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oberman's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
informative
medium-paced
5.0
ameyawarde's review
4.0
I already knew that the MBTI is not scientifically valid before reading this, but I still liked it, and honestly I still do too. I am of the era of knowing all my friends Hogwarts houses, too, though, so I don't go into a personality test assuming scientific validity. Anyway, I enjoyed this book, and I think the author did a fair job on biographies of the women, and the test ("INDICATOR") itself for being a super-not-fan and skeptic. I would have liked to hear more than just a passing "studies have shown it has no scientific validity" for it's critiques, though. I'm glad to have heard more about Katherine (the mom) as well because she is the same era of other women I do research on, and though it wasn't mentioned in this book, she seems to fit in very well with a few of the women I research-- Smart women trying to figure out how to balance their intellectual life and need for purpose with their still solid ideas that their #1 purpose in life is about improving first their own children, and then society as a whole.
11corvus11's review against another edition
I DNFed this one when I realized it's basically a biography of the creator of the MBTI rather than a general personality psychology book. To be honest, I kept finding her boring and unlikable and decided there are other books in my queue to better spend my time with.
alexisrt's review against another edition
3.0
I already knew that the MBTI was not considered valid by psychologists, and that it had been invented by a mother and daughter who were not trained in psychology, so this contained no surprises on that score. The intro to this book makes it seem like there's vast secrets hidden in the archives; nothing quite so thrilling.
Emre has a certain appreciation for Briggs and Myers and their desire to see something positive in all types of personalities; this remains part of the appeal of the MBTI, along with its ability to easily categorize people according to 4 simple traits, classified in a binary manner. The story, while fun and well written, would have benefited from someone with more experience in psychology and personality testing. The lack of validity of the test is fairly easy to demonstrate, especially once you know the history, but it would have benefited at least as well from a wider approach to the science of personality and not just the personalities of Katherine Briggs and Isabel Myers.
Emre has a certain appreciation for Briggs and Myers and their desire to see something positive in all types of personalities; this remains part of the appeal of the MBTI, along with its ability to easily categorize people according to 4 simple traits, classified in a binary manner. The story, while fun and well written, would have benefited from someone with more experience in psychology and personality testing. The lack of validity of the test is fairly easy to demonstrate, especially once you know the history, but it would have benefited at least as well from a wider approach to the science of personality and not just the personalities of Katherine Briggs and Isabel Myers.
emma_fen's review against another edition
3.0
The extensive research put into this book and the history it thoroughly explains is very interesting. However, the way the author condemns the sweeping conclusions drawn by Katherine and Isabel because of their biases while she continually does the same throughout the book is more than a little irritating. Definitely worth reading for the content, though I found the writing style dry and difficult to get through in a lot of places.