Criticisms and Current Uses of the Rorschach Test The Rorschach Inkblot test is a psychological test that is used to determine certain mental disorders and hidden personalities. The inkblot test can provide some very innovative insights into someone’s unconscious, including hidden personalities and feeling. But it is frequently questioned for it’s validity and reliability. The Rorschach Inkblot test is highly controversial for many reasons but is still widely used today. Before someone criticize the test, he/she must get a little backstory on it. Hermann Rorschach created the inkblot test in 1921 after noticing that schizophrenic patients responded differently to inkblots than people with no mental disorders. When delivering his test, Rorschach
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The inkblot test is intended to be given by an experienced professional with a subject who has no prior knowledge of the test. This guideline was first bent in 1975 when a book called The Nuremberg Mind contained the inkblots. It went one step further when in 1983 William Poundstone released the book Big Secrets. This book not only contained the inkblots, it also possessed the most common answers. The leaking of the test finally reached its peak in 2009 when Dr. James Heilman, an emergency-room doctor, released all 10 inkblot cards along with the most common answers on the online encyclopedia website, Wikipedia. This caused many psychologists to become outraged because the once classified test was now in public …show more content…
Validity is based on how well the test measures what it is intended to measure. At the time of the formation of the inkblot test, Hermann Rorschach intended for the test to be used to determine schizophrenia and other mental disorders based on how the answers compared to others, but it also used for finding unconscious personalities. The use of the test to determine mental disorders was questioned in 2003 when Scott Lilienfeld and authors wrote the book, What’s Wrong with the Rorschach? For this book, the authors analyzed more than 50 years’ worth of data on scientific evidence for the inkblot test. They discovered that almost half or the normal inkblot test-takers were labeled as having “distorted thinking.” Overall, the researchers labeled the test’s ability to determine mental disorders as “weak at best and nonexistent at worst.” When the test is used as a projective personality test it is also questioned. When Rorschach created the test, he was skeptical about using it to determine personalities, but in 1939 it started being used this
The inkblot test is intended to be given by an experienced professional with a subject who has no prior knowledge of the test. This guideline was first bent in 1975 when a book called The Nuremberg Mind contained the inkblots. It went one step further when in 1983 William Poundstone released the book Big Secrets. This book not only contained the inkblots, it also possessed the most common answers. The leaking of the test finally reached its peak in 2009 when Dr. James Heilman, an emergency-room doctor, released all 10 inkblot cards along with the most common answers on the online encyclopedia website, Wikipedia. This caused many psychologists to become outraged because the once classified test was now in public …show more content…
Validity is based on how well the test measures what it is intended to measure. At the time of the formation of the inkblot test, Hermann Rorschach intended for the test to be used to determine schizophrenia and other mental disorders based on how the answers compared to others, but it also used for finding unconscious personalities. The use of the test to determine mental disorders was questioned in 2003 when Scott Lilienfeld and authors wrote the book, What’s Wrong with the Rorschach? For this book, the authors analyzed more than 50 years’ worth of data on scientific evidence for the inkblot test. They discovered that almost half or the normal inkblot test-takers were labeled as having “distorted thinking.” Overall, the researchers labeled the test’s ability to determine mental disorders as “weak at best and nonexistent at worst.” When the test is used as a projective personality test it is also questioned. When Rorschach created the test, he was skeptical about using it to determine personalities, but in 1939 it started being used this