Veralyn Sage's Three-Dimensional Myers-Briggs Inventory

Veralyn Sage's Three-Dimensional Myers-Briggs Test

Oh, what's that? You don't like actual Myers-Briggs theory? Too confined? Too one-dimensional? Too corporatist? Well, gosh. Okay, Madame Sir Professor Magic Theorist Ph.D. Here's something you might like a little bit more than “dichotomy Myers-Briggs.”

Myers-Briggs theory is great, but it really does have some big problems that I'd like to tackle:

- some official form questions only weakly connect back to the axes they test for according to factor analysis
- Myers-Briggs testing forms have evolved to resemble Big 5 testing instruments, which doesn't really flesh with the MBTI as well as it does for Big 5
- people aren't really hardwired to the four axes, which is where the official forms' tendency to play with absolutes doesn't quite work

My solution? Three-dimensionality! We can now, along with the already adopted dimensional preferences along the four axes, judge for ourselves how much of a priority these preferences really have in our lives. In other words, why define ourselves in Myers-Briggs with preferences we just don't relate to? That doesn't make sense now, does it?

This test will gauge your Myers-Briggs preferences along those axes that already exist, but I'll throw in positivity (and negativity) into the mix, which will gauge your "prioritization" of preferences and figure out what fits you a little bit better than a simple four-letter type code.

How to take the test:
For each question, you will be asked to choose between two choices: one will be blue and the other will be gold. The rightmost slider corresponds to the question, where the leftmost choice indicates the strongest preference for blue and the rightmost choice indicates the strongest preference for gold. Your response can be anywhere between these two extremes. The slider on the left (labeled by "How strongly does your preference here define you?") pertains to your response given along the blue/gold slider: how strongly or weakly does your response to the question (indicated by the blue/gold slider) correspond to how you define yourself? The leftmost point on the slider indicates the weakest possible answer and the rightmost point on the slider indicates the strongest possible answer.

You can submit your results at the bottom of the page.

#1 In a social scenario, are you more one to initiate a conversation or be introduced to a conversation?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#2 Generally speaking, would you rather ideas and theories or facts and details be the topic of conversation?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#3 Do you see yourself as more reserved or outgoing?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#4 Do you value sentiment over logic or logic over sentiment?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#5 Generally speaking, do you tend to move toward others or keep more to yourself?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#6 When in a tough situation, is it more important to keep your head cool or keep your heart warm?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#7 Do you consider yourself more imaginative or realistic?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#8 Do prefer to get things done beforehand or play it loose until absolutely necessary?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#9 Do you see yourself more drawn to the new and novel or the tried and tested?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#10 Before heading off somewhere, do you plan what you will do or just go?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#11 Do consider yourself more spontaneous or organized?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#12 Do you prefer to settle things in advance or keep your options open?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#13 Is it more important to analyze in a situation logically or sympathize in a situation tenderly?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#14 You concern yourself more with being fair and impartial or maintaining a harmonious atmosphere?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#15 Do you find that being around a lot of people gives you more energy or is often draining?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#16 Which set of words appeals to your more: logic, fairness, and truth or tact, compassion, and warmth?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#17 Are you more fact-oriented or possibility-oriented?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#18 In your way of living, do you prefer to be original or conventional?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#19 Having to choose between the two, do you find that you more often forget to move into action or stop and reflect?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#20 Do you prefer to do things based on however you feel in a given moment or a set schedule?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#21 Is it more important to tell the truth or avoid offending somebody?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#22 Would you rather spend most of your time with a group of people or spend most of your time alone?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#23 Do you keep your head in the clouds or your feet on the ground?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

#24 Do you prefer to follow a schedule or go with the flow?
How strongly does your preference here define you?		← blue / gold →
most weakly	most strongly

The following questions are optional, but recommended. Please answer truthfully.
Age:
Sex:						male female other
Gender:						male female other
What Myers-Briggs type do you identify as? Please, please, please do not report a function-based type here. This is for letters, dichotomies, or whatever else you choose to call them. In order to improve the test, it is imperative that I receive relevant responses that pertain directly to a Myers-Briggs type as would be tested for.
What Enneagram type do you identify as?
Any additional comments?

questions you may have and their answers

How am I supposed to read this?
When you receive your results, you'll get two tables: a colorful four-letter type, and a table with what looks like a whole lot of macaroni. Fortunately, this isn't as complicated as it may seem to be. In the first table, which shows you your four-letter result, there are three things to look out for. The first is, as you would guess, the letters you got: this is the four-letter result that you receive from your raw scores. The second thing you want to look for is the opacity of your letters. The more opaque a letter is, the stronger the preference is in terms of your raw score. The third thing is harder to make sense out of, and it pertains to the colors you receive. The more red a letter is, the more negative the preference is, and the green a letter is, the more positive the preference is.

The second table shows you the actual values for these scores: raw values range from 0 to 60, compared values range from -60 to 60, confidence percentages range from 0 to 100%, and positivity ranges from -30 to 30.

But what do any of those things actually mean?
Raw score pertains to the total strength of the preferences you highlighted with the blue/gold sliders. Each axis is given 6 questions, each with scoring ranging anywhere from 0 to 10. The highest possible score is therefore 60, and the lowest possible score is 0.
Compared score takes your raw responses and multiplies it with how strongly or weakly you indicated your responses define you (positivity/negativity). This score isn't reused in any of the algorithms, but you may see it worth looking at.
Confidence percentages indicate the confidence with which the test returns you its responses. This is based on linear regression comparing your raw scores with their respective positive/negative values as you would have assigned them. This is a very experimental algorithm—it requires further testing!
Positivity score relates to the total strength of the preferences you highlighted with the pink/yellow sliders, which measure how strongly you feel your blue/gold preference defines you as a person. The more a preference defines you, the more positive it is; the less a preference defines you, the more negative it is.

You may have added a third-dimension to the test, but I still can't relate to one answer over the other!
That's Myers-Briggs' biggest problem I think—that it forces you to choose between two items that aren't necessarily logically dichotomous. It's frustrating because I would find a way around this… except that MBTI is inconsistent with how dichotomous it chooses to be: E/I and N/S are fairly straightforward in being true opposites that capture entire domains of personality, but T/F refers to something that doesn't truly encircle a domain of personality (e.g. people who aren't T are not necessarily F by how F is defined; people who aren't E should almost always be able to relate to I). I would probably make it so that each letter could be scored by itself had it not been for all this, or else we'd be dealing with E, N, F, T, J on the test instead. But maybe that's okay? I'll have to play around with that.