Chapter 7: Further Reading

Essential Sources

Pittenger, D. J. (2005). "Cautionary comments regarding the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator." Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research, 57(3), 210–221. Comprehensive review of the MBTI's psychometric problems. The definitive critique.

National Research Council. (1991). In the Mind's Eye: Enhancing Human Performance. National Academies Press. Chapter on personality assessment concluding that evidence was insufficient to justify MBTI's use in career counseling.

John, O. P., Naumann, L. P., & Soto, C. J. (2008). "Paradigm shift to the integrative Big Five trait taxonomy." In O. P. John, R. W. Robins, & L. A. Pervin (Eds.), Handbook of Personality (3rd ed., pp. 114–158). Guilford Press. The authoritative overview of the Big Five model's development, evidence base, and structure.

Boyle, G. J. (1995). "Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI): Some psychometric limitations." Australian Psychologist, 30(1), 71–74. Concise documentation of the MBTI's reliability and validity problems.

McCrae, R. R., & Costa, P. T., Jr. (1989). "Reinterpreting the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator from the perspective of the Five-Factor Model of personality." Journal of Personality, 57(1), 17–40. Showed that MBTI dimensions correspond poorly to the Big Five factors, particularly missing neuroticism entirely.

Hook, J. N., et al. (2021). "The Enneagram: A systematic review of the literature and directions for future research." Journal of Clinical Psychology, 77(4), 865–883. One of the few systematic reviews of the Enneagram. Finds limited and methodologically weak evidence.

Barrick, M. R., & Mount, M. K. (1991). "The Big Five personality dimensions and job performance: A meta-analysis." Personnel Psychology, 44(1), 1–26. The landmark meta-analysis establishing that conscientiousness is the strongest personality predictor of job performance across occupations.

Emre, M. (2018). The Personality Brokers: The Strange History of Myers-Briggs and the Birth of Personality Testing. Doubleday. A fascinating and well-researched history of the MBTI's development. Tells the story of Katharine Briggs and Isabel Myers while documenting how the industry grew despite the evidence.

Grant, A. (2013). Give and Take: A Revolutionary Approach to Success. Viking. Adam Grant's work on personality in the workplace, which draws on Big Five research rather than type-based frameworks.

Online Resources

International Personality Item Pool (ipip.ori.org). Free, open-source personality inventories with strong psychometric properties. The IPIP-NEO provides a Big Five profile with facet scores at no cost.

Soto, C. J., & John, O. P. (2017). "The next Big Five Inventory (BFI-2)." Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 113(1), 117–143. The latest validated Big Five inventory, available for research and personal use.