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What is personality, and why is it so important? Personality determines a great deal: what kind of job, husband, wife, occupation and home you will prefer. No one knows how we became the way we are, and most agree that we cannot change ourselves too much. To know one's natural traits and talents, many employers and employees willingly choose to take take a personality test.

The most famous quiz, which has been used for over half a century is the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator.

The Meyers-Briggs (Personality) Type Indicator (or MBTI) was developed from 1917 to 1962, and was based upon the theories of Phychological Type by psychology pioneer Carl Jung at around 1910. His concepts formed the backbone of the test, which was further developed by its American founders, Katherine Cook Briggs and her daughter, Isabel Briggs Meyers.

Its first wide-scale application was in helping women coming to work in the munitions factories during World War II. Many of these women had never been commercially employed. The test was of great assisstance in assimilating their responses to see where they would have the best personality and task-related fit in their work environments.

Isabel Briggs Meyers later introduced the test to college students entering the work force for the first time. The test became a household word at this time. The test was timely for this particular era since women began entering the workplace in great numbers and simultaneously baby boomers began to seek out employment, a huge wave http://re.vu/freepersonalitytest of employment. Using statistical analysis, its purpose was to help determine how and where the applicants' existing strengths could help create a good job fit.

Sixteen possible combinations exist, based on the rational (judging) functions and the irrational (perceiving) functions. Using an initial to abbreviate each term, the types are sorted according to the test participants' natural preferences. Just as a right handed person prefers to write with the right hand, these preferences are considered natural to the person's innate personality and would be difficult to continue for long in an unnatural way.

The classifications are as follows:

I - Introvert versus E- Extrovert

Introverts are thought oriented, while Extroverts are action oriented

T - Thinking versus F - Feeling

Making judgments (known as rational decision making) is based on Thinking or Feeling preferences. A person with a Feeling preference would "feel better" in one environment over another, whereas a person with a Thinking preference would most likely write a list of pros and cons before making a decision.

S - Sensing versus N- Intuitive

Making perceptions (known as irrational decision making) is determined by sensing or through intuition.

T - Thinking versus J - Judging

The last letter indicates how the person interacts with the outside world, like their outside label. The final result is a chain classification like ENFJ or ITST.

There are no "good" types or a "not so good" types. All types are good - just different. Knowing how you fall into the spectrum of personalities enables a person to make a better choice as to what professions would be a good fit for his/her personality, and have a better chance of finding enjoyable work in which he would most naturally succeed.

Today, the MBTI is administered over two million times a year, and it has been translated into sixteen languages.