The Rorschach in the Context of Performance-Based Personality Assessment

Abstract

In this article, I draw on literature concerning the current status of the Rorschach Inkblot Method (Exner, 2002), performance-based personality measurement, direct versus indirect personality assessment, and dual-process models to suggest a reconceptualization of the Rorschach. The goal is to offer an updated conceptual framework for thinking about the Rorschach that can potentially be used both to enhance the image of the method and to provide direction for future research on the validity of specific Rorschach scores.

Acknowledgments

I am deeply grateful for the advice and encouragement provided by Stephen Armeli, Robert Bornstein, Robert Erard, Howard Garb, Donald Viglione, Irving Weiner, and an anonymous reviewer. The challenges their feedback presented to me dramatically improved the quality of this article. I hope they find the final result worthy of their efforts. Portions of this article were presented at the 2004 Midwinter Meeting of the Society for Personality Assessment, Miami, FL.

Notes

¹ Bornstein (2007b) and Schultheiss (2007) have suggested alternative classification models for psychological measures in response to Meyer and Kurtz (2006). The concept of performance-based personality tests used in this article encompasses four categories of instruments listed in BBornstein's (2007b) Table 1: stimulus attribution, performance based, constructive, and observational. It also parallels Schultheiss's category of nondeclarative measures. However, Schultheiss's association of nondeclarative measures with specific mental processes and with unconscious activity may be too restrictive, as my later discussion suggests.

²Similarly, items that are intuitively related to the constructs they are thought to reflect are used successfully in self-report measurement even though some questions about their use remain unresolved, such as the degree to which these items reflect self-presentation versus self-disclosure (Johnson, 1981).

³A glossary that includes all Rorschach coding and scoring terms used in this manuscript may be found in Anonymous (2007).

⁴As a side note, the conversion of the elements to dichotomous outcomes before their aggregation rather than standardization and summation could also compromise the validity of the composite.