Emotional Reactions and General Personality Structure

Two types of tests are available for studying personality. These are the paper-pencil tests and the projective tests. Projective techniques which reveal the subject's personality through his treatment of the test material are generally more valid and more revealing than the paper-pencil tests which require the underlining of words or the answering of "Yes" or "No" to a list of questions. This is true of all subjects but seemed to apply more particularly to those used in this study. Such tests as the Psychosomatic Inventory and the Bell Adjustment Test were tried out in the initial stages of the investigation but were soon discontinued as the subjects gave continued evidence of a desire to ingratiate themselves with, or to make a showing for, the examiner. Questions whose intent was obvious were almost invariably answered as the subject thought the examiner wanted them to be or as he thought would look best on his record. For this reason most of the tests employed were those whose purposes were less easily interpreted by the subjects.