Understanding Your Results
A profile of your cognitive development is presented below, based on how you have described yourself. A 4-letter personality type code and temperament are also presented for your convenience if you are familiar with those frameworks. Most people find their results match their 4-letter personality type code and temperament. That is, we tend to develop what we prefer and vice versa. As you reflect on your cognitive profile, keep in mind that sometimes we develop a cognitive process to meet the demands of our environment or use a process well in one area of our lives but not others.

The Eight Processes
Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung identified four mental functions — today known as cognitive processes. We focus our attention and gather information using Sensing (S) and iNtuiting (N), and we organize our experiences and make decisions using Thinking (T) and Feeling (F). Jung described how each of these four processes plays out in a person's "internal world" (I) of thoughts, feelings, memories and imagination; and in the "external world" (E) of actions, people, tools and organizations. Thus, 8 cognitive processes (Se, Si, Ne, Ni, Te, Ti, Fe, Fi).

Basic and Developed Use
Each cognitive process can be engaged in a basic, unsophisticated way reflecting our natural human capabilities. Almost everyone can engage each process in some basic way. Beyond this, you will engage some cognitive processes in a more sophisticated, developed way. This is usually the result of innate preference plus lifelong growth and practice, which equals development.

Perceiving—how we focus our attention and gather information

   Cognitive Process Basic (Passive) Use Developed (Active) Use
   extraverted Sensing (Se) Notice sensory data in the environment. Trust your instincts and take action relevant to the moment and current context.
   introverted Sensing (Si) Recall tangible data and experiences. Stabilize a situation by comparing it to what is expected, known and reliable.
   extraverted Intuiting (Ne) Notice abstract patterns as they emerge. Shift a situation's dynamics and explore imaginative potential possibilities.
   introverted Intuiting (Ni) Receive "ah-ha" insights and realizations. Persue a greater level of awareness to transform who you are and how you think.

Judging—how we organize our experiences and make decisions

   Cognitive Process Basic (Passive) Use Developed (Active) Use
   extraverted Thinking (Te) Follow steps, points and time tables. Create structure, reason by measures and evidence, and implement complex plans.
   introverted Thinking (Ti) Adhere to definitions and impersonal principles. Analyze a problem using a framework, and find an angle or leverage by which to solve it.
   extraverted Feeling (Fe) Honor others' needs and preferences. Connect with people by sharing values and taking on their needs as yours.
   introverted Feeling (Fi) Adhere to personal beliefs about what's important. Evalute situations and choose what you believe is congruent with your personal identity.

Development is more than basic or developed use of processes in isolation. Excellent use of a cognitive process involves both basic and advanced use as appropriate, and ability to deploy other processes in its service. Average to good use usually means we can use the process in limited situations or use it well but only with the aid of other processes. Poor use means basic use at most. Finally, we may get ourselves into trouble when we don't use a process at all.

Sixteen Patterns
Jung observed that everyone has potential access to all eight cognitive processes but that we each prefer one as dominant — playing a lead role — with a second process playing a support role. Your two preferred cognitive processes allow you to do information gathering and decision making, introverting and extraverting. Maybe you prefer introverted Intuiting in a lead role with extraverted Feeling in a support role, or maybe you prefer extraverted Sensing in a lead role with introverted Thinking in a support role. Or maybe you prefer some other pairing. These pairings tap into sixteen possible patterns which are often represented using a 4-letter code. Here are the sixteen type patterns and the preferred cognitive processes associated with each:

   Type Lead Process Support Process
   ESTP extraverted Sensing introverted Thinking
   ISTP introverted Thinking extraverted Sensing
   ESFP extraverted Sensing introverted Feeling
   ISFP introverted Feeling extraverted Sensing
   ESTJ extraverted Thinking introverted Sensing
   ISTJ introverted Sensing extraverted Thinking
   ESFJ extraverted Feeling introverted Sensing
   ISFJ introverted Sensing extraverted Feeling
   ENTJ extraverted Thinking introverted Intuiting
   INTJ introverted Intuiting extraverted Thinking
   ENTP extraverted Intuiting introverted Thinking
   INTP introverted Thinking extraverted Intuiting
   ENFJ extraverted Feeling introverted Intuiting
   INFJ introverted Intuiting extraverted Feeling
   ENFP extraverted Intuiting introverted Feeling
   INFP introverted Feeling extraverted Intuiting

Validity and Reliability of Results
As of October 2005, over 3000 people have taken this cognitive assessment. There are many ways to validate an assessment. A common statistical method called factor analysis confirms there are eight distinct cognitive categories (all items in the assessment that tap into the same cognitive process have a correlation of at least r=0.2 and most have r=0.4 to r=0.6.) Furthermore, people who have taken this assessment and reported their 4-letter type code have received results that matched their type code 75% to 80% of the time. This is excellent performance since the reported type may be inaccurate even when "validated" or from a professional assessment. Even when the type code does not exactly match, the temperament result matches over 95% of the time. Thus, you can consider your results here as valid as those from any professionally developed assessment.

Further Exploration
What if the 4-letter code reported here is different from what you expected? Say your type code result here is ESTP and the type you are familiar with for yourself is INTJ. Even though the type codes look quite different, you may have rated the cognitive processes for these two types rather closely. Also, keep in mind the cognitive profile is based on your responses. Continuing with the example, if you didn't think of yourself as an ESTP, then you would want to explore why you rated highly a phrase such as "freely follow your gut instincts and exciting physical impulses as they come up." This phrase clearly does not fit with the INTJ type pattern. Please visit www.bestfittype.com for more information and exploration. You may also be interested in "8 Keys to Self-Leadership" by Dario Nardi.