Class 2 Flashcards
Projective Tests Traditionally
Projective traditionally refers to:
- Ambiguous stimulus or activity
- Test-taker generates a response with minimal external guidance
- In responding the test-taker projects or puts forward elements of her personality
- Interpretation requires subjectivity
Tester’s personality is part of the process
This insight was ahead of its time
> > Intersubjectivity
What is projection?
Things that aren’t there.
- Movement probably is a bit projective because blot does not move
- Embellishment leaves the field too
> Bats classification answer
> Bat that just went through a storm and is all beat up - Minus responses may be projections
- Special scores
Projective vs. Performance-Based
Performance-based tests are nomothetic, that is, one’s performance can be scored into meaningful categories that can be compared to norms, resulting in reliable and valid implications that are totally separate from projective analysis
Performance-based Measures
Value as a different method from Self-report tests
What do we miss with self-report tests?
- Maturity?
- Narcissism?
- Intelligence?
- Trauma?
The Value of the Rorschach
The Rorschach is a standardized behavioral experiment that “provides a sample of how one”:
- Filters and organizes information
- Applies meaning to stimuli and situations
- How conventionally they perceive
- How logically they think and communicate
- How they handle inconsistencies, contradictions, and ambiguity
Explicit vs. Implicit
Self-report measures tend to tap explicit aspects of a person (I.e., how a person sees themselves)
Performance-based measures tend to tap implicit or underlying aspects of a person
Similar to intelligence - self-report likely very different from WAIS-IV results (performance-based)
Introduction to the Rorschach
We cut out the possibility of a correct answer - an inkblot
Thus, we set into motion a complicated set of psychological operations
> Enter it into short term storage, scan it, cognitively identify it, dredge up long-term storage for comparison data, etc.
“Critical Distal Bits”
The most potent properties of the field
They create the parameters that limit the range of possible objects
Distal features of the inkblots are not as precise and discrete as usual
BUT each contains distinctive features that could be identified as similar to objects in memory traces (Rorschach made them that way)
Thus, the blots fall far short of being ambiguous
The critical bits that limit the array of possible translations allow for rapid formation of potential answers
> Popular responses (this is a scoring category)
Populars
Each blot has high valence bits that tend to define classification
Evidence?
The Big Picture
Administration
Scoring
Interpretation (what do indicators mean?) - what does content, sequence, etc. offer?
Integration (with other indicators, other tests, history, etc.)
Perspectives (reliability, validity, strengths and weaknesses, cultural issues, etc.)
Performance-Based Tests (Finn, 2016)
Recent research shows that:
projective/performance-based tests like the Rorschach, which use primarily visual stimuli and are administered in relatively unstructured, interpersonal, and thus affect arousing situations, are highly activating of the right hemisphere and of subcortical areas involved in emotional activation and regulation
Performance-based Tests (Finn, 2016)
Rorschach and similar projective/performance-based tests are extremely useful in picking up the effects of trauma and early insecure attachment experiences, and in showing functioning when clients are emotionally arouse
Performance-based Tests (Finn, 2016) Cont.
Rorschach and other projective/performance-based tests are irreplaceable in gaining access to the secrets hidden in the right hemisphere and limbic areas
Without this information, the client remains victim of unseen influences
The Adult Attachment Projective Picture System
Validated measure of adult attachment representation (status)
Projective attachment scenes
- Seven cards
- Increasing activation of the attachment system
The respondent tells a story to each card
Each story is rigorously coded for attachment themes and defenses
