Maintaining positive relationships, whether with a friend, family member, or romantic partner, is largely about understanding. Learning more about yourself and those around you can lead to more effective communication and deeper connection. In this article, we will take a look at four personality assessments that can serve as powerful tools in cultivating meaningful relationships.

For additional information and advice regarding relationships, visit BetterHelp.

4 Types of Personality Assessments

Enneagram

The Enneagram system offers descriptions of nine distinct personality types. Enneagram theory posits that our basic personality type develops in the early years as a coping strategy. From there, we begin operating under subconscious beliefs about what we need to do to be okay- for example, Type 3s believe they must achieve in order to earn love, and Type 9s think they can only be okay if there is an absence of conflict. Each type has positive qualities and areas of weakness that must be addressed in order to move towards the healthiest version of themselves.

Due to the depth of the Enneagram that focuses on an individual’s core motivations, fears, and desires, there is a potential to use it as a tool to enhance connection with those in our lives. Understanding your type can help you to better identify your unconscious patterns of behaviour and ways of being that may no longer be serving you. It can increase your awareness in how you relate to others, what you need and how to better show up for those in your life in their unique ways of functioning.

You can take a free enneagram test here. However, it is important to keep in mind that taking a test is only a starting point and finding your type is often a process. Many times, deeper research is required in order to identify which of the nine types resonates the most. 

Myers Briggs

The Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) focuses on four areas: how an individual receives energy (extroversion/introversion), processes information (sensing/intuition), makes decisions (thinking/feeling), and implements information (judging/perceiving). For example, a person’s Myers Briggs type might be INFJ which stands for Introversion-Intuition-Feeling-Judging.

Taking a Myers-Briggs test can provide deeper insight into your way of being in the world. One aspect that is particularly helpful is assessing where you are on the introvert-extrovert spectrum. Determining whether you get energy from others, from solitude, or are somewhere in between, can help you to tune into your needs as well as honour what your partner or friends need as well.

Love Languages

This assessment emphasizes that everyone expresses love differently. It discusses five love languages: words of affirmation, quality time, acts of service, physical touch and gifts. Determining how you most prefer to receive love can help you to clarify your needs within your relationships. Identifying the love languages of those in your life can guide you in showing your appreciation in a way that matters the most to the other person- whether it is a handwritten card, helping them with a tangible task, or spending an afternoon doing something you both enjoy.

Click here to take a free love languages assessment.

Attachment Styles

Our attachment styles form as a result of our early interactions with primary caregivers and their attunement to our needs. There are four attachment styles: secure attachment, anxious attachment, avoidant attachment and disorganized attachment. We continue to see our attachment styles play out in adulthood, affecting how comfortable we feel with both intimacy and autonomy in our relationships.

Gaining awareness over your attachment wiring is extremely beneficial for recognizing how you may behave within an intimate relationship and can help you to manage your fears and anxieties instead of reacting in harmful ways. Discussing attachment needs with a partner can help you to create a plan for helping you both to feel secure and safe within the relationship.

Find out your adult attachment style here.

The takeaway

Exploring personality assessments can be transformational for your connections with the important people in your life. Understanding your own tendencies as well as how those around you function can help to facilitate deeper avenues of relating and more fulfilling relationships.