Description
Book SynopsisSince its creation more than eighty years ago, the famous Rorschach inkblot test has become an icon of clinical psychology and popular culture. Administered over one million times world-wide each year, the Rorschach is used to assess personality and mental illness across a wide range of circumstances: child custody disputes, educational placement decisions, employment and termination proceedings, parole determinations, and even investigations of child abuse allegations. The test''s enormous power shapes the lives of hundreds of thousands of people -- often without their knowledge. In the 1970s, this notoriously subjective test was supposedly systematized and improved. But is the Rorschach more than a modern variant on tea leaf reading?
What''s Wrong With the Rorschach? challenges the validity and utility of the Rorschach and explains why psychologists continue to judge people by their reactions to ink blots, in spite of a half century of largely negative scientific evidence.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments ix
1 A Psychological X-Ray: The Power of the Rorschach 1
2 A Test is Born: Origins of the Rorschach Inkblot Technique 22
3 The Rorschach Come to America 48
4 Rorschach Rules! 84
5 The Many-Portaled Quandary: Balkanization of the Rorschach 136
6 Scientists Look at the Rorschach 136
7 The Rorschach in Crisis 157
8 New Life for the Rorschach: John E. Exner’s Comprehensive System 193
9 The Unraveling of the Comprehensive System 217
10 Still Waiting for the Messiah: The Future of the Rorschach 256
11 Clinging to the Wreck: Why Some Psychologists Won’t let Go 284
12 Objection, your Honor! Keeping the Rorschach out of Court 300
Epilogue: Will the Rorschach go on Forever? 322
Appendix: Graphs on Psychometrics and the Rorschach 325
Notes 333
References 379
About the Authors 415
Name Index 417
Subject Index 423
