Reply to Re: The Enneagram
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I fail to see how some static questions where you tick a box of choices with no other input or variables from the participant is ever likely to come close to naming the complexity of a human psyche and definately not in one sentance or so.
Some might treat the tests that way, but the approach I take is to look at them as a starting point. The test is just a clue to which type(s) you fit the best, and then you can read the type descriptions to get a better idea. Some tests have come closer to the types I seem to be than others.
Tests by themselves aren't that helpful anyway as type descriptions because they're so abbreviated, as you pointed out. As I see it, with personality typologies like Myers-Briggs and the Enneagram, you can think of a personality type as a complicated, 3-dimensional web of traits that are tied together naturally. If you have certain traits in the web, you're likely to have others. So the tests pick out a few of those traits that can be used to distinguish between the types. Then you read the type descriptions to get the fuller picture.
But even if it were scientifically validated, I wouldn't even take the whole Enneagram system (or the Big Five or anything else) to be a complete description of a person. They're just angles to look at a personality from. They show you some things and not others. So I like to learn about a variety of them.
Some might treat the tests that way, but the approach I take is to look at them as a starting point. The test is just a clue to which type(s) you fit the best, and then you can read the type descriptions to get a better idea. Some tests have come closer to the types I seem to be than others.
Tests by themselves aren't that helpful anyway as type descriptions because they're so abbreviated, as you pointed out. As I see it, with personality typologies like Myers-Briggs and the Enneagram, you can think of a personality type as a complicated, 3-dimensional web of traits that are tied together naturally. If you have certain traits in the web, you're likely to have others. So the tests pick out a few of those traits that can be used to distinguish between the types. Then you read the type descriptions to get the fuller picture.
But even if it were scientifically validated, I wouldn't even take the whole Enneagram system (or the Big Five or anything else) to be a complete description of a person. They're just angles to look at a personality from. They show you some things and not others. So I like to learn about a variety of them.
