TL/DR: KEY POINT TAKE-AWAY:

All personality tests (including Metageno) assume a set number of personality types, and that the person taking the test must be one of them...

BUT every other test apart from Metageno cannot be failed. Therefore, even if the person taking the test enters total nonsense, all other tests must deliver a result. They accomplish this by averaging and weighting answers to come up with a best-guess result and then they call it "you" even if it's only a 10% match to one of the personality types in that system; it has to default to something. This is one reason why personality tests are "notoriously inaccurate" (New York Times).

Metageno refuses such a compromise and insists on a true match or a "fail." Failing the test does not mean you don't have a Metageno type; it means that your answers were not an exact match for one of the types. This happens because your true Self (who you were at birth) becomes distorted by post-birth social conditioning, resulting in what science calls "self-report bias." This is why Metageno also strongly encourages a trusted third-party verification of any result, and as a way of finding a result; because we don't see ourselves nearly as clearly as those who know us well.

ANY test that cannot be failed is not a test, at all. A personality test that delivers a result regardless of what a person enters (including total gibberish) is fundamentally flawed.

Destiny deserves definition. That's why Metageno exists.

Why Sheridan-Metageno is the only personality test you can fail (and why other personality tests don't measure personality!)

Most personality tests say they show your “true self.”


But that raises a basic question: what does “true self” actually mean?

If it means who you are before the world shapes you, then the only real starting point is birth. At birth, you don’t have opinions, coping habits, or social roles yet. What exists then is biology.

After birth, everything else starts shaping how you act:

  • Family rules

  • School pressure

  • Rewards and punishments

  • Trauma

  • Fitting in

  • Learning what works and what doesn’t

That shaping process is called social conditioning.

Most personality tests don’t measure what you were born with. They measure how you’ve adapted.

Behavior is not personality

Most personality tests ask questions like:

  • “I am outgoing”

  • “I like structure”

  • “I avoid conflict”

These are behaviors, not personality itself.

A simple analogy helps:

  • Music = your underlying personality (the source)

  • Speakers = your behavior (how it comes out)

If speakers are damaged or poorly tuned, the music sounds different.


That doesn’t mean the music itself changed. Social conditioning works the same way. It can distort behavior without changing the underlying structure. Measuring the speakers is not the same as measuring the music.

Why behavior looks unique but personality shouldn’t

Everyone’s life experiences are different, so behavior looks endlessly unique. That’s why personality test results often feel very personal. But if personality is something real and enduring, it can’t be unlimited.


It must be:

  • Structured

  • Limited in number

  • Stable beneath surface differences

Otherwise, it’s not a structure at all — it’s just description.

The category mistake in personality testing

Here’s the core problem:

Most personality psychology treats behavior as personality.

E

ven if behavior is related to personality, that doesn’t make them the same thing. Correlation is not identity. This creates what's called a category error:

  • Defining personality as something stable and enduring

  • But measuring it using behavior shaped after conditioning

That’s like saying height is fixed, then measuring shoe size and calling it height.

Even official definitions contradict themselves

The American Psychological Association (APA) defines personality as:

  1. Enduring characteristics

  2. A person’s unique adjustment to life

These two things cannot be the same.

Something enduring exists before circumstances.

An adjustment is a response to circumstances.

A thing cannot be both the cause and the consequence.

Why most personality tests can’t be failed

Most popular personality tests are designed so everyone gets a result. If your answers are:

  • Mixed

  • Inconsistent

  • Situational

  • Conflicted

The test doesn’t stop. Instead, it:

  • Averages your answers

  • Weights them

  • Reinterprets them

  • Forces a type anyway

This means the test bends to the user, not the other way around. If every input produces a “valid” result, the test has no way to say:

“I couldn’t actually detect what I claim to measure.”

Research on self-report bias and impression management shows this problem clearly (Viswesvaran & Ones, 1999; Paulhus & Reid, 1991; Paulhus & Vazire, 2007; Griffith & Peterson, 2008).

Why the Sheridan-Metageno® Personality Test is the only test that can be failed

Metageno works differently. It does not ask:

“Which label fits you best?”

It asks:

“Is there a clear underlying pattern here at all?”

The key difference is strict matching.

If your answers don’t clearly resolve into one coherent type, Metageno:

  • Does not average

  • Does not reinterpret

  • Does not force a result

It returns no result. That failure is intentional. It means the answers reflected:

  • Adaptation

  • Surface self-description

  • Mixed roles

  • Conflicting self-images

—not a clean underlying structure.

Why failure is the point

A test that cannot fail cannot tell you when it failed to measure anything real.

A test that can fail can refuse to give a false answer.

If the goal is to measure:

  • The music (underlying personality)

  • Not just the speakers (conditioned behavior)

Then failure is not a flaw.

Failure is the signal that no clear structure was detected.

And that is exactly why most personality tests don’t measure personality — but Metageno insists on finding it, or saying nothing at all.