Looking back at traffic to various postings, there is considerable interest still in personalilty types/traits and testing of librarians. It would be interesting today to redo “The Scherdin Study“ which used the Myers Briggs Type Indicator to determine if the results have significantly changed. The results of the original study were summarized by Anne K. Beaubien in Library Journal in 1995 and posted on the “Image of Libraries in Popular Culture” website [http://besser.tsoa.nyu.edu/impact/f01/Focus/Image/DarLynn/dntopic1.htm]:
“The Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) confirmed some of the most deeply ingrained stereotypes in the 1970s and 1980s: that librarians are process-driven and shortsighted, and tend to shy away from any type of confrontation. The MBTI was used to determine an individual’s personality based on four dichotomous scales: Introversion/Extroversion (I/E), Sensing/Intuition (S/N), Thinking/Feeling (T/F), and Judging/Perceiving (J/P). The Scherdin Study determined the following percentages for librarians’ personality traits: 63 percent Introverted, 60 percent Intuitive, 61 percent Thinking, and 66 percent Judging. Traditionally, ISFJ was the personality type assigned to librarians, but Scherdin determined that the ISTJ and INTJ personality types were most prominent in librarians and were also found in the following occupations: Computer professionals, chemists, electrical engineers, high-level corporate executives, auditors, life and physical scientists, school principles, dentists, lawyers, and judges, according to CAPT’s Atlas of Type Tables. Scherdin asserts that an array of dynamic qualities are needed to meet the challenges of the Information Age and staff MBTI profiles can help create strong project teams that work well together.”
According to The Personality Test Center [http://www.personalitytest.net/types/descriptions/infj.htm], “INFJ”s typically do well at the following occupations:
“career counselor
psychologist
educational consultant
special education teacher
librarian
artist
playwright
novelist/poet
editor/art director
information-graphics…designer
HRM manager
merchandise planner
environmental lawyer
marketer
job analyst
mental health counselor
dietitian/nutritionist
research
educational consultant
architects
interpreter/translator”
SEE ALSO
Librarians Signal Personality “Patterns” Survey and DiSC Profile Results
Lone Wolf Librarian and the Briggs-Myers Personality Profile Test Results
[...] was and remains significant interest in past posts regarding personality testing and librarians so I thought this is interesting from Signal Patterns from their [...]
Hello- a very late comment on this. I use the Harry Potter Myers Briggs on Pirate Monkey with my class each semester. The majority of my students each time are primarily INFJ’s (Albus Dombledore) and INTJ’s (Severus Snape). Using the True Colors test the primary color regardless of other colors is always GOLD. So there you are, an unscientific study verifies the Scherdin Study. By the way, I’m ESFJ (Molly Wheasley). At the beginning of my career (I’m now retired) I tested as ESTJ. So over the years I grew a heart.
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[...] Full Stop Interactive that describes the Myers-Briggs personality type of hackers and developers in much the same way many have described librarians: an apparently paradoxical mix of utopian ideology and sensible shoes practicality that brings [...]
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