Is a veterinary student's performance on multiple-mini interviews affected by personality preferences?

The Myers–Briggs Personality Types of Veterinary Students and Their Animal Ethical Profiles in Comparison to Criminal Justice Students in Slovenia

Simple Summary

Personality is a relatively constant and exclusive set of mental, behavioral, and physical characteristics that distinguish individuals. Personality assessment is a well-researched scientific field in which a number of theories have been developed to interpret diverse personality types. The Myers–Briggs Model (MBTI) is the most widely used self-assessment tool in the world to identify the different personality types of individuals. Since personality, with its unique characteristics, distinguishes people from each other, it also influences communication between different types of people and has an impact on attitudes toward animals. The purpose of this study was to examine the MBTI types of veterinary students compared to criminal justice students. In addition, we were interested in the attitudes of both types of student toward animals. Overall, the MBTI types and preferences of veterinary students were very different. Introversion, Sensing, Thinking, and Judging were the predominant preferences. When ethical profiles related to animals were examined, the viewpoints differed significantly between the comparison groups. The utilitarian viewpoint was most veterinary students, and the animal rights perspective was most prevalent in criminal justice students. This study highlights the importance of personality traits for better communication and work in veterinary science as well as criminal justice.

Abstract

Personality types are related to trustworthy, reliable, and competent communication, especially when dealing with clients. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to investigate whether the Myers–Briggs (MBTI) indicator could be used to detect differences in the personality preferences of students at the Veterinary Faculty, University of Ljubljana (VS) compared to students at the Faculty of Criminal Justice and Security, University of Maribor (CJS). Our aim was to profile the two cohorts of students in Slovenia, to compare profiles of students from the social and natural sciences with similar personality traits, and to compare them with published results. CJS are considered well-established, well-studied, non-science ombudsman profiles of students in Slovenia for whom care and safety will play important roles in their future work, similar to VS. Views of people’s duties to animals and the implications for animal care, safety, and welfare are also very important, especially for VS. For this reason, we tested the ethical viewpoints of the two cohorts of students using an interactive web-based program. Our results show that both VS and CJS had different MBTI types, with ISTJ (Introversion, Sensing, Thinking, and Judging) preferences predominating, followed by INFJ (Introverted, Intuitive, Feeling, and Judging) in VS and ESTJ (Extraverted, Observant, Thinking, and Judging) in CJS. Between the two cohorts, the ratio between ISFJ and INFJ was statistically different. In the animal ethics study, the utilitarian viewpoint was most prevalent and statistically higher in VS compared to CJS, where the animal rights perspective was most prevalent. Compared to previous profile studies, some differences were found that could be related to the COVID-19 pandemic and/or the different generations of students. Overall, this study highlights the importance of personality traits for better communication, work, and animal research in veterinary science as well as criminal justice.