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Isabel Briggs Myers (October 18, 1897 – May 5, 1980)^[1][2] was an American psychological theorist. She was co-creator, with her mother, of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI).

She was home-schooled by her mother (Katharine Cook Briggs, January 3, 1875 – 1968)^[3] and went on to earn a bachelor's degree in political science from Swarthmore College. In 1918 she married Clarence Myers.

Katharine Briggs read Carl Jung's book, Psychological Types and recommended it to Isabel Myers; the mother and daughter then formulated the MBTI together. Later in life, Myers collaborated with Mary McCaulley to conduct tests of her research and of the MBTI.

Myers wrote a prize-winning mystery novel, Murder Yet to Come, in 1929, using typological ideas. In 1934 she published a second novel,Give Me Death (Frederick A. Stokes Co., New York), a murder mystery that revolves around a note from a supposed suicide to his daughter, in which he confesses to a strain of Negro blood, advises her to forget she ever thought of marriage, and apologizes for the humiliation he has brought upon her. Dialogue in the book concerns the "impossibility" of interracial marriage.

Publications

• Myers, I. (1995) Gifts Differing:Understanding Personality Type. Davies-Black Publishing,U.S. ISBN 0-89106-074-X
• Myers, I. (1990) Introduction to Type: A Description of the Theory and Applications of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator. Center for Applications of Psychological Type Inc ISBN 0-935652-06-X

Further reading

Saunders, F. W. (1991) Katharine and Isabel: Mother's Light, Daughter's Journey. Davies-Black Publishing, U.S. ISBN 0-89106-049-9 A biography of Katharine Cook Briggs and Isabel Briggs Myers.

References

External links

• Biographical information on Isabel Myers
• Additional biographical information on Isabel Myers
• Descriptions of psychological types according to the Myers-Briggs typology
• "Isabel Briggs Myers and Her Mother, Katharine Cook Briggs" at MyersBriggs.org