Yahoo! News - Employers Relying On Personality Tests To Screen Applicants
Psychologists have long debated whether personality can be reduced to a set of numbers, like a person’s weight, shoe size or eyeglasses prescription. But that has not stopped people from trying. The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, which measures four qualities of a person — introversion/extroversion, sensing/intuition, thinking/feeling, judging/perceiving — is often used to help match people up with careers. The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory, which attempts to measure propensity for substance abuse or other pathologies, is regularly used to assess candidates for sensitive positions in police departments, banks, nuclear plants and the like. The Neuroticism, Extroversion and Openness Personality Inventory breaks personality down into five characteristics that some companies use to assess traits such as management potential.