Product Description

Since 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.

What's Wrong With the Rorschach? offers a provocative critique of one of the most widely applied and influential - and still intensely controversial - psychological tests in the world today. Surveying more than fifty years of clinical and scholarly research, the authors provide compelling scientific evidence that the Rorschach has relatively little value for diagnosing mental illness, assessing personality, predicting behavior, or uncovering sexual abuse or other trauma. In this highly engaging, novelistic account of the Rorschach's origins and history, the authors detail the wealth of scientific evidence that the test is of questionable utility for real-world decision making.

What's Wrong With the Rorschach? presents a powerfully reasoned case against using the test in the courtroom or consulting room - and reveals the strong psychological, economic, and political forces that continue to support the Rorschach despite the research that has exposed its shortcomings and dangers.

James M. Wood (El Paso, TX) is Associate Professor, Department of Psychology, at the University of Texas at El Paso.

M. Teresa Nezworski (Dallas, TX) is Associate Professor, Department of Psychology, University of Texas at Dallas.

Scott O. Lilienfeld (Atlanta, GA) is an Associate Professor of Psychology at Emory University in Atlanta.

Howard N. Garb (Pittsburgh, PA) is on the faculty at the University of Pittsburgh and the author of Studying the Clinician: Judgement Research and Psychological Assessment.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #393577 in Books
• Published on: 2003-03-07
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 446 pages

Review
"provocative and important ...a continual assessment of the merits and pitfalls of projective testing." (by Frederick C. Crews, from his article Out, Damned Blot!, Volume 51, Number 12 July 15, 2004)

Review
In this brilliant, powerful book, four experts on clinical assessment expose the fatal flaws of the famous inkblot test. Casting their penetrating critique in gripping narrative form, Wood, Nezworski, Lilienfeld, and Garb have composed a requiem for the Rorschach that will fascinate anyone interested in how clinical psychology is now transcending its prescientific past."
— Richard J. McNally, Ph.D., professor, Harvard University, and author of Remembering Trauma

"By demolishing the misconceptions and exposing the weaknesses of the Rorschach as it is currently used today, the authors have paved the way for this infamous psychological phoenix to rise again from the ashes."
— Edwin E. Wagner, Ph.D., psychologist and author, The Hand Test and The Logical Rorschach

"A much-needed rigorous analysis of the Rorschach, a must-read for anyone who cares about validity issues in clinical assessment."
— Gerald C. Davison, Ph.D., professor and chair, Department of Psychology, University of Southern California

"A thorough, scholarly, and devastating critique of the Rorschach inkblot test. Attorneys will no doubt find the book invaluable as an aid to prepare for cross-examination of psychologists who use the Rorschach in their work."
— Solomon M. Fulero, Ph.D., J.D., psychologist and attorney, professor of psychology, Sinclair College, Dayton, Ohio

"Wood and his coauthors provide such a fascinating history of the immortal Rorschach inkblot test that it's easy at first to miss the troubling implications of the tale. The well-told story is so engaging that one does not have to be a nerd or combatant in the Rorschach wars to read on for fun. The sense of a serious problem magnifies as the tale unfolds, and the reader realizes that important clinical and legal decisions still routinely depend on the results of this unreliable and invalid test."
— James C. Coyne, Ph.D., professor, Department of Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania Medical School

From the Inside Flap
Since 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 worldwide 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 inkblot test and explains why psychologists continue to judge people by their reactions to inkblots, in spite of a half century of largely negative scientific evidence against the test.

What's Wrong with the Rorschach? offers a provocative critique of one of the most widely applied and influential— and still intensely controversial— psychological tests in the world today. Surveying more than fifty years of clinical and scholarly research, the authors provide compelling scientific evidence that the Rorschach has relatively little value for diagnosing mental illness, assessing personality, predicting behavior, or uncovering sexual abuse or other trauma. In this highly engaging and colorful account of the Rorschach's origins and history, the authors detail the wealth of scientific evidence that the test is of questionable utility for real-world decision making.

What's Wrong with the Rorschach? presents a powerfully reasoned case against using the test in the courtroom or consulting room— and reveals the strong psychological, economic, and political forces that continue to support the Rorschach despite the research that has exposed its shortcomings and dangers.

Customer Reviews

Nearly Rubbish
With the exception of a very accurate depiction of the history of the Rorschach, the book is a biased, poorly argued and narrow minded attack on a well respected performance-based measure of clinical assessment.

Truly the most laughable part of the text is an argument made by one of the authors about the lack of clinical utility in "reflection responses" as potentially indicative of narcissism, particularly when he argues that the index has no validity given that he, the accomplished, high functioning, respected, prolific author and professor that he is, actually obtained reflection responses in his own Rorschach protocol...HOW COULD THAT BE???!!! Well, it is not a predictive measure of narcissistic personality disorder, but of the tendency to self aggrandize and inflate one's own self worth, a coping strategy that many people rely upon that ultimately makes them interpersonally inaccessible. Nevertheless, rather than critiquing the imperfection of some of the scales, the authors flagrantly attack the Rorschach, and do so with a self-inflated perspective that theirs is the single, solitary correct attitude to adopt with regard to the Rorschach if you are a psychologist.

There are other contemporary "critical" investigations of Exner's Comprehensive System for the Rorschach (published in peer reviewed journals) that point out the system's assets and liabilities without advocating throwing out the baby with the bathwater! Seek those out not this text.

What's Wrong with the Rorschach?
Readers of this book-length criticism of the Rorschach Test and, more pointedly, the Rorschach Comprehensive System (CS) developed by John Exner, may have been alerted by controversial articles appearing in professional journals, popular media outlets (e.g., New York Times Magazine, Scientific American) and symposia at professional meetings over the past several years. Wood, Nezworski, Lillienfeld, and Garb have developed a peculiar fixation on the Rorschach Test, adopting an unrelentingly skeptical posture that equates use of the test with fortune telling, claims of the paranormal, and junk science (what they refer to as "widespread quackery"; see also Lohr, Fowler, & Lillienfeld, 2002). The authors characterize Rorschach developers as "wizards" whose "tricks" were designed to defraud and mislead the gullible. They insinuate that Rorschach clinicians are members of a cult-like religious movement whose motivations are mercenary, or worse. A review of their output suggests that this fixation has come to characterize a significant portion of their scholarly interest. This overdetermined fixation on the Rorschach Test seems curious. One wonders why they haven't focused on widespread unsubstantiated assessment methods and practices that have profoundly negative effects, for example, polygraph or plethysmographic testing, efficacy of anger management, so-called attachment therapies, or diagnostic mammography.

What's Wrong with the Rorschach? is an informative critical biography and cultural history of the Rorschach Test's development, advent in the United States, dissemination during the glory days of the `40's and `50's, period of apparent decline during the '60s, and resurgence with the advent of the Comprehensive System. In contrast to most books on the Rorschach, the authors take a less than adoring view of Rorschach "heroes." What's Wrong with the Rorschach? is not exactly Rorschach hagiography. In fact, the authors debunk the cult of Rorschach "great men," and dispel many of the bombastic claims made about the test over the decades. They pick out certain of the Rorschach "great men" for particular lambasting, for example, Bruno Klopfer and John Exner. Marguerite Hertz, on the other hand, is lauded throughout, based on the rigor of her dogged insistence on grounding the test scientifically.

Much of this material is informative, some of it amusing. At many points, the author's arguments are incisive and critical. They point out a number of factors that well-informed Rorschach clinicians have been aware of for years. Some of their criticisms deserve serious attention from the Rorschach establishment, for example, the weak scientific database derived from Exner's "in house" research, Exner's disinclination over the years to include or recruit the work of researchers outside of his establishment, the problem of "R" (why the Rorschach community didn't adopt a fixed R a long time ago as did the Holzman Inkblot Test has long been a mystery to me), the mediocre performance of DEPI or some of the other CS indices, the recent "overpathologizing" debate, and the embarrassing issue of the duplication of a significant number of records in the so-called "normative data." (I have known John Exner since the late '70s when I took my first Rorschach workshop. Exner resisted calling these samples of outpatient, inpatient, depressed, etc., subjects "normative." He referred to them as "reference data"). To their credit, Wood, et al.'s criticisms of the Rorschach Test have stimulated a flood of Rorschach research in refereed journals examining both clinical and methodological issues. Overall, the author's effort to convince the informed reader of the Rorschach Test's fundamental bankruptcy fails given their selective review of the scientific evidence (MacCoun, 1998) and undisguised polemical intent. Despite the book's easygoing, somewhat avuncular tone, it becomes clear quite early on that a dispassionate assessment of the Rorschach Test is not the authors' intent. What's Wrong with the Rorschach? is popular, albeit well-written polemical screed, not a scientific treatise.

The authors thoughtfully included the undersigned as one of the "supporters and followers" of their work. They make one specific and two general errors that deserve comment. They take me (along with my former student, Greg Meyer, current editor of the Journal of Personality Assessment) to task on p. 232 and again on p. 266 for asserting that "Rorschach scoring reliability of .61 is "good" and that reliability of .74 is "excellent," disingenuously, perhaps, failing to remind the reader that standards of what constitutes adequate reliability depend on whether one is referring to an intra-class correlation or a kappa coefficient. It is generally accepted that kappa coefficients .61 and above do indeed reflect "good" reliability (Acklin, McDowell, Verschell, & Chan, 2000).

The second issue concerns the authors' failure, despite having the opportunity of an interested reader's attention for 324 pages, to give a good accounting of what the Rorschach Test is really about. They suggest the test's persistence and popularity has to do with wizardry, or perhaps chicanery, but realistically speaking, all of their attention in a growing list of publications does not yield a clue.

We have adopted the position over the years in both our theoretical and research endeavors that the Rorschach Test yields a sample of verbal behavior that embeds the respondent's stylistic dispositions and repertoire of ego states. This verbal material, in the form of a written protocol, may be coded by any number of pertinent coding schemes (We have proposed that computerized content or text analytic approaches may render the whole statistical debate moot; see Gottschalk, 1979). As such the material provides a deeply personal, that is, idiographic view of the person (Stricker & Gold, 1999).

On occasion, the authors give credit where credit is due, for example, the previously mentioned lauding of Marguerite Hertz, recognition of the Joseph Zubin (a thoughtful and well-informed critic of the Rorschach Test), mention of the Thought Disorder Index by Philip Holzman, or the work of Edward Aronow, who uses the Rorschach as a clinical technique not a psychometric instrument, and the strongly empirical work of Goldfried, Stricker, & Weiner (1971). Consistent with their selective use of the literature, however, they skate over the weighty scientific contributions of R. Holt and S. Blatt. There are excellent suggestions/recommendations concerning canons of Rorschach research and necessary foundational psychometric requirements for scientific respectability (Exhibit 9.2). They rightly criticize misuse of the test for purposes that it should not be used, for example, making determinations of vocational choice or confirmation of sexual abuse. They seem to identify the Rorschach Test as uniquely flawed among instruments commonly used in assessment psychology. Many of their criticism are relevant to any psychological test used inappropriately by a poorly trained clinician. They fail to place the Rorschach's capabilities into context with other assessment instruments (e.g., the MMPI), or the general weakness of "soft psychology" in general (Acklin, McDowell, & Ornduff, 1992; Cohen, 1962, 1988). They suggest that the Society of Personality Assessment and the Journal of Personality Assessment, two respected, long-standing organizations dedicated to psychological evaluation, are corrupt and self-serving. A third, serious weakness is most apparent in the way that the authors conclude their argument and, thus, the book. Chapter 12 ("Objection, Your Honor! Keeping the Rorschach Out of Court) and the Epilogue are notably weak, perhaps the weakest chapter in the book. The authors fail to take advantage of a decisive opportunity to make their argument that the Rorschach Test should be inadmissible in court by avoiding a thorough analysis of the Rorschach literature in relationship to current admissibility standards (Frye Test, Federal Rules of Evidence, Daubert and Kumho). This, of course, they could not do since theirs is not a dispassionate inquiry. The Epilogue suggests their ultimate befuddlement: How could or does the Rorschach Test maintain its endurance and clinical popularity? As clinicians persist in using the test despite the depredations of managed care and the criticisms of Wood, et al. and their ilk, there must be some other reason beyond fad, mendacity, or self-serving economic motivation. Here the authors appear clueless.

What's Wrong with the Rorschach? is not and does not purport to be a systematic analysis of the behavioral science foundations of the Rorschach test. Too bad. This has yet to be written. Because of this, despite an informative and generally well-written text, nicely packaged, the authors fail to make their case. It remains for the community of Rorschach researchers and clinicians to meaningfully address the valid critical points raised here in a way that establishes a firm empirical foundation for the Rorschach Test's continuing use. Although the authors call for a moratorium on the test, one of the more whimsical aspects of their criticisms, which even they admit is unlikely to occur, they should be satisfied if Rorschach Test users adopt a more critical and informed approach to all of their assessment endeavors.

References

Acklin, M.W., McDowell, C.J., & Orndoff, S. (1992). Statistical power and the Rorschach: 1975-1991. Journal of Personality Assessment, 59, 3 66-3 79.

Acklin, M. W., McDowell, C. J., Verschell, M.J., and Chan, D. (2000). Interobserver agreement, intraobserver reliability, and the Rorschach Comprehensive System. Journal of Personality Assessment, 74, 15-47.

Cohen, J. (1962). The statistical power of abnormal-social psychological research: A review. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 65, 145-153.

Cohen, J. (1988). Statistical power analysis for the behavioral sciences. Hillsdale, NJ: LEA, Inc.

Gottschalk, L. A. (1979). Content analysis of verbal behavior: Further studies. Hillsdale, NJ: LEA, Inc.

Lohr, J.M., & Fowler, K.A., & Lillienfeld, S. O. (2002). The dissemination and promotion of pseudoscience in clinical psychology: The challenge to legitimate clinical science. The Clinical Psychologist, 55, 4-10).

McCoun, R. J. (1998). Biases in the interpretation and use of research results. Annual Review of Psychology, 1998, 49, 259-87.

Stricker, G., & Gold, J.S. (1999). The Rorschach: Toward a nomothetically based, idiographically applicable configurational model. Psychological Assessment, 11, 240-250.

Marvin W. Acklin, PhD, ABAP, ABPP
Honolulu, Hawaii
acklin@hawaii.edu

What's Wrong with this Book?
If you are looking for an unbiased review of the current Rorschach empirical literature, this book is NOT the place to look. That's what I was looking for when I read this book, and was quite disappointed. Yet, I hate to admit that I was initially taken in by the authors' emotional writing style. It was only after some perspective and looking up some of the research cited (and not cited) in this book that I realized the irony -- that is, the authors use the very method that they condemn to make their 'case.' In that sense, I would rate this book a '4 or 5' for anyone interested in critical analysis and persuasion (even if you're not interested in the Rorschach) as a wonderful example of how information can be misused, distorted, and employed for personal gain.
Here are some of the issues: First, as implied by the title of the book, its purpose is to evaluate the status of the Rorschach from a scientific perspective. Yet, this was only a VERY small portion of the book. That is where I'm most regretful that I actually bought the book. Furthermore, in their 'scientific review,' the authors frequently actually 'cite' correspondence from Internet discussion lists as their 'scientific data!' Ha! This is absurd. And they do so in the context of building up a 'case' in their 'scientific review' that there is some big conspiracy among these Rorschach researchers that the authors are letting the public in on. In fact, this not-so-concealed conspiracy theory comprises most of the theme of the book! One begins to wonder why the authors are so invested in passionately and condescendingly dissing this test and the test's researchers. Very poor form, authors.

Here are more examples:
1. In the first few pages of the book, the first author (Wood) begins by telling us some of his own Rorschach test results. And then he proceeds to expect us to take his word for it that any negative implications of these results are absurd, since he's such a well-adjusted guy (by his own report). Yet I found it funny that his very book seemed to support some of these interpretations; if they're not true, he should have been more careful to not display those characteristics in his book. Especially the interpretation that says he's egocentrically focused on himself. (does anyone else see the irony here?) That was actually humorous! I got a kick out of that.

2. If the reader is already lulled into sympathizing with this poor author and the invalidity of the test from these first few pages, they will be further inclined to believe the next section (and use it as verification of the author's conclusions in the preceding pages). The next few pages discuss a court case involving child sexual abuse; an abusing father was not identified and was allowed to have custody of the child. As you might guess from the authors' title of their book, this was the Rorschach's fault. Yet, this was a case where there were MANY lapses and errors on the part of *all* the professionals involved in the case (and hindsight is 20-20). In a court case (or any evaluation), any personal report of the people involved and any 'test' results can be misused, misinterpreted, ignored, and invalid. Yet the authors seem to think it is the fault of one test. This is a great section to show how emotional manipulation can lead one to lose their own critical abilities.

3. Throughout the book, the authors use emotional manipulation and single 'case studies' like these, as well as conclusions based on minor details of research and out-of-context posts from Internet discussion (!) groups. This is ironic and somewhat funny, since these are the very methods that the authors themselves most strongly critique!

4. However, their book is a psychologist's treat in examples of primitive defenses: Splitting, idealization, devaluation, projection. The authors are good and the Rorschach researchers are bad (splitting). There is even a chapter title that characterizes anyone who attempted to integrate the past Rorschach approaches as "Still Waiting for the Messiah" on the part of the psychologists interested in the Rorschach (idealization). Then the authors proceed to nitpick -- no, not exactly the Rorschach research but -- the Rorschach researchers themselves (!), making them sound like idiots and suspicious characters (devaluation and paranoia). Yet, if one actually READS the published articles they cite (especially by Gregory Meyer who they cite and frequently villainize), one finds a quite thoughtful and actually VERY scientific approach. Wow. The authors of the book "What's Wrong with the Rorschach" aren't even in the same league.

So, what's wrong with this book? Answering that question is the only reason to read it.