False Rumors Concerning Celebrities and Their Types

As if the epistemological status of Jungian typology were not already compromised enough by the prevalence of people who type by face reading, stock characters, and handwriting analysis, a further problem that mars the field is the circulation of unfounded rumors about celebrities self-identifying as certain types or taking personality tests and coming out as specific types.

At CelebrityTypes we have decided not to pass along hearsay, so we only include self-identifications and test results on our site if we have seen the source material with our own eyes, either in the form of published sources, or via personal correspondence with the individual in question. For this reason we have tried to track down the sources for much of the popular hearsay that thrives in the field of Jungian type. Here are the rumors that turned up false:

Bill and Hillary Clinton
There is a (very widespread) rumor that the Clintons took the test and scored ENFP (Bill) and INTJ (Hillary). In the process of researching this claim we have tracked down two separate sources who both lay claim to having firsthand knowledge of Bill and Hillary Clinton self-identifying as ENFP and INTJ, respectively. However, once we asked these people to go public with their eyewitness accounts, so that we could get a solid source, they backed down.

Thus, while most people have heard this story, it must be considered unfounded and an urban legend.

Update: Indeed, in the book “Personality Power”, it is reported that Hillary Clinton has never taken the test. [Zichy & Bidou: Personality Power (Amacom 2013) pp. 128-130]

Oprah Winfrey
There is a rumor that she has taken a Jungian type test and scored ESFP.
However, there appear to be NO sources to back this claim.

Paris Hilton
There is a rumor that she has taken a Jungian type test and scored ISTP.
However, there appear to be NO sources to back this claim.

Matthew Inman (TheOatmeal.com)
There is a rumor that he identifies himself as an introvert, but the rumor is false.
Our source is personal correspondence with Inman.

Marilyn vos Savant
There is a rumor that she self-identifies as ENTP, but she has never done so, and in fact she identifies herself as an introvert.
Our source is Savant herself.

Dr. Phil

There is a rumor that he took a “Big Five” personality test on his show and both scored as an extrovert and self-identified as one. Yet we watched the episodes of his show related to personality testing, and Dr. Phil does not identify as an extrovert, nor are his scores ever revealed.

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Therefore, unless solid sources materialize, all of the rumors above should be considered false.

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And then a genuine “rumor”:

Ray Dalio
According to the Institutional Investor Magazine, Ray Dalio identifies himself as ENTP.
While not constituting direct evidence, we take it on good faith from the magazine that this is indeed Dalio’s self-assessment. (Although we do not agree that Dalio is ENTP.)

9 Comments

  1. I second that!! I’m an INFP and watching JK Rowling speak just makes me cringe. She’s INFJ.

  2. @Collins @Justine

    I’d say she’s more ISFP than anything.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kn7nlfoMcwQ

    I can see inferior thinking in the way she talks, but the way she describes things seem more “sensorish”. She doesn’t appear to jump from idea to idea, rather she connects them together.

    “Some failure in life is inevitable. It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all—in which case, you fail by default.”

    “I don’t think there’s any harm at all in allowing a kid to fantasize. In fact, I think to stop people from fantasizing is a very destructive thing indeed.”

    “I think you’re working and learning until you die. I can with my hand on my heart say I will never write for any reason other than I burningly wanted to write the book.”

  3. @CV

    Claiming that, “She doesn’t appear to jump from idea to idea, rather she connects them together…”, does not necessarily make her someone with a Sensing preference. If anything, that is indicative of Introverted Intuition (Ni), as opposed to Extroverted Intuition (Ne), which further supports her identification as an INFJ, rather than an INFP.

    As for the website’s claim that she’s an INFP, I really want to see some evidence too, besides those silly quotations. It seems all the fantasy writers (many of them, at least) have been typed as INFPs, purely because they have a faculty for fantasy and imagination.

  4. @admin

    I don’t know for sure what she is but I do hope you guys get some ISFP sci-fi & fantasy authors to compare.

    Actually, any ISFPs will do. I find your lack of ISFPs disturbing.

  5. So you dont agree Ray Dalio being an ENTP. Could you offer your contradicting opinion in addition of just disagreeing?

  6. Listen to the first 10 minutes of Ray Dalio reading “Principles” — he is undoubtedly an ENTP

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