Vers des normes francophones pour le Rorschach en système intégré : premiers résultats sur un échantillon de 146 adultes

The effect of administration skills on Rorschach protocols

Although the Rorschach is the most widely studied and used non self-report measure to assess personality, no empirical studies have been carried out to investigate what level of expertise is needed to properly collect valid Rorschach protocols. The aim of the current study was to explore, using a within-subject design, the effect of training on proficiency in administering the Rorschach, specifically a) what kind of errors are associated with different levels of training, and b) what level of expertise guarantees a sufficiently effective Rorschach administration. The second (T1), the fifth (T2) and the tenth (T3) Rorschach protocols collected by 50 licensed psychologists attending a Rorschach training course were examined to explore what kind of mistakes were made at the different stages of training. In the Response phase, examiners collected more simplistic protocols and made more errors at T1, while they showed satisfactory proficiency at T2. Regarding the Inquiry Phase, the most relevant finding was that at T1 examiners made both errors of omission and commission, while at T2 they no longer made errors of omission but they did make more errors of commission, likely as a temporary effect of the training. At T3 a sufficiently effective Rorschach administration was carried out. Findings suggest that a 100-h Rorschach training course and 10 administrations as practicum, each followed by individual feedback and group discussion, might be sufficient to guarantee sufficiently effective Rorschach administration skills.

Left Prefrontal Cortex Supports the Recognition of Meaningful Patterns in Ambiguous Stimuli

Processing of ambiguous visual stimuli has been associated with an increased activation of the left lateral prefrontal cortex (PFC) in neuroimaging studies. Nevertheless, the functional role of prefrontal activity in this process is not fully understood. In this experiment we asked participants to evaluate ambiguous inkblots from the Rorschach test, while stimulating the left lateral PFC using excitatory anodal transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS). In addition, visual insight ability was assessed as a control measure requiring visual and conceptual restructuring and convergent thinking rather than divergent idea generation employed to interpret the equivocal Rorschach inkblots. Using a randomized double-blind design, we demonstrated that anodal tDCS increased the number of meaningful patterns recognized in the inkblots but had no significant effect on visual insight. These findings support the role of left lateral PFC in the processing of ambiguous visual information and object recognition. More generally, we discuss that the PFC may be involved in the mechanisms supporting the activation of stored visual and semantic representations in order to compensate for less informative bottom-up inputs and thus facilitate flexible cognition and idea generation.

Addressing Issues in the Development and Use of the Composite International Reference Values as Rorschach Norms for Adults

This article describes 3 studies evaluating normative reference data for the Rorschach Comprehensive System (CS; Exner, 2003, 2007), with a particular focus on the viability of the Composite International Reference Values (CIRVs) that were compiled from 21 adult studies by Meyer, Erdberg, and Shaffer (2007). Study 1 documented how the CIRV norms are virtually identical when organized into 3 groups differentiated by the quality of their data collection effort, including an optimal group of 4 samples that relied on multiple experienced examiners and provided ongoing quality control over administration and coding. Analyses also showed that relative to the group of more optimal samples, the group of less optimal samples did not produce more variability in summary scores within or across samples or lower interrater reliability for coding. Study 2 used the existing CS reference norms to generate T scores for the CIRV means and documented how the CS norms make other samples of healthy nonpatients look psychologically impaired in multiple domains. Study 3 documented with examples from 4 different countries how 2 sets of within-country local norms produced notably different results on some variables, which compromises the ability of local norms to be used instead of the CIRVs. Taken together, the 3 studies provide support for the use of CIRVs in clinical practice as norms that are generalizable across samples, settings, languages, and cultures and that account for the natural variability that is present when clinicians and researchers contend with the ambiguity contained in the standard CS reference materials concerning the proper ways to administer and code. We conclude by urging CS users to rely on the CIRVs when making clinical inferences and to adopt alternative methods of ensuring they are following cohesively standardized administration and coding guidelines.

On Being a Child of an Ill Parent

Cancer in a parent has a devastating effect on the psychological well-being of the children. In this comparative study, we examined the hypothesis that children who have a parent suffering from cancer experience greater difficulty in terms of psychological adaptation than children with a parent suffering from another chronic pathology. A group of 52 children of parents with cancer was compared with a group of 50 children whose parents were suffering from another chronic disease (respiratory insufficiency, diabetes) (mean age = 12.3 ± 2.8 years, 46 boys, 56 girls). All the children took part in a Rorschach Comprehensive System examination. Results showed that the children who had a parent suffering from cancer exhibited a higher number of signs of anxiety and depressive affects as well as reduced self-esteem. These difficulties were more pronounced in the case of girls and when it was the mother who was suffering from cancer. These results confirm the data reported in the literature in a large sample and using an indirect performance-based evaluation method. They emphasize the need to develop specific interventions which take account of the gender of the child and the ill parent.

Toward international normative reference data for the comprehensive system

We build on the work of all the authors contributing to this Special Supplement by summarizing findings across their samples of data, and we also draw on samples published elsewhere. Using 21 samples of adult data from 17 countries we create a composite set of internationally-based reference means and standard deviations from which we compute T-scores for each sample. Figures illustrate how the scores in each sample are distributed and how the samples compare across variables in eight Rorschach Comprehensive System (CS; Exner, 2003) clusters. The adult samples from around the world are generally quite similar, and thus we encourage clinicians to integrate the composite international reference values into their clinical interpretation of protocols. However, the 31 child and adolescent samples from 5 countries produce unstable and often quite extreme values on many scores. Until the factors contributing to the variability among these samples are more fully understood, we discourage clinicians from using many CS scores to make nomothetic, score-based inferences about psychopathology in children and adolescents.

A Rorschach Stability Study in a Nonpatient Adult Sample

The objective of this study was to provide new primary data on Rorschach Comprehensive System stability levels. To achieve this, we tested 75 French nonpatient adults twice on the Rorschach with a 3-month interval between the tests. Interrater reliability was in the excellent range for most of the variables studied. The overall stability level in a selected set of previously studied variables was below expectations (median r = .53). Personality, cognitive or self/relational variables yielded higher test-retest correlations than emotional and coping variables. Moderators of stability could be identified: (a) overall level of Task Engagement (TE) in F, m, FM + m, a, FC, Sum C', Sum V, Sum Shd, Fr + rF, INC + FAB, COP, es, Adj es, EGO, and Blends; (b) variations in TE in F, FM, and p; (c) state distress in Zd, m, FM + m, a, C, CF + C, WSumC, FD, and es; (d) variables derived from the number of responses impacted stability in P, Zf, m, FC, CF + C, Sum C', Sum V, MOR, EA, es, and Blends. These results provide further support for the reliability of several measures. Examiner effects as an influence on productivity and TE were identified as an important area for future research.