Knowledge, experience, and character.
Keep in mind though that MBTI and similar are generally not considered as scientifically founded theories. It is also quite common for people to test incorrectly or test differently when tested again.
A few examples of this spring to mind.
1) I suspect that people who are not good at observing themselves may have trouble answering the test accurately.
2) People who are familiar with the test, having taken it in the past or read about it, may bias their results to a certain type. Especially if they perceive a certain type as desirable. Apparently people self reporting as INTJ is somewhat common, no thanks to Keirsey's retarded "Mastermind" label.
3) A lot of Jung's work is based on anecdotal data and similar. Having said that, it does appear to be somewhat accurate, for me at least.
Not sure where I'm going with this. I guess the main point is not to put too much stock into a person's personality type. Having said that, it is a good tool to give hints as to what people will like, and therefore do well at.
Finally, I don't think that INTJ as the "perfect" surveying personality is correct. I think it is one of several personality types that will thrive in a survey environment. There are a lot of factors that make a surveyor, and I don't think trying to isolate one factor is the best method of analysis.
Field and Office Divide
> You are right when you say a party chief has to understand not only what he is doing, but what the software/PLS in the office is doing.
>
> That is exactly the point that I have been attempting to convey to instrument men when they come to me wanting Party Chief pay.
>
> I have been looking for that rare personality that is willing to learn more skills and have more knowledge than they currently posses.
Problem is, people like that tend to also be fairly uppity. If they're the sort of person I'm thinking about then they'll learn the system, and then start going outside it, finding better, more efficient ways to do the job. Trouble then occurs if the company doesn't support them and give them the leeway to experiment. These people generally don't respond well to authority and they respond really badly when they've developed improvements to a system and are told "No, we won't change it because that's the way it's always been done".
Knowledge, experience, and character.
> 3) A lot of Jung's work is based on anecdotal data and similar. Having said that, it does appear to be somewhat accurate, for me at least.
Well, Jung himself considered personality type to be a tool of practical psychology. He was an empiricist who observed his patients and attempted to make useful descriptions. Jung used type to orient his communications with patients, i.e. a feeling type can't usually be persuaded by purely theoretical, abstract arguments, and to identify the least developed aspects of his patients's personalities. Those less developed or inferior functions were often where the real action of his work lay.
That is, a person with inferior intuition may involve himself in all sorts of things without ever paying attention to the consequences, unforeseen by him, that may possibly follow. That inferior function is necessarily unconscious and presents itself in the materials of dreams as something separate from the dreamer, although of course it is a part of his psyche, if an unconscious one.
> Not sure where I'm going with this. I guess the main point is not to put too much stock into a person's personality type.
If you regard Jung's theory of type as a practical tool to identify communication styles and native abilities, I doubt you'll go too far wrong. Send a Sensing type to do a task that requires well developed Intuition and it will be a struggle.
What strikes me as interesting about type in modern surveying is the element of technology. Increasingly, more and more energy is being spent just making the technology work. This was hardly the case thirty years ago. I strongly suspect that the nature of technology is selecting certain types for surveying work that would not have been in earlier decades and once a profession is packed with a particular type, the nature of the profession simply flips over like an overloaded boat. and something else appears.
> I did enjoy Brian Dunnings views on the subject (but then again, his hobby is skepticism):
>
> "From the perspective of statistical analysis, the MBTI's fundamental premise is flawed. According to Myers & Briggs, each person is either an introvert or an extravert.
Actually, that isn't correct at all. The MAIN FUNCTION is typically either extroverted or introverted and the auxilliary (second-best-developed) functions do not typically share that attitude.
Said more simply, an introverted Sensing type (for example) will have an extroverted judging function, either Thinking or Feeling that he or she customarily uses to "meet" the world. That extroverted function is how one tends to experience another at first impression.
However, the funny thing is that in an introverted Sensing type (where the personality is built around the perceptive function of Sensing), the inferior function will be Intuition and will be Extroverted. In the case of the Swiss, for example, who are as a group introverted Sensing types par excellence, the extroverted Intuition shows up in wild and highly entertaining ways.
Meyers-Briggs-Stills-Nash & Jung
> I was with you all the way down to the generalization ... about the Swiss. (hard to disagree with well established stereotypes).
Actually, that assessment is from a couple of noted psychologists who were Swiss themselves, C.G. Jung and his coworker, Marie-Louise Von Franz. Both lived in Zurich most of their lives.
Meyers-Briggs-Stills-Nash & Jung
> There may very well be validity to the theories; I won't argue that possibility, but the misuse by employers who treat it like a crystal ball rather than judging (oh, J!) experience and performance, plus the pop-practitioners misusing for self-serving purposes - those are not making the case for validity any easier.
Well, natural aptitude is always going to be a factor, particularly in interactions with others that engage one's least developed or inferior function. To want to pretend that anyone is equally suited to a certain task seems a bit naive when there is such a wide variation in natural gifts.
> That study would be a fascinating read (as is anything about the history etc. of the Swiss) if a link was handy.
There is an extensive literature dealing with the subject of psychological type. Once you understand type, you will recognize it in action all around you every day. It's not like the hunt for the Higgs Boson. :>
Forever Jung
> I appreciate all of the fine dialogue, but why does it have to fall back to "if someone disagrees at all then they must be in complete disagreement"? Sounds like the splitting of bell curves again. That is more the realm of simple reaction.
Translation? I don't see any connection to the subject under discussion.
> And yet again, that is not what I was saying. I never did say that anyone could be suited for any job. Not at all, period. I do believe that the evaluation of whether someone is fit for a job should be based on experience, aptitude, and proven results, rather than a psychological test that is not even widely accepted by the field of psychology and has actually been legally challenged when suspected of misuse.
Okay, so you agree that not everyone has an equal aptitude for any particular task, but you just don't like to think that some people have natural aptitude for some types of work? Why exactly do you think it is that certain personality types gravitate to certain fields?
> But as for "thinkers" being more likely to accept such tests as conclusive than "feelers"; is that based on any statistically significant study that could be cited?
Actually, it has to do with the nature of thinking, separated as it is from what one's feelings are about a particular result. Feeling types will tend to vapor lock the moment that a conclusion is one that is in some way unpleasant to them. I mean, the fact that they don't like the result means the analysis must be faulty.
> Or if it is based on a lot of objective observation then I could offer my own: I have had the humbling fortune to have known and worked with a great many academics, scientists, and folks far higher up the curve in intellect than I.
This is a feeling argument called "appeal to authority", just so you know.
> If I wanted to seek what a "thinker" felt about something, there might be a good chance that those folks might fit such a bill. To a one, none have reacted with anything but amusement at the mention of the notion that the infinite complexities of human personality can be tied up with 16 neat little bows.
Okay, so how exactly did you pose the matter of personality type to them? Were they hypothetical thinking types or were they in possession of how they themselves scored on the Myers-Briggs test?
> Science should be all uphill, not finding a comfy ledge to rest on. There were people in the past who were convinced that measuring human skulls would reveal true patterns of "types"; that did not turn out well.
That is also a sort of feeling argument that offers no actual critique other than "everything I don't like about psychology is simply phrenology".
> If the little bows (or even star signs) makes people happy about themselves then I do wish them happiness. It can be a harmless hobby.
>
> Trying to find shortcuts to complex concepts has at times done a lot of harm. Fortunately humans grow and evolve beyond a past filled with oversimplifications.
So, the feeling conclusion is "people are way too complicated to understand?" Unfortunately, Jung's theory of type perfectly categorizes that conclusion as specific to type. :>
For the Jung at heart
I think you're conflating Jung's work with that of Isabel Myers-Briggs. The latter was based upon Jung's descriptions of different aspects of personality and devised a standardized test (something a Sensation type should like) as a measure. What I posted was:
> So, the feeling conclusion is "people are way too complicated to understand?" Unfortunately, Jung's theory of type perfectly categorizes that conclusion as specific to type.
Which it does. Maybe this is the year when I write something about the different styles of surveying practice that seem to correlate with psychological type. I'll include you (under a pseudonym, of course).
Oscar-Meyers-Briggs & Jung
> And if a standard chain only had 16 links, they would be awfully long links, and very hard to measure anything precisely.
Yeah, and isn't it a bummer that only three dimensions, X, Y, and Z, describe any point on the Earth? :>
> I will enjoy your surveyor types analysis, even if I am one of the targets of creative finger pointing
Actually, it's mostly just an observation that the four dimensions of psychological type (E/I, T/F, N/S, and P/J) measured by Isabel Myers-Briggs figure into the three-dimensional world of surveying practice as it does.
Oscar-Meyers-Briggs & Jung
> But the earth keeps on moving.
Tell that to the Australians.
Forever Jung
I had a College Professor that contended Psychoanalysis is a value/belief system just like Christianity, Judaism, etc.
Really, in a primitive hunter gatherer society does it matter what your M-B score is?
I think these assessments of the unassessable (personality) are highly influenced by culture and socio economic status. How do you scale a personality? Some other personality (Jung or whoever) has to assess the other personalities.
Forever Jung
> I had a College Professor that contended Psychoanalysis is a value/belief system just like Christianity, Judaism, etc.
What subject did he or she teach? :> Essentially, that statement amounts to saying that some observable behavior cannot originate outside the awareness of a person, i.e. that the unconscious is not a significant factor.
> Really, in a primitive hunter gatherer society does it matter what your M-B score is?
Sure, of course it does. Do we think that even early human societies didn't have differentiated roles within them?
> I think these assessments of the unassessable (personality) are highly influenced by culture and socio economic status. How do you scale a personality? Some other personality (Jung or whoever) has to assess the other personalities.
Naturally, that is the very nature of psychology. However, the bias of the observer is present throughout the sciences, not just psychology. To begin, for example, with the dogmatic idea that personality is unassessable would tend to merely give confirmatory results. :>
A similar critique may be laid to the study of culture, which is a sort of collective personality that some groups of people ahare. The observer from another culture will have his or her own cultural bias that filters observations and structures hypotheses. Does that mean that culture is impossible to characterize or to usefully describe? I don't think so. It merely requires more of the observer.
Meyers-Briggs & Stratton
Actually, doesn't your diagram show quite uniform motion of the plate upon which Australia is situated? That's a much different situation than at the US edge of the Pacific plate.
Meyers-Briggs & Stratton
Said more directly, the diagram doesn't purport to represent velocities with respect to the Geocentric Datum of Australia. Those should be quite small in that deformation of the plate under Australia is reportedly quite small.
Kent
> > And if a standard chain only had 16 links, they would be awfully long links, and very hard to measure anything precisely.
>
> Yeah, and isn't it a bummer that only three dimensions, X, Y, and Z, describe any point on the Earth? :>
>
> > I will enjoy your surveyor types analysis, even if I am one of the targets of creative finger pointing
>
> Actually, it's mostly just an observation that the four dimensions of psychological type (E/I, T/F, N/S, and P/J) measured by Isabel Myers-Briggs figure into the three-dimensional world of surveying practice as it does.
Is that one of those "faith based approaches" to scientific measurement you were dispelling some time ago? Simple observation and no quantifiable measurement? 🙂
Kent
> Is that one of those "faith based approaches" to scientific measurement you were dispelling some time ago? Simple observation and no quantifiable measurement?
Well, standardized psychological tests are generally considered to be measurements for the obvious reasons. :>
Jung people on the move down under
> are you saying that Austrlia is not affected by any tectonic movement at all and that XYZ of any given point in Austrlia will remain static forever amen?
My understanding is that the coordinates of primary control points in Australia published with respect to GDA are not considered to have velocities since the entire section of the plate upon which Australia sits is considered to be rigid. In other words, the X,Y,Z values of points there with respect to GDA are not changing.
Jung quibble tribbles
> With respcts to CDA sure, but there are even velocities relative to CDA; subtle, but velocities all the same. I just said the earth is moving, and that does include Australia.
Actually, as far as GDA ("G" as in "Geodetic") is concerned, the earth isn't moving in Australia. That was the entire point of my original witticism. :>
Jung quibble tribbles
Well, it may well be another characteristic of the _SF_ type that you have to explain jokes to them since they are so literal-minded. :>