Dr. Raymond Hawkins of University of Texas at Austin Discusses How He Was Introduced to the MBTI, and Why Its Critics Are Wrong

Recently John Hackston, Head of Thought Leadership at The Myers-Briggs Company, conducted an in-depth interview with Dr. Raymond Hawkins, Clinical Assistant Professor at The University of Texas at Austin, and co-founder of the Austin Stress Institute, the first private clinic in Austin to specialize in biofeedback and clinical health psychology. In this article we present a few excerpts from the interview, in which the two discuss how he initially became acquainted with the MBTI instrument. Hawkins also counters some of the common criticisms of the MBTI, explaining its solid scientific basis, and its uniquely useful approach to understanding personality.

To watch videos of the interview, check out Taking the Myers-Briggs Assessment for the First Time and What do people get wrong about the MBTI assessment?

Hackston: Let me welcome Dr. Raymond Hawkins who is a clinical assistant professor at the University of Texas at Austin in the department of psychology. Ray, I know you’ve used The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator® (MBTI®) assessment for many years, so tell me a little bit about that. Where did you first hear about the MBTI?

Hawkins: It was well over 42 years ago, John, when I first heard of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, and I was approaching it as a psychological scientist.

So I decided to take it for myself and I was absolutely amazed by what it revealed about my healthy personality.

I felt for almost the first time that I was really known in-depth. At least that I could see a description that would fit my own sense of myself.

Then I began to use it clinically and in my research.

Hackston: And I think the interesting thing is what you just said, that as a psychologist it was the first time you’d really seen yourself in what came out of an assessment. I guess the question is, what did it give you that the other assessments you’ve seen didn’t give you?

Hawkins: To make this statement more for the lay audience, John, I will simply say that in psychology as an academic scientist we tend to look at continuous trait measures. In other words we tend to look at variations around a theme, and therefore what we get is a description largely of problems — sometimes of personality strengths — that are not individual portraits of whole types as we call it in the Myers-Briggs jargon, or of whole persons.

And so this individualization [from the MBTI] and the positive connotations meant a great deal to me. I’d never seen anything like it before.

Hackston: So if I’m hearing it right it’s about that idea of describing the whole person rather than where you are on a succession of different scales?

Hawkins: Exactly.

Hackston: What do most people get wrong or misunderstand about the MBTI?

Hawkins: First of all let me say that there have been some books and articles written in the past five years that largely tried to discredit the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator or psychological type theory in general as being a sort of a parlor game, or a way of using a popularized type approach that is not scientifically based. And that is absolutely wrong.

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator has some of the finest psychometrics — in other words reliability and validity and stability over time — equal to or better than any of the other known psychological tests. And I’m talking about the latest version of the Myers-Briggs type indicator, which is called form M.

So that’s one aspect. The other aspect is what I said earlier. I’ll just add this on, that psychologists and social scientists in general tend to look at trait measures or continuous variability. And the Myers Briggs type indicator, as developed by Isabel Briggs-Myers and her Associates, is based upon type.

Type is basically qualitative distinctions among different personalities, and this was made to synchronize with Carl Jung’s theory of psychological individuation.

Unfortunately Dr. Jung was not highly regarded in academic psychology either, so there’s another biasing factor for you.

Hackston: For me there’s something about the way that the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator looks at those differences between people which actually makes it much easier for people to use and understand. Because as human beings we can see those differences we can say that’s there, and this is there.

It’s much more difficult I think for us to get hold of this idea of continuous scales or continuous variables, as you said.

Hawkins: Yes, I think so. I mean obviously we have a varying degree of ability in some areas as we learn a new skill like, say, a sport.

However I think it’s common sense that we tend to view the world in categories. Sometimes these are naive stereotypes and they can give rise to all kinds of biases, John, which can be detrimental.

However, as we get to meet people, as I said earlier — whole types or whole persons — and we interact with them we appreciate the variety of differences. And that’s one of the main values that Isabel Briggs Myers tried to inculcate, which is to appreciate differences rather than to blame those differences, or to judge.

Hackston: Absolutely. But I guess that’s why she called one of the best little books she wrote about type “Gifts Differing” — because we all have those different gifts.

For more commentary on the MBTI from expert leading academic psychologists, read John Hackston’s interview with Dr. Aqualas Gordon of Maryville College.