# Correlation Between MBTI Types and Enneagram Types by Heidi Priebe



## _Blackstar_ (Jul 22, 2015)

I enjoyed this article. It presents and analyses areas of overlap between MBTI and Enneagram types. 

I think that this could help someone who is trying to figure out their type or suspects they've mistyped themselves (E.G. an ENFP E-7 repressing some of their Fi on account of E-7's propensity to avoid pain and seek pleasure, and therefore considering themselves an ENTP on account of their behaviour - a spurious line of reasoning propped up by the ENTP's dominant Ne, which would appear to jive with the mistyped ENFP's behaviour).

Of course, to avoid writing an article of gargantuan proportions, Priebe has limited herself to the most popular areas of overlap between the types, so a confused INTP 2w3 sx/so won't find an analysis of their type, nor any reasons why one might mistype as it. Nevertheless, I think it's a useful article, and the statistics on the instinctual variants at the bottom of each page are interesting.

Apologies if this has been posted before. It may still offer material for discussion and, if it has been posted, newer members might not have seen it.

Here Are The Most Common Enneagram Types For Each Myers-Briggs Personality Type | Thought Catalog


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## Figure (Jun 22, 2011)

A few comments, as a first time reader of this study: 

At a very _high _level, I think this was well done with respect to what most people loosely familiar with both theories would expect to see. It's a decent side by side of the stereotypes of types within both theories. 

At a more granular level, I still think it is remarkably difficult to use these descriptions for typing purposes. I generally do not think it is a good idea for people to cross theories to try and justify why they may be one type over another, or why they don't fit a stereotype which this article basically invites those unsure of their type to do. Having written enneagram type descriptions for INTJ's myself before, even with what I'd consider a good amount of exposure to both theories it was extremely difficult to differentiate what was "INTJ" and what was "enneagram" without just re-stating existing stereotypes, many of which are not unique to a type structure. I also noticed in the article that certain combinations I have noticed a high frequency of were vastly underrepresented in the numbers (for example, ISTP type 6, ISTJ type 9, ESTJ type 8w9). 

The disconnect here is basically that enneagram type is at the level of ego structure/focus of attention, and cognitive type is at the level of information processing - but the type descriptions still rely on non-unique, vague descriptors. She says, to use my type as an example, that INTJ 1's are "more ethical" and "stronger with Fi/Te." Other MBTI sources also describe Fi as the bona fide "ethical" cognitive function. At the same time, a whopping 7 of 913 (or 0.76%) Fi dominant or auxiliary types in her survey identified as type 1's. If having "stronger" Fi makes INTJ 1's "more ethical," why are more Fi _strong _types not also 1's? Something is clearly tangled, either with 1's having significantly less to do with morality than people stereotype (which is what I think), or Fi types being mistyped (which may or may not be true). As an aside, INTJ 1's I believe are more likely to be the Te subtype, and therefore stronger in Te and Se, not Te and Fi and look more like ENTJ's than ISTJ's. That's just one example of why it is not a sound practice to combine type descriptions in this way - I'm confident if I poked around a bit more in this article, I'd find more. 

To be fair, the author did report that the types were self-reported and should allow for a large margin for error. I would, however, argue that this isn't just a sidenote and that the pitfalls of self typing in both theories could make that gap large enough to discredit the study. Think about how much effort and how much of a journey it is to type oneself in enneagram - did these 3,000 participants type themselves by an online test, or by doing inner work, reading multiple sources, etc. With MBTI, typing challenges crop up in the theory not providing any kind of constraints per type that make that type unique (i.e. ESFJ's have more in common with ENFJ's and ISFJ's than they have traits that distinguish them uniquely as ESFJ and nothing else). Enneagram has core passions and foci of attention that distinguish each type - MBTI does _not_. How did these people type themselves in either theory? 


Overall, it was a nice effort, but if people use this to try and parse through self-typing discrepancies, I think it may muddle the waters more than clarify them. This study really tried to tackle a lot, and could use more detailed data and more precise definitions to support the conclusions that were made.


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## Brains (Jul 22, 2015)

Figure said:


> She says, to use my type as an example, that INTJ 1's are "more ethical" and "stronger with Fi/Te." Other MBTI sources also describe Fi as the bona fide "ethical" cognitive function. At the same time, a whopping 7 of 913 (or 0.76%) Fi dominant or auxiliary types in her survey identified as type 1's. If having "stronger" Fi makes INTJ 1's "more ethical," why are more Fi _strong _types not also 1's? Something is clearly tangled, either with 1's having significantly less to do with morality than people stereotype (which is what I think), or Fi types being mistyped (which may or may not be true). As an aside, INTJ 1's I believe are more likely to be the Te subtype, and therefore stronger in Te and Se, not Te and Fi and look more like ENTJ's than ISTJ's. That's just one example of why it is not a sound practice to combine type descriptions in this way - I'm confident if I poked around a bit more in this article, I'd find more.


Fi is probably thought of too much as something ethical - ethics, in the sense of codified code, is much more a product of Thinking than Feeling in my view. Fi is just a drive to do things how they feel right to, not necessarily to be moral. To put it another way, quoting Doctor Who: "Good men don't need rules. Today is not the day to find out why I have so many." A virtuous person will simply act virtuously, it is his nature. A person who doesn't know virtue might use rules to walk a better path.

Type 1 I see as a Pi-Je type of mindset at heart - see something elevated, and try to bring it to reality. Si-Te and Ni-Te are perfect for this, with Fe an ENFJ's Fe-Se setup seems most fitting.

Whether it's 1 or Fi, morality doesn't really have to enter the equation. Personal integrity, yes.


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## newbie const (Nov 26, 2015)

MBTI and Enneagram are two different systems.Each is based on different areas of personality.One can use both of them to cover up more traits for himself,but there is no correlation between the two and there is no common type for any of them either.It creates numerous mistypings and helps some persons to develop Special Snowflake syndrome and also a disrespect to other's typings.


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## _Blackstar_ (Jul 22, 2015)

newbie const said:


> MBTI and Enneagram are two different systems ... One can use both of them to cover up more traits for himself,but ....It creates numerous mistypings and helps some persons to develop Special Snowflake syndrome


True. If it does nothing else, the linked article demonstrates how people meld both systems to create a super-type that validates their sense of self. This is probably best represented by the overwhelming number of INFJs who identified as 4s.

Perhaps I would have done better to say that this article shows where certain MBTI types can "take on" an incorrect E-type which they believe matches up with the MBTI type they've integrated -- and vice versa. I can see why this would happen; those who haven't looked into either system might view them as two jigsaw pieces to be fitted together.


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## Highlander (Dec 20, 2009)

Daemonion said:


> I enjoyed this article. It presents and analyses areas of overlap between MBTI and Enneagram types.
> 
> I think that this could help someone who is trying to figure out their type or suspects they've mistyped themselves (E.G. an ENFP E-7 repressing some of their Fi on account of E-7's propensity to avoid pain and seek pleasure, and therefore considering themselves an ENTP on account of their behaviour - a spurious line of reasoning propped up by the ENTP's dominant Ne, which would appear to jive with the mistyped ENFP's behaviour).
> 
> ...


She seems to have copied my idea. I think in comparison, her data and analysis is poor. It's disappointing because I shared this study with her two months prior to her coming out with that article and she just came up with her own stuff which wasn't as good. Do these journalists have no integrity?

Enneagram and MBTI Correlation - Typology Wiki


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## Inveniet (Aug 21, 2009)

There are few people who understand just one of those theories well.
Even fewer who understand both well.
That make such correlations based on selfreporting useless.
It would be like a distrobuted math project to people who can't do basic math.
You will get a result, but if 80-90% of the ones responding thinks 2+2=5 your result is basically garbage.


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## Highlander (Dec 20, 2009)

Strontphite said:


> There are few people who understand just one of those theories well.
> Even fewer who understand both well.
> That make such correlations based on selfreporting useless.
> It would be like a distrobuted math project to people who can't do basic math.
> You will get a result, but if 80-90% of the ones responding thinks 2+2=5 your result is basically garbage.


You think there is a better way to do it? Please enlighten us.


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## Brains (Jul 22, 2015)

Highlander said:


> You think there is a better way to do it? Please enlighten us.


That some way is bad doesn't mean there is a better way. It just means the way it was done was bad and doesn't really give a real result because of all the noise people's general ignorance causes.


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## Highlander (Dec 20, 2009)

Brains said:


> That some way is bad doesn't mean there is a better way. It just means the way it was done was bad and doesn't really give a real result because of all the noise people's general ignorance causes.


I wouldn't put much stock in her study results but the ones I produced are based on almost 26,000 data points. I'm sure some of that data isn't good but there are enough data points to make arriving at some inferences a fairly reasonable thing to do. What better place to get that data from than two Typology Forums?


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## Brains (Jul 22, 2015)

Highlander said:


> I wouldn't put much stock in her study results but the ones I produced are based on almost 26,000 data points. I'm sure some of that data isn't good but there are enough data points to make arriving at some inferences a fairly reasonable thing to do. What better place to get that data from than two Typology Forums?


Some data sample where people are not grossly mistyped. Doesn't need to be near as large as that, but you'd have to confirm a bunch of people's typings by people who you're convinced know their stuff.


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## Inveniet (Aug 21, 2009)

Highlander said:


> You think there is a better way to do it? Please enlighten us.


Okay here are the steps.

Step 1: Become very good in both systems. 
---(Reading every book written about the subject with detailed notes)
Step 2: Become very good at typing people in both systems. 
---(You should type several hundreds before even considering starting the project)
Step 3: Set aside massive amounts of time where you meticulously type everyone in person face to face.
---(Dataset was about 20K people give or take, 1 a day should take you 54 years, doing ten per day would only take you 5,4 years)

The reason people cop out with a solution that is bad, 
is that the amount of work it takes to do it right is extremely high.
I sure as hell wouldn't want to sit day and night charting out thousands of peoples type in 2 systems.
Nevermind that one has to spend a couple of years to hone the skills to be able to type well.


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## Brains (Jul 22, 2015)

Strontphite said:


> Okay here are the steps.
> 
> Step 1: Become very good in both systems.
> ---(Reading every book written about the subject with detailed notes)
> ...


Massive overkill in both qualifications and amount of people to be typed.


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## Inveniet (Aug 21, 2009)

Brains said:


> Massive overkill in both qualifications and amount of people to be typed.


Well if you want to operate with a lesser standard feel free.
From what I've seen of this field so far I might have underestimated the qualifications.
I'm not sure what number would be sufficient TBH.
Maybe you know that?


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