1. The Rorschach Test

2. The Projective Hypothesis
Responses to ambiguous stimuli will reveal aspects of personality including drives, motives, defenses, emotional style, and cognitive processes.

3. Advantages of Projective Tests
Less obvious, harder to fake
May tap underlying (unconscious) psychological processes
May be effective with guarded patients and kids
May help us understand disorders in which symptoms are not immediately present

4. Disadvantages of Projective Tests
Reliability and validity
Cross-cultural issues
Complex scoring systems
Cumbersome, time-consuming

5. Uses of the Rorschach
Describes perceptual-cognitive aspects of the individual
Elicits need states that are projected onto the blots
Gives info on strengths and weaknesses

6. Limitations of the Rorschach
Diagnostic decision-making
Treatment planning
Predicting behavior

7. Administering the Rorschach
Introduction
Free association
Inquiry
(Then lots and lots of coding and scoring)

8. What Gets Interpreted? Location Content Determinants Form quality
Special scores
Structural summary

9. Location Where does the client see what she sees? W Whole blot
D Common detail
Dd Uncommon detail
S White space

10. Content
Human
Animal
Other
Idiosyncratic
Morbid
Aggressive movement

11. Determinants Form (F) Chromatic color (C, CF, FC)
Achromatic color (C’, C’F, FC’)
Light-dark features
Shading (Y, YF, FY)
Texture (T, TF, FT)
Vista (V, VF, FV)
Movement
-Human (M) vs. animal (FM)
vs. inanimate (m)
- Active (a) vs. Passive (p)

12. Form Quality + Superior (good form, unusually well-developed)
o Ordinary (good form,
nothing special)
u/w Weak/unusual (poor form,
but plausible)
- Minus (poor form, grossly
distorted)

13. Special Scores Unusual verbalizations Fabulized Combination
Contamination
Perseveration

14. Structural Summary Completed after the Sequence of Scores
A form in which totals across the cards are calculated
Includes many, varied ratios percentages and derivations
Rorschach interpretation is based on this structural summary

15. Ratios, Percentages & Derivations
L=(sum of pure F)/(sum of nonpure F)
EB= M : Sum C
EA= M + Sum C
eb= Fm + m : T + Y + V + C’
ep= Fm + m + T + Y + V + C’
W : M
F+%

16. Rorschach Interpretation
Involves Putting the structural summary together with clinical data
Areas of interest:
Cognitive style
Emotional style
Ego strength and coping
Interpersonal style

17. Critique CS norms are poor May not work well on minorities
Score reliability is poor for about half the scores
Test-retest r is low or unknown for many scores
Number of responses influences scores
Rorschach scores don’t hang together
Low predictive and incremental validity