Critical review of the use of the Rorschach in European courts

Abstract

In relation to the admissibility of evidence obtained using projective personality tests arose in F v. Bevándorlási és Állampolgársági Hivatam (2018). The Court of Justice of the European Union has held that an expert’s report can only be accepted if it is based on the international scientific community’s standards, but has refrained from stipulating what these standards are. It appears timely for European psychologists to decide what standards should be applied to determine whether or not a test is appropriate for psycholegal use. We propose standards and then apply them to the Rorschach because it was used in this case and is an exemplar of projective tests. We conclude that the Rorschach does not meet the proposed standards and that psychologists should abstain from using it in legal proceedings even in the absence of a clear judicial prohibition.

Keywords:

• psychology
• law
• forensic assessment
• courts
• professional standards
• ethics
• evidential value
• acceptability
• projective test
• Rorschach

Acknowledgements

The authors thank Dr Maria Allan for her comments on drafts of the paper.

Ethical standards

Declaration of conflicts of interest

Igor Areh has declared no conflict of interests.

Fanny Verkampt has declared no conflict of interests.

Alfred Allan has declared no conflict of interests.

Ethical approval

This article does not contain any studies with human participants or animals performed by any of the authors.