Wellington vs MBTI: traits, not types

What is the MBTI?

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator was developed by Katharine Cook Briggs and Isabel Briggs Myers from Carl Jung's ideas about psychological types, first published in the 1940s and today owned by The Myers-Briggs Company. It scores four dichotomies, Extraversion or Introversion, Sensing or Intuition, Thinking or Feeling, and Judging or Perceiving, and combines the four letters into one of sixteen types such as INFJ or ESTP.

It is widely used in workplaces and coaching because the types are memorable and the descriptions are flattering. The publisher itself advises that it should not be used to select people for jobs.

The official instrument is paid and usually delivered through a certified practitioner. Most people who say they know their type have taken a free imitation instead, often 16Personalities, which uses the same four-letter naming style with a model of its own. The two are not the same product, and neither reports how far from a cut point you actually sat.

What does research say about the MBTI?

Three findings recur. First, the four scales are not dichotomies. Scores on each are continuous rather than dichotomous, so the letter you receive can reflect a small difference either side of a cut point (McCrae & Costa, 1989). Second, the four-letter formula does not carry the weight put on it: a review for practitioners concluded that it does not support the inferences commonly drawn from it, and that considerable caution is warranted (Pittenger, 2005). Third, the model has no dimension for emotional stability, which is one of the strongest predictors of wellbeing and one of the Big Five.

The MBTI scales do relate to real traits: E/I lines up with Extraversion, S/N with Openness, T/F with Agreeableness and J/P with Conscientiousness. The instrument's trouble is not that it measures nothing, but that it throws most of the measurement away by turning a position on a scale into a letter.

That mapping has been measured directly. Furnham (1996) gave both the MBTI and a NEO five-factor inventory to the same sample and found each MBTI scale sitting on a Big Five dimension, with nothing in the MBTI corresponding to Neuroticism. McCrae and Costa (1989) had reached the same conclusion from a larger adult sample, adding that the scales behaved as continuous trait measures, with no support for truly dichotomous preferences or qualitatively distinct types.

Pittenger (2005) reviewed the accumulated evidence for practitioners and drew the practical conclusion: for all its intuitive appeal, the instrument may not support the claims made for it, and considerable caution is warranted before drawing an inference from a four-letter type. His advice was not to abandon the vocabulary but to stop making decisions with it.

How do the four letters map onto Big Five traits?

If you already know your type, this is the honest translation. Each letter tells you which side of a middle you fell on, and nothing about how far out you were, which is the part that changes what a description should say about you.

It explains why an MBTI description can feel right, since it describes four real traits, and why it can feel thin, since it describes each of them with one bit of information.

What does the MBTI leave out?

The missing fifth dimension matters more than the rounding does. Emotional Stability, the reverse of Neuroticism, is one of the five clusters that lexical research keeps recovering whenever people describe themselves and each other (Goldberg, 1993), and it is the dimension that carries most of the variance in how steady a person feels under pressure. Personality traits as a set predict outcomes such as mortality, divorce and occupational attainment about as well as socioeconomic status or measured intelligence do (Roberts et al., 2007). A profile with no room for that dimension cannot say the most useful thing about you.

A sixth dimension is missing too. Lexical studies in several languages find a factor of sincerity, fairness and modesty that the Big Five folds into Agreeableness, and that the HEXACO model separates as Honesty-Humility (Ashton & Lee, 2007). Two people can share a type and differ completely on whether they will take advantage of a situation.

• What is measured well. Four broad dispositions, in the right order, with the right neighbours (Furnham, 1996).
• What is lost in the letters. Distance from the middle, the facets beneath each trait, and any sense of how confident the reading is.
• What is absent. Emotional Stability and Honesty-Humility, two of the six dimensions the Big Five and HEXACO literature treats as basic.

Which is more useful, a type or a trait score?

A type is easier to remember and to share, and that is a real advantage: it gives people a word for something they had noticed but not named. The cost arrives the moment the label is used for a decision, about which job to take or whom to put in front of a client.

A trait score keeps what the letter discards. At the 52nd percentile on Extraversion you are told you are near the middle, which is a different life from the 95th, though the MBTI would call both of you E. A percentile moves a little between sittings, while a letter flips, which is one reason a review for practitioners urged caution about the inferences drawn from a type (Pittenger, 2005). If you want the longer version of that argument, see how accurate are personality tests and how to read personality test scores.

The two are not rivals for every purpose. Keep the vocabulary if your team already speaks it, and use a measurement for anything you intend to act on. If you came here asking what is my personality type, the better-formed question is where you sit on each trait.

Why does Wellington use scores and bands instead of a type?

Each of the four scales measures a quantity. Across a large sample those quantities form a bell, the middle crowded and both ends sparse, so the common case is a person who is somewhat one thing rather than clearly either.

No point on that bell is a natural boundary, so each boundary is a choice made by the people who built the scoring. Rounding a position to a side loses the distance, and for anyone near the boundary a slightly different week is enough to hand them the opposite letter. The scales behave as continuous dimensions rather than distinct types (McCrae & Costa, 1989), on a structure built up over decades of descriptive research (Goldberg, 1993).

Wellington publishes the position and the boundaries together. Each dimension is a percentile against a reference sample, wrapped in three bands with stated cut-offs: Quiet as far as the 30th percentile, Balanced to the 70th, High above it, on norms that remain provisional until the norming sample is complete. The bands and the Portrait names exist to make the result easier to talk about; the percentile is the measurement, and it is always shown alongside.

A band is easier to talk about than a number, and a name easier still, so the pattern of bands also carries a named Portrait. It is a summary chosen from the scores, not a box standing in for them. The name is for practicality. The numbers are the measurement.

What does Wellington do instead?

Wellington is a science-based personality assessment from Therabot Labs LLC. It measures personality as continuous traits, built on the Big Five and HEXACO models, and writes the results back as a personal report rather than a type.

The free Snapshot scores 6 continuous dimensions, the Big Five plus Honesty-Humility from the HEXACO model, from 60 questions. Each score is a percentile against a reference sample, with a written page for the band you are in. Nobody is an E or an I; you are at a percentile on Extraversion, and the page describes that position. The Wellington Membership adds the facets beneath each dimension and the 24 VIA character strengths, 90 traits in all.

It takes about 7 minutes. Every statement is rated on a 5-point accuracy scale, each dimension is the average of several statements rather than one, and the average is placed against a reference sample as a percentile and reported in one of three bands: Quiet below the 30th percentile, Balanced to the 70th, High above it. Those norms are provisional until the norming sample is complete, and the methods page says so. The first ten questions are answered before anything is asked of you; after question ten you sign in with an email so your answers are saved and your results can be shown. No card is needed.

In the written report, every trait carries three pages, one per band, prepared in advance by the writing and psychology team, and your answers decide which one you read. That is the part a type test gets right and most trait inventories get wrong: a table of percentiles is accurate and hard to use. Definitions for all six dimensions are in the glossary.

Side by side

If you know your MBTI type, the rough translation is: E/I to Extraversion, S/N to Openness, T/F to Agreeableness, J/P to Conscientiousness. There is no MBTI counterpart for Emotional Stability or Honesty-Humility, which the Wellington Snapshot measures. Wellington is a wellness tool for reflection, not a medical or psychological diagnosis, and it does not replace care from a qualified professional.

Neither is built for hiring. Wellington is written for the person taking it, and you can export or delete your data at any time.

Questions people ask

Is the MBTI scientifically supported?

In part. Its four scales relate to real Big Five traits, which several studies have shown directly (Furnham, 1996; McCrae & Costa, 1989). What the evidence does not support is the claim that people fall into sixteen discrete types: the scales behave as continuous dimensions rather than dichotomies (McCrae & Costa, 1989), and a review for practitioners concluded that the four-letter formula cannot carry the inferences drawn from it (Pittenger, 2005). Treat it as a vocabulary, not a measurement.

Can I convert my MBTI type to Big Five scores?

Only roughly. Each MBTI letter corresponds to one side of a Big Five dimension, but the letter does not say how far from the middle you are, and nothing in the MBTI corresponds to Emotional Stability. A seven-minute Wellington Snapshot gives you the actual positions.

Should employers use the MBTI for hiring?

No, and the publisher says the same in its own guidance. A review for practitioners concluded that the four-letter type formula does not support the inferences commonly drawn from it, and urged considerable caution about using it at work (Pittenger, 2005). Wellington is not designed for selection either; it is a reflective tool written for the person taking it, and the same caution applies to any personality questionnaire used on a candidate.

Why did my MBTI type change when I retook it?

Because you were probably near a cut point on at least one scale. The four scales are continuous rather than dichotomous (McCrae & Costa, 1989), so a small change in mood or wording can move a letter without anything about you having changed. A percentile shifts a few points in the same situation, which is easier to read honestly.

What does the MBTI not measure?

Emotional Stability, the dimension most closely tied to how steady you feel under pressure, and Honesty-Humility, the sincerity and fairness factor that the HEXACO model separates out (Ashton & Lee, 2007). It also drops the distance between you and the middle of each scale it does measure, which is where most of the useful detail sits.