Differential item functioning on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) was examined in regard to gender. The Myers-Briggs has a differential scoring system for males and females on its thinking/feeling subscale. This scoring system preserves the 60 % thinking male and 30 % thinking female proportion that is implied by the Jungian theory underlying the Indicator. The MBTI's authors contended that the sex-based differential scoring system corrects items that subjects at a certain level of a latent trait either incorrectly endorse or leave blank.
This reasoning is the classical definition of differential item functioning (DIF); consequently, the non differentially scored items should exhibit DIF. If these items do not show DIF, then there would be no reason to use a differential scoring system.
Although the Indicator has been in use for several decades, no rigorous item response theory (IRT) item-level analysis of the Indicator has been undertaken. IRT analysis allows for mean differences in subgroups to occur, independent of the question of DlF. Linn and Harnisch's (1981) pseudo-lRT analysis was chosen to test for the presence of DlF in the MBTl items because it is best for tests of relatively small length. The Myers-Briggs subscales range from 22 to 26 items, which is relatively small by lRT standards. lRT analyses conducted on N=1887 subjects indicated that no items on the thinking/feeling subscale showed evidence of DIF. Out of 94 items, only one extraversion/introversion item and one judging/perception item showed evidence of DIF; no Thinking/Feeling items showed DIF. It is recommended that sex-based differential MBTI scoring be abandoned, and that the distribution of type in the population be examined in future studies. / Ph. D.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:VTETD/oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/38455 |
| Date | 06 June 2008 |
| Creators | Greenberg, Stuart Elliot |
| Contributors | Psychology, Harvey, Robert J., Foti, Roseanne J., Hauenstein, Neil M. A., Gustafson, Sigrid B., Markham, Steven E. |
| Publisher | Virginia Tech |
| Source Sets | Virginia Tech Theses and Dissertation |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Dissertation, Text |
| Format | ix, 181 leaves, BTD, application/pdf, application/pdf |
| Rights | In Copyright, http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ |
| Relation | OCLC# 29046290, LD5655.V856_1993.G744.pdf |
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