service

THE 16 TYPE COMBINATIONS

Descriptions provide an overview of the characteristics of people who fit into the 16 types.

DOMINANT AND AUXILIARY PROCESS - COMPLEX CONCEPTS


USING THE MYERS-BRIGGS TYPOLOGY IN COUNSELING

There are frequent occupational choices that are made by people in each type.

THE ROLE OF OCCUPATIONAL INFORMATION

Using the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), the counselor can match the client’s Myers-Briggs type with the Myers-Briggs types of occupations.

THE ROLE OF ASSESSMENT INSTRUMENTS

The MBTI is crucial in the use of the theory. Several report forms exist.

APPLYING THE THEORY TO WOMEN AND CULTURALLY DIVERSE POPULATIONS

The MBTI has been translated into many languages. Studies have been done on gender and cultural differences.

COUNSELOR ISSUES

Myers suggests that counselors need to adjust their style when dealing with people who are different MBTI types.