All posts by : Project Cleris

From the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator test to those Buzzfeed questionnaires that tell you what kind of bread you are, personality tests have become an increasingly popular entertaining activity. People take these tests for various reasons, whether to get to know themselves better or to figure out what kind of person is their ‘perfect match.’ However, the accuracy and truth of personality tests are often subject to debate, mainly due to their very foundation. Despite this, the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is popular among individuals and corporations.

The MBTI test sorts people into 1 of 16 personalities based on four cognitive foundations: Extraversion/Introversion, Sensing/Intuition, Thinking/Feeling, and Judging/Perceiving. The name of each personality type is an abbreviation of the four starting letters of the preferred cognitive function, e.g., ENFP.

In the 1920s, Katharine Briggs and Isabel Briggs-Myers, an American mother-daughter duo with no formal training in psychology, developed the personality test. However, the true origins of the theory behind the acclaimed test is a book written by Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung, namely Psychological Types. Jung’s work was entirely theoretical and based on personal experience.

“This was before psychology was an empirical science,” says Adam Grant, a psychologist at the University of Pennsylvania. “The characteristics measured by the test have almost no predictive power on how happy you’ll be in a situation, how you’ll perform at your job, or how happy you’ll be in your marriage.”

The basis of many personality tests is inherently theoretical, not through controlled experiments or data. The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator test is no exception to this common notion. Nevertheless, people are still drawn to it. It is embedded in human nature to be curious, and this curiosity drives our pursuit of knowledge. The same applies to understanding ourselves, and who we are in relation to the many individuals in this world.

That’s why we love taking personality tests.

We are enticed by the prospect of discovering something new about ourselves, whether our strengths and weaknesses or what kind of parents we will become. The kind of job that suits us best. The kind of friends that suit us best. The kind of partner that suits us best. Personality tests can also help us understand those around us better; they reinstall the connected nature of humanity.

But maybe, just maybe, there lies another reason beyond wanting to learn something new: the yearning to feel less alone. Every person on this planet leads their own life; with their own family, friends, hopes, and dreams. It’s hard not to feel lonely. Through media-like personality test results, people are reminded that others think like them. In a world so vast yet so small, there is comfort in knowing that people like you exist, even when the science behind it remains unproven.

SOURCES:
https://www.simplypsychology.org/the-myers-briggs-type-indicator.html
https://www.vox.com/2014/7/15/5881947/myers-briggs-personality-test-meaningless
https://careerassessmentsite.com/why-is-the-mbti-assessment-popular/#:~:text=People%20want%20to%20understand%20themselves.&text=Human%20identity%20and%20personality%20are,making%20sense%20of%20this%20complexity.

Have you ever woken up from a bizarre dream and wondered what it meant? You wouldn’t have been the only person to do so. For centuries, people have considered the meaning of our dreams.

Sleeping

Every night, our bodies need to recover from the day’s obstacles in order to improve our performance, mood, and overall health for the following day. But did you know that even as you sleep, your brain still performs all sorts of activities? As you sleep the night away, your brain progresses through different sleep cycle stages: REM (rapid eye movement) and NREM (non-rapid eye movement). When you first fall asleep, you experience the light sleep of the Stage 1 NREM phase, characterized by slowing brain activities. It is fairly easy to wake up from this stage of sleep, often without noticing that you have fallen asleep in the first place. However, if uninterrupted, a person progresses to the second stage of the sleep cycle: Stage 2 of NREM. In this stage, the body starts to cool down, the muscles relax, and the breathing/heart rate slows. The last stage of NREM is deep sleep. 

After the period of non-rapid eye movement is over, REM takes place. In this stage, you experience atonia, which is the temporary paralysis of your body, except for your eyes and breathing mechanisms. Your body does this to prevent you from reenacting your dreams. Other than dreams, nightmares also occur in this stage of sleep. 

Dreams

Did you know everyone is thought to have between 3 to 6 dreams every night? This phenomenon begs the question: Why do we dream in the first place? 

Despite centuries of research and attempts at figuring out the answer to this question, we still do not have a clear answer. However, a popular theory is that dreams aid with memory consolidation. Deep NREM sleep helps in the consolidation and strengthening of individual memories. Moreover, dreaming and sleeping, in general, allow these memories to come together, allowing for greater creativity and problem-solving. A study by Greater Good Magazine tested this idea by waking up participants during NREM and REM stages. They were given anagram puzzles and had to unscramble letters to form a word. When woken up at a later interval during NREM sleep (which is when humans do not experience dreaming), participants were less creative compared to when they were woken up during REM (dreaming stage) sleep. 

While much research has been and continues to be done, we still have many questions about dreaming that are yet to be answered. What we do know, however, is that sleep leads to many health benefits when done appropriately, such as restoring mood, healthy weight, reduced stress, lower chances of significant health problems, better memory, and many more. So, the next time you encounter a challenging situation, think back to the good old saying and sleep on it.

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/284378#_noHeaderPrefixedContent

https://newsinhealth.nih.gov/2013/04/sleep-it

https://health.gov/myhealthfinder/healthy-living/mental-health-and-relationships/get-enough-sleep

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-science-behind-dreaming/