I hate personality tests. At first, they look so nice and inviting, almost as if I’m being offered airplane sprite and a wonderful Biscoff cookie on a flight. I get so excited because finally, I’ll be able to understand myself!
I take the test, as giddy as when I got LEGOs for Christmas as a kid. And then, when I finally get the result, I end up stuck with an existential crisis for weeks. Sound familiar?
But unlike LEGOs, Biscoff cookies, and airplane Sprite, personality tests can spell doom for someone’s conception of self. But why? It’s just a test; shouldn’t we know better? Well, there’s a certain marketing that is used in the majority of these tests that many people don’t realize.
The two most popular personality tests are the Enneagram test and the Myers Briggs test, specifically the variant called “16 Personalities.” If you go to different websites that advertise these tests, all you’ll find them saying is that you’ll get accurate results. There is no acknowledgement or disclaimer announcing the fact that these tests do not account for the full sum of someone’s personality or how they think. Instead of advertising these tests as a way to assist and augment someone’s understanding of themselves, they advertise these tests as the perfect way to get a complete understanding of yourself.
But people aren’t dumb (hopefully), and there’s a certain level of nuance that is usually assumed when taking any personality test. So, why is it still emotionally confusing for some people (like me) when they get their results? Well, the answer lies in our human psychology (who would’ve thought?).
As humans, we tend to want things to be simple. In an article by NBC News, Pamela Rutledge, director of the Media Psychology Research Center, states that, “People remain a mystery to themselves as well as others — and they are always curious to get a bit of insight as to what they’re really like.” Nuance frustrates people; we want things to be understandable and under our control. So, we go to personality tests, not because we want to know the actual truth but because we want an echo chamber. We want the way we understand ourselves to be validated by logic or science so that we feel good about ourselves. But when the result comes, and it gives us something different than we were expecting … oh what a sad day indeed.
So, how do we stop getting our hearts broken when we’re rejected by our personality crush? How can we move on? The answer is simple; we need to have enough confidence in ourselves to realize that we do know ourselves, even if we don’t. We are complex creatures. Maybe we are wrong; maybe we are right. Maybe the personality test is somewhat right, or maybe it’s malarkey. But our value doesn’t change.
