Does the admissions committee select medical students in its own image?

A previous issue of the Journal referred to a national study of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) in which 12 schools participated. A comparison of our students' type preference with that of their peers at the 11 other schools revealed that only two of the 11 schools demonstrated our strong preference for the combination of sensing, thinking, and judging. We wondered if our Admissions Committee members, too, would demonstrate a preference for the same combination of Myers-Briggs dimensions. In fact, students' trait preferences matched those of Admissions Committee members on all MBTI dichotomies, suggesting that the Committee's own image may have influenced the selection of medical students. A Committee member's awareness and appreciation of his own personality characteristics may be extremely helpful in the admissions process.