The basis of Thema,c Appercep,on tes,ng originates from the projec,ve hypothesis which states that responses reveal inner thoughts and feelings. It was developed by Chris,na Morgan and Henry Murray in the 1930’s when an undergraduate student who’s young son was ill at home and spent the day making up stories about people in magazines. Asked……“could pictures be employed in clinical seIngs to explore underlying dynamics of personality. Morgan and Murray decided to explore this. Chris,na Murray also used some of her own illustra,ons. The first T.A.T picture used was the boy and the violin. The T.A.T test was finally published in 1943 and throughout the 1960’s and 1970’s saw a surge of interest.
A projec,ve test is a method of tes,ng personality. What dis,nguishes this method from other methods of tes,ng is the s,muli to which a par,cipant responds. The s,muli are ambiguous – meaning there is more than one way in which a person can respond. The hope is that the response will reveal
informa,on about personality and thought processes, which may previously have been hidden. Projec,ve tes,ng is based on psychoanaly,c theory – i.e. through interpre,ng things such as dreams, drawings, word associa,ons etc. It reveals thoughts and feelings that may be suppressed and exist in the
unconscious psyche. There are concerns about projec,ve tests, as the results of them are open to interpreta,on from a researcher or psychologist, as it is them who analyse what the results mean. Despite this, projec,ve tes,ng is s,ll carried out today, some of which include: the ‘Word Associa,on’ test, the
‘Draw a Person’ test, the Rorschach inkblot test and the Thema,c Appercep,on Test, or T.A.T. Test.
“The girl is in a chemistry lesson at her school and her teacher is watching over her, giving her advice on what to do. The girl thinks the teacher is
very helpful.”
The man has had a crush on his fellow
worker for a while and is building up the
courage to ask her on a date. The woman, however, is only
interested in her work”
“The man is wai,ng for his medicine at the pharmacy. He is frustrated because the woman is taking too long to
measure it out.”
“The woman is a trainee scien,st who is feeling
pressured as her poten,al boss is watching her work. She is not comfortable and
as a result, makes a mistake and does not get
hired”
The TAT consists of specialised picture cards that are shown to a pa,ent who then describes what they see. Due to the ambiguous nature of the content on the pictures, an analysis of the pa,ent’s recall of what they see is what is used to help diagnose their mental state. There are 31 cards in total. The examiner will select a set of eight to twelve cards that are suitable for the pa,ent. Factors such as the age, gender and mental fragility of the pa,ent need to be considered. The cards are there for the pa,ent to tell a story about what is going on in the image they are viewing. These include what lead up to the scene they are seeing, the thoughts and feelings of the characters and an outcome to the story. The examiner records what the pa,ent is describing when the TAT cards are presented, with a subjec,ve analysis of what they interpret the descrip,ons given to them in rela,on to the mental state of the pa,ent. Body movements, pauses and tone of voice from the pa,ent have to also be recorded by the examiner if they believe they have significance. This means the examiner will be working strenuously, which is why some psychologists have decided to use video to record their pa,ents. The examiner must also avoid interjec,ng at any point, as there could be a danger of influencing the pa,ent’s answers. There is no standardised scoring system for TAT. One of the common methods is the Defence Mechanisms Manual which assumes thoughts and feelings are projected into the stories. This method assesses denial, projec,on and iden,fica,on as defence mechanisms and includes example answers to help assist and a thorough knowledge of defence mechanisms is a recommended.
One of its main applica,ons is that it is used as a tool for research into areas of psychology such as dreams, fantasies and mate selec,on. This test can also be used to find out what mo,vates people to choose their occupa,on. The T.A.T test can be used to assess the psychological state of a person including personality and thought disorders. Other applica,ons are that it can be used to screen applicants for high stress jobs and used in forensic examina,ons to evaluate crime suspects.
There are many advantages of the Thema,c Appercep,on Test. It can be used as an adjunct to psychotherapy where it is very useful as discussions can be made about the theme of certain stories the client gives that might not have been within the client’s current awareness. Another advantage is that it is really helpful for children as they might have difficulty expressing themselves using words alone. The children can then make use of the pictures to tell a story about their emo,onal and internal conflicts. Also with this test, Murray stated that without excep,on, every person who par,cipated in the study injected aspects of their personali,es into their stories. The par,cipants also find it difficult to fake a response as they cannot figure out how their response will be interpreted.
The use of TAT has been seen mul,ple ,mes in popular culture with famous cases such as Hannibal Lecture and Harry Benson. A disturbed pa,ent receives the test from the novel Terminal man, by Michael Crichton. Other examples are seen in A Clockwork Orange and Flowers for Algernon.
The TAT has been cri,cised for being too unscien,fic because it does not use objec,ve measures to back up its findings. It has shown it cannot be proven to give consistent results over ,me, thus unreliable. TAT has no zero-‐order and no valid norms, which some think makes it invalid. Also, it has been viewed as a way of purely viewing the subconscious of the par,cipant, so does not account for recent contact that may be in the par,cipants’ consciousness. The pictures have been characterised as old fashioned, with a lack of racial diversity. The situa,ons depicted lack cultural validity and do not reflect normal modern day situa,ons. As a result, people find it difficult to iden,fy and concur with the concept of the s,muli. Researchers found that TAT cards cause more ‘deviant’ stories than photographs, so the differences were a consequence of the differences in the characteris,cs of the images used. Finally, the images are also seen to be too achroma,c and nega,ve in emo,onal tone.
PROS CONS
We asked a number of people to interpret what they believe is going on in the ambiguous scene below. Similar to a real T.A.T case, the par,cipants did not
have any background knowledge of what is happening in the picture and had to come to their own conclusions…