MBTI Personality Type and the Utility of Error Correction among English Majors in Taiwan

The issue of whether or not to correct errors in students’ writing is controversial. Some scholars argue that error correction is helpful, while others argue that it is ineffective, perhaps even harmful. What is missing from the literature are studies about how error correction might affect the performance of specific types of students. This study, which included 140 undergraduate English majors from Taiwan, examined the relationship between Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) personality types on the effectiveness of one kind of error correction of writing. To identify their personality types, the students completed Form G of the MBTI. To determine their opinions about error correction of writing, the students wrote—at the beginning and the end of the two-semester course—in-class essays about whether or not they wanted to receive error correction of their writing. The purpose of this repetition, using a pre-test/post-test format, was to assist the researchers in the comparison of the students’ self-reported opinions about error correction over time. In addition, the researchers compared improvement in students’ written grammatical accuracy by the variables of self-reported error-correction preferences and MBTI personality types. The students also completed the grammar section of the Michigan Test of English Language Proficiency (MTELP) at the beginning and the end of the course; its purpose was to double-check any gains in grammatical accuracy in the essays with the results of a standardized grammar assessment. Once the data were collected, the Kruskal-Wallis test