Training of the interpreter.

A layman with refined intraceptive intuitions and beginner's luck can

often, without any experience in testing, make valid and important inferences by feeling his way
into the mental environment of the author of a set of TA'T stories; and even an old hand at the
game must rely on the same process — empathic intuition first and last, disentangled as far as
possible from personal elements. No true sci-is capable of yielding precise and pertinent
information. Of course intuition alone is highly unreliable; what is required is a rigorously trained
critical intuition.
Besides a certain flair for the task, an interpreter of the TAT should have a background of clinical
experience, observing, interviewing and testing patients of all sorts; and, if he is to get much
below the surface, knowl. edge of psychoanalysis and some practice in translating the imagery
of dreams and ordinary speech into elementary psychological components.
In addition he should have had months of training in the use of this specific test, much practice
in analyzing stories when it is possible to check each conclusion against the known facts of
thoroughly studied personalities.
Interpretations in vacuo often do more harm than good, since the apparent plausibility of clever
interpretations creates convictions which merely serve to confirm the interpreter in the error of
his ways. TAT stories offer boundless opportunities for the projection of one's own complexes or
one's pet theories, and the amateur psychoanalyst who is disrespectful of solid facts is only too
apt to make a fool of himself if, in interpreting the TAT, he gives free rein to his imagination. The
future of the TAT hangs on the possibility of , the interpreter (psychology's forgotten instru-ment)
more than it does on perfecting the material.
Necessary Basic Data. Before starting to interpret a set of stories the psychologist should know
the following basic facts: the sex and age of the subject, whether his parents are dead or
separated, the ages and sexes of his siblings, his vocation and his marital status. Without these
easily ob-rained public facts (which the TAT was not designed to reveal) the interpreter may
have difficulty orienting himself as he reads. A blind analysis is a stunt which may or may not be
successful; it has no place in clinical practice.
Modes of Content Analysis. In dealing with the content of stories the method which we
recommend is that of analyzing each successive event into (a) the force or forces emanating
from the hero, and (b) the force or forces emanating from the environment. An environmental
force is called a press (plural press).

i. The hero. The first step in analyzing a story is to distinguish the character with whom the
subject has identified himself: (1) the character in whom the story-teller was apparently most
interested, whose point of view was adopted, whose feelings and motives have been most
intimately portrayed. He (or she) is usually (2) the one who most resembles the subject, an
individual of the same sex, of about the sarne age, status or role, who shares some of the
subject's sentiments and aims. This charac-ter, called hero (whether it be male or female) is
usually (3) the person (or one of the persons) depicted in the picture, and (4) the person who
plays the leading role in the drama (hero in the literary sense), who appears at the beginning
and is most vitally involved in the outcome.
Although most stories have but one hero (readily distinguishable by these criteria), the
interpreter should be prepared to deal with certain common complications: (1) the identification
of subject with character
antisocial drive by a criminal and conscience by a law enforcing 'agent.
Here we would speak of an endopsychic thema (internal dramatic situa-tion) with two
component heroes. (3) The subject may tell a story that contains a story, such as one in which
the hero observes or hears about events in which another character (for whom he feels some
sympathy) is leadingly involved. Here we would speak of a primary and a secondary hero. Then
(1), the subject may identify with a character of the opposite sex and express a part of his
personality just as well in this fashion. (In a man this is commonly a sign of a high feminine
component and in a woman of a high masculine component.) Finally, there may be no
discernible single hero; either (5) heroship is divided among a number of equally significant,
equally differentiated partial heroes (e. g. a group of people); or (6) the chief character (hero in
the literary sense) obviously belongs to the object side of the subject-object situation; he is not a
component of the story-teller's personality but an element of his environment.
The subject, in other words, has not identified with the principal character to the slightest extent,
but has observed him as he would a stranger or disliked person with whom he had to deal. The
subject himself is not represented, or is reoresented by a minor character (hero in our sense).
Characterization of the heroes by the interpreter should include the fol-lowing: superiority
(power, ability), inferiority, criminality, mental ab-normality, solitariness, belongingness,
leadership, and quarrelsomeness (the degree to which he becomes involved in interpersonal
conflicts). ii. Motives, trends, and feelings of the heroes. The interpreter's next task is to observe
in great detail everything that each of the twenty or more heroes feels, thinks, or does, noting
evidences of type of personality or of mental illness as well as everything that is unusual:
uncommon or unique; of common but unusually high or low in intensily or Irequency.
L one dell of experience withat is us al the interpreter must have had more deof stere, since no
satisitest, must have studied at least so of more sets of stories, since no satisfactory standards
or tables of frequency
are as yet available,)
In describing or formulating the reactions of the heroes the interpreter is free to use any set of
variables he choses. He may analyze the behavior in accordance with a comprehensive
conceptual scheme which gives every psychologically significant variable its due place or he
may confine himself to the observation of a few traits. It all depends on what he wants to know
about his subject. He may be interested in evidences of extraversion. introversion, of
masculinity-femininity, of ascendance-submission; or he may be looking for signs of anxiety,
guilt or inferiority; or he may want to trace, certain deep-rooted sentiments to their source; or,
again, he may wish to include all of these and more in his plan of study.
Our practice is to use a comprehensive list of 28 needs (or drives) classified according to the
direction or immediate personal goal (motive) of the activity. A need may express itself
subjectively as an impulse, a wish or an intention or objectively as a trend of overt behavior.
Needs may be fused so that one action satisfies two or more at once; or one need may function
merely as an instrumental force, subsidiary to the satisfaction of another dominating need.
Besides the needs, our list of variables belong. ing to the hero includes a few inner states and
emotions.
The strength of each variety of need and of each variety of emotion manifested by the hero is
rated on a 1 (one) to 5 (five) scale, 5 being the pighest possible mark for any variable on a
single story. The criteria of strength are intensity, duration, frequency and importance in the plot.
The slightest suggestion of a variable (e. g. a flash of irritability) is given a mark of s, whereas an
intense form (e. g. violent anger) or the continued or repeated occurrence of a milder form (e.g.
constant quarreling) is scored 5. Marks of 2, 3, and 4 are given for intermediate intensities of
expression. After the twenty stories have been scored in this way, the total yate o wat do tie sent
are lied an er on
relation to each other.
There is not space in this manual for a complete account of the variables used. The short list
that follows must suffice. After the name of each variable there is printed (within parentheses)
the corrected average (Av.)
total score, and the range (R) of scores, for male college students.
The
figure in each case is for twenty stories averaging 300 words in length.*
• A correction must be made whenever the average length of a set of stories diverges much
from the standard (300 words per story), because, as one might expect, sets of short It might be
said here that a psychologist can use these variables without subscribing to any particular
theory of drives. He may, if he chooses, call them attitudes or traits.
• Abasement (Av. 16 R. 6-27). To submit to coercion or restraint in order to avoid blame,
punishment, pain or death.
To suffer a disagreeable press (insult,
injury, defeat) without opposition. To confess, apologize, promise to do better, atone, reform. To
resign himself passively to scarcely bearable conditions. Masochism.
• Achievement (Av. 26 R. I-51). To work at something important with energy and persistence.
To strive to accomplish something creditable.
To get ahead in
business, to persuade or lead a group, to create something. Ambition manifested Aggression
(Total Av. 36 R. 8-52).
a. Emotional and Verbal (Av. 14 R. 2-29). To hate (whether or not the feel. ing is expressed in
words). To get angry. To engage in a verbal quarrel; to curse, criticize, belittle, reprove, blame,
ridicule. To excite aggression against another person by public criticism.
b. Physical, Social (Av. 8 R. 0-16). To fight or kill in self-defense or in defense of a loved object.
To avenge an unprovoked insult.
To fight for his country
or for a good cause. To punish an offense. To pursue, catch or imprison a criminal or enemy.
c. Physical, Asocial (Av. 9 R. 0-17). To hold-up, attack, injure or kill a human being unlawfully. To
initiate a fight without due cause. To avenge an injury with excessive brutality. To fight against
legally constituted authorities. To fight against his own country. Sadism.
d. Destruction (Av. 4. R. 0-15). To attack or kill an animal. To break, smash, burn or destroy a
physical object.
coerce, restrain, imprison.
n Intraggression (Av. 10 R. 2-25). To blame, criticize, reprove or belittle himself for wrongdoing,
stupidity or failure. To suffer feelings of inferiority, guilt, remorse.
To punish himself physically. To commit suicide.
stories yield relatively low marks on almost all variables, and sets of long stories relatively high
marks; and therefore, if the examiner fails to make the proper correction the subject's relative
position on a variable will depend more on the length than on the content of his
the toul are of caci varale by the Tacor tha corets for the Eiven varaion in Tength.
The following table gives the factor to be used in connection with each length range, length
being expressed as average number of words per story. The figures indicating range are
inclusive.

Stories from a sane adult averaging less than 140 words per story usually indicate lack of
rapport and cooperation, lack of self-involvement.
As a rule they are not worth scoring.

Factor
Average Length
Factor
Average Length

196-215 ..
1.3
Under 140 words
1.9
216-242 ..
1.2
140-146
1.8
243-276
1.1
147-155

11.0
156-16

277-329
167-179
1.5
330-400 .
Over 400 words
180-195
1•4

Scanned by CamScanner
n Nurturance (Av. 14 R. 4-34). To express sympathy in action.
To be kind and
considerate of the feelings of others, to encourage, pity, and console, To aid, protect, defend or
rescue an object.
n Passivity (Av. 18 R. 3-52). To enjoy quietude, relaxation, slcep. To feel tired or lazy after very
little effort. To enjoy passive contemplation or the reception of sensuous impressions. To yield to
others out of apathy and inertia.
" Sex (Av. 12 R. 0-24). To seck and enjoy the company of the opposite sex. To have sexual
relations. To fall in love, to get inarried.
" Succorance (Av. 10 R. 2-20). To seck aid or consolation. To ask, or depend on someone else
for, encouragement, forgiveness, support, protection, care. To enjoy receiving sympathy,
nourishment or useful gifts. To feel lonely in solitude, home sick in a strange place, helpless in a
crisis.
Under this heading is included Intranurturance: to comfort himself, self-pity. To get some
enjoyment out of his own grief. To seck consolation in liquor or drugs.
Other needs are Acquisition, Affliation, Autonomy, Blamavoidance, Cognizance, Creation,
Deference, Excitance, Exposition, Harmavoidance and so forth.
From the list of inner states and emotions we select the following:
Confice (Av. 14 R. 4-29). A state of uncertainty, indecision, or perplexity. A mo mentary or
enduring opposition between impulses, needs, desires, aims.
Moral con-
fict Paralysing inhibitions.
Emotional Change (Av. 18 R. 0-31). To experience a marked change of feeling toward someone.
To be fitful, inconsistent or unstable in his affections.
To exhibit
fuctuations of mood or temper; the occurrence of exaltation and depression in one story. To be
intolerant of sameness and constancy. To seck new people, new inter. ests, a new vocation.
Dejection (Av. 23
R. 0-42). The experiencing of a feeling of disappointment, dis
illusionment, depression, sorrow, grief, unhappiness, melancholy, despair.
Other inner states are Anxiety, Exaltation, Distrust, Jealousy.
Besides these needs and emotions, the following very important variables are scored on a - 3
(minus three) to +3 (plus three) scale: Superego, Pride, Ego Structuration.
Here, in each case, the scoring is done on the basis of several operational criteria.
i. Forces of the hero's environment. The interpreter should observe the details as well as the
general nature of the situations, especially the human situations, which confront the heroes.
Here again he should be set to underscore uniqueness, intensity and frequency, and to record
the sig. nificant absence of certain common elements. Special note should be taken of physical
objects and human objects (other characters) which are not shown in the pictures but invented
by the imagination of the story-teller.
Mark the traits which recur among the people with whom the hero deals.
Are they, for the most part, friendly or unfriendly? Are the women more friendly or less friendly
than the men? What are the characteristic traits of the older women (mother figures) in the
stories? of the older men (father figures)?
Our practice is to use a comprehensive list of press (kinds of environmental forces or situations)
classified according to the effect that they have (or that they promise or threaten to have) upon
the hero. In our list more than half the press directed toward the hero are trends of activity
originating in other characters; that is to say, they are needs of the persons with whom the hero
deals. This being understood, it is not hard to see that the concept of press can be extended to
include the absence of required beneficial press (lack, deprivation, loss, dispossession) and
also to include bodily disburbances to which the personality must adjust (physical pain, injury,
disfigurement, disease). Here again, the, strength of each press that occurs in the story is rated
on a i to 5 scale, 5 being the highest possible mark for any press on a single story. As usual, the
criteria of strength are intensity, duration, frequency and general significance in the plot. After
rating the twenty stories, the total score for each press is compared to the standard score for
subjects of given age and sex, and the press which are conspicuously high or low are recorded
and examined in rela-
tion to each other.
There is no room here for more than the briefest mention of a few of the thirty or more press
which constitute this part of our conceptual scheme. As in the list of needs and emotions, the
numbers in parentheses refer to the average (Av.) total score and the range (R) of scores
(corrected for average length of stories) for male college students.
p Affliction (Total Av. 29 R. 17-35)
a. Associative (Av. 14 R. 4-27). The hero has one or more friends or sociable companions. He is
a member of a congenial group.
b. Emotional (Av. 15 R. 9-22). A person (parent, relative, lover) is affectionately devoted to the
hero. The hero has a love affair (mutual) or gets married.
P Aggression (Total Av. 35 R. 6-62)
a. Emotional and Verbal (Av. 10 R. 0-21). Someone hates the hero or gets angry with him. He is
criticized, reprimanded, belittled, ridiculed, cursed, threatened.
A person slanders him behind his back. Verbal quarrel.
b. Physical, Social (Av. 11
R. 0-21). The hero is in the wrong (he is an aggres
sor or criminal) and someone defends himself, attacks back, pursues, imprisons or kills the
hero. Some legitimate authority (parent, police) punishes the hero.
c. Physical, Asocial (Av. 12 R. 5-23). A criminal or a gang assaults, injures, or kills the hero. A
person starts a fight and the hero defends himself.
d. Destruction of Property (Av. 2 R. 0-8). A person damages or destroys the hero's possessions.
p Dominance (Total Av. 37 R. 16-60).
a. Coercion (Av. 10 R. 0-22). Someone tries to force the hero to do something.
He is exposed to commands, orders or forceful arguments.
b. Restraine (Av. 18 R. 7-34). A person tries to prevent the hero from doing something. He is
restrained or imprisoned.
c. Inducement, Seduction (Av, 9 R. 4-20). A person tries to infuence the hero (to do something
or not to do something) by gentle persuasion, encouragement, clever strategy or seduction.
p Nurturance (Av. 15 R. 6-23). A person nourishes, protects, aids, encourages, consoles or
forgives the hero.
p Rejection (Av. 14 R. 1-28). A person rejects, scorns, repudiates, refuses to help, leaves, or is
indifferent to the hero. A loved object is unfaithful. The hero is unpopular or not accepted for a
position. He is fired from his job.
8 Lack, Loss (Total Av. 25 R. 9-48).
a. Lack (Av. 11 R. 2-27). The hero lacks what he needs to live, to succeed or to be happy. He is
poor, family is destitute; he lacks status, influence, friends. There are no opportunities for
pleasure or advancement.
b. Loss (Av. 14 R. 4-24). Same as p Lack except here the hero loses something or someone
(death of loved object) in the course of the story. p Physical Danger (Total Av. 16 R. 4-34).
2. Active (Av. 10 R. 4-20). The hero is exposed to active physical dangers from non-human
forces: savage animal, collision of train, lightning, storm at sea (including bombardment).
b. Insupport (Av. 6 R. 0-16). The hero is exposed to the danger of falling or drowning. His car
overturns; his ship is wrecked; his airplane is injured; he is on the edge of a precipice.
p Physical Injury (Av. 5 R. 0-12). The hero is hurt by a person (p Aggression) or by an animal or
accident (p Physical Danger). His body is mutilated or dis
It should be understood that a single environment force often consists of a fusion of two or more
different press.
iv. Outcomes. The next important matter to which the interpreter should attend is the
comparative strength of the forces emanating from the hero and the forces emanating from the
environment. How much force (energy, determination, enduring effort, competence) does the
hero manifest? What is the strength of the facilitating or beneficial forces of the environment as
compared to the opposing or harmful forces? Is the hero's path of achievement difficult or easy?
In the face of opposition does he strive with renewed vigor (counteraction) or does he collapse?
Does the hero make things happen or do things happen to him? To what extent does he
manipulate or overcome the opposing forces and to what extent is he manipulated or overcome
by them? Is he coercing or coerced? mostly active or mostly passive? Under what conditions
does he succeed, when others help him or when he strives alone? Under what conditions does
he fail?
After committing an offense or crime does the hero get properly pun-ished? does he feel guilty,
confess, atone and reform? or is the misdemeanor treated as a matter of no moral significance
and the hero allowed to "get away with it" without punishment or fateful consequence? How
much energy does the hero direct against himself?
Viewing each event, each interaction of press and need, from the point of view of the hero, the
interpreter must estimate the amount of hardship
and frustration experienced, the relative degree of success and failure.
What is the ratio of happy and unhappy endings?
v. Themas. The interaction of a hero's need (or fusion of needs) and an environmental press (or
fusion of press) together with the outcome (success or failure of the hero) constitutes a simple
thema. Combinations of simple themas, interlocked or forming a sequence, are called compler
themas. When used precisely the term designates the abstract dynamical structure of an
episode, when used loosely it means plot, motif, theme, principal dramatic feature of the story.
To take up the hero and the environment separately, as we have just outlined, involves the
dislocation of the two fundamental elements of each concrete event. This is useful, since it is
enlightening to know that a given subject's heroes manifest, let us say, an unusual amount of
anxiety, passivity and abasement, or that their environments are peopled with many threatening
domineering figures. But now the interpreter has
he does this by taking each unusually high need in turn and noting the he observes with which
needs and emotions the unusually high press most often interact. In this way the interpreter will
obtain a list of the most prevalent themas (need-press combinations), to which he will add any
other themas, which, though not frequent enough to result in a high total score for the need or
press involved, seem significant for one reason or another — uniqueness, vividness, intensity,
explanatory value.
It is also possible to make an over-all thematic analysis without scoring the separate variables.
Here it is a matter of viewing each story as a whole and picking out the major and minor
themas, the plot and sub-plots. The question is: what issues, conflicts or dilemmas are of the
greatest concern to the author? There are common themas, for example, centering round
problems of achievement, rivalry, love, deprivation, coercion and restraint, offense and
punishment, conflict of desires, exploration, war and so forth. vi. Interests and sentiments.
These are treated separately since the author displays his own interests and sentiments not
only by attributing them to his heroes but in his choice of topics and in his manner of dealing
with these. Of particular importance is the positive or negative cathexis (value, appeal) of older
women (mother figures), older men (father fig. ures), same-sex women and same-sex men
(some of whom may be sibling figures).
Interpretation of Scores. A set of stories is analyzed and scored at first regardless of the
probable personal significance of their content. The result is a list of unusually high and
unusually low variables (needs, emotions and press), and a list of prevalent themas and
outcomes, together with a host of observations too specific to be caught in the net of any
con-veniently brief conceptual scheme. Then two tentative assumptions are made, to be
corrected later if necessary. The first is that the attributes of the heroes (needs, emotional states
and sentiments) represent tendencies in the subject's personality. These tendencies belong to
his past or to his anticipated future, and hence stand presumably for potential forces which are
temporarily dormant; or they are active in the present. (Of these past, present or expected
tendencies, the subject may be more or less uncon-scious.) They represent (not literally in most
cases but symbolically)
(r) things the subject has done, or (2) things he has wanted to do or been tempted to do, or (3)
elementary forces in his personality of which he has never been entirely conscious although
they may have given rise to fantasies and dreams in childhood or later; and/or they represent
(4) feelings and desires he is experiencing at the moment; and/or (5) anticipations of his future
behavior, something he would like to do or will perhaps be forced to do, or something he does
not want to do but feels he might do because of some half-recognized weakness in himself.
The second assumption is that the press variables represent forces in the subject's apperceived
environment, past, present or future. They refer, literally or symbolically, to (1) situations he has
actually encountered, or
(2) situations which in reveries or dreams he has imagined encountering, out of hope or fear; or
(3) the momentary situation (press of the examiner and the task) as he apperceives it; and/or (4)
situations he expects to encounter, would like to encounter, or dreads encountering. Roughly
the press may be interpreted as the subject's view of his world, the impressions he is likely to
project into his interpretations of an existing situation and into his anticipations of future
situations.
Some knowledge of the subject's past history and present circumstance plus a little intuition is
required to decide whether a given element belongs to the subject's past, present or anticipated
future. As it happens the discrimination of the temporal reference is not a matter of critical
importance.
To guide the intuitions of the interpreter from this point all that can be offered in this short
manual are a few guiding principles coming out of several years of practical experience. The
testing of these and other suggestions constitutes a program for the future. In any event the
conclusions that are reached by an analysis of TAT stories must be regarded as good
"leads" or working hypotheses to be verified by other methods, rather than as proved facts.
In arriving at his final conclusions the interpreter should take account of the following points:
(i) If the test has been unskillfully administered, if the subject has not been involved in the task,
if the stories are short and sketchy, the content may be psychologically irrelevant, composed, for
the most part, of imper-sonal elements: (1) elements given in the picture, (2) parts of events
witnessed by the subject, (3) fragments from books he has read or movies he has seen, or (4)
inventions of the moment — none of these being representative of a determining tendency in his
personality.
(i) Under average conditions about 30 per cent of the stories (six out of twenty) will fall in the
impersonal category, although even from these a few items of significance can usually be
extracted.
(ili) One must not lean too heavily on the subject's judgment in decid. ing whether a given item is
personal or impersonal. According to our findings more than half of the content which subjects
trace to newspapers, magazines, books and movies are objective equivalents of unconscious
memories or complexes in their own personalities. Some internal selective factor has operated
to determine each subject's attention to, registration and eventual recall of just these, rather
than countless other, elements of his experience.
(iv) The TAT draws forth no more than twenty small samples of the subject's thought. To
suppose that these will invariably provide a skeleton of the total personality is unduly optimistic.
Just as in a series of interviews or in a psychoanalysis there are some totally unproductive
hours, so there are sets of TAT stories composed of impersonal or superficially personal
elements from which it is impossible to infer the underlying determinants of character.
(v) It is convenient to distinguish two levels of functioning: first level functioning — physical and
verbal behavior (actual overt deeds); and second level functioning — ideas, plans, fantasies and
dreams about be-havior. The conduct of the subject in relation to the examiner and to the task
belongs to the first level, but the content of his stories belongs to the second level. Since
individuals vary greatly in ideo-motor conductance (extent to which ideas and fantasies become
objectified in action), the interpreter must be prepared to find subjects with low conductance
whose stories are indicative of their mental preoccupations but not of their overt behavior, actual
or potential.
(vi) It is also convenient to distinguish three, if not more, layers in normal socialized
personalities: the inner layer is composed of repressed unconscious tendencies which in their
crude form are never, or very rarely, expressed in thought (second level) and never, or very
rarely, objectified in action (first level). The middle layer is composed of tendencies which
appear in thought (second level) in undisguised form, and which may perhaps be confessed to
one or more suitable individuals, and may also perhaps be objectified in action (first level)
privately and secretly. The outer layer is composed of tendencies which are publicly asserted or
acknowledged (second level) and/or openly manifested in behavior (frst level). It is for the
interpreter to determine, if he can, to
which of these three layers each conspicuous variable (noted in the TAT stories) belongs.
(vii) It may be stated, as a rough generalization, that the content of a set of TAT stories
represents second level, covert (i. e., inner and middle layer) personality, not first level, overt or
public (i. e., outer layer) per-sonality. There are plenty of ways of discovering the most typical
overt trends; the TAT is one of the few methods available today for the disclosure of covert
tendencies. The best understanding of the total structure of personality is obtained when the
psychologist considers the characteristics of manifest behavior in conjunction with the TAT
findings. (viii) Half-unmindful of the fact that they are dealing with imaginal productions, rather
than records of actual behavior, some interpreters are inclined to assume that variables which
are unusually strong and variables which are unusually weak in the TAT stories will be unusually
strong and unusually weak respectively in the subject's manifest personality.
There is some pragmatic basis, to be sure, for this expectation inasmuch as statistical studies
have shown that with most variables there is a positive correlation between the strength of their
imaginal (TAT) expressions and the strength of their behavioral expressions. We can not lean
very heavily on this over-all finding, however, since not only do we find numerous individual
exceptions, but in the case of certain other important drives and emotions, especially those
which are customarily repressed, the exact opposite is generally true. Here one is reminded of
the principle that currents of thought are more rigidly influenced by strong needs which have
been inhibited or rested for a long time than by needs which have recently been fully satisfied or
fatigued by overt action. What is revealed by the TAT is often the very opposite of what the
subject consciously and voluntarily does and says in his daily life. Thus the picture that emerges
from this test may be unrecognizable by the individual's casual, or even intimate,
acquaintances.
(ix) Although the TAT was not designed to reveal first level, outer layer personality (public
behavior) the interpreter can often guess some of its characteristic features by taking note of the
following points:
(a) The stories composed in the first session (in response to the first ten pictures) are more
closely related to the outer layer of personality, as a rule, than those composed in the second
session, many of which express inner layer tendencies and complexes symbolically.
(b) Tendencies which are not restricted by cultural sanctions are likely to be as strong in their
overt as in their covert manifestations. In college men, for example, there is a positive
correlation (over 40) between the TAT and the behavioral manifestations of the following
variables:
• Abasement, n Creation, in Dominance, n Exposition, n Nurturance, n Passivity, n Rejection
and Dejection. On the other hand, according to our findings, n Sex in the TAT and n Sex in overt
behavior correlates between -33 and -74 depending on the type of activity that is being
con-sidered. Statistically there is no correlation at all between the intensity of covert second
level manifestations and overt first level manifestations of n Aggression and n Achievement (due
possibly to variations in the fatigue factor).
(c) Knowing a few facts about the subject, the interpreter, feeling his way into the atmosphere of
the stories and noting repetitions and elements congruent with these, can usually without much
difficulty distinguish the portions (about 15 per cent of the stories) which are almost literally and
consciously personal. Out of this nucleus of impressions a portrait of the middle and outer layer
personality will usually emerge. Portions requiring depth interpretation are usually derived from
the inner layer.
(x) Experiments have shown that the sex of the examiner must be taken into account. This is
especially true when analyzing the stories of a subject who entertains an unusual amount of
hostility towards members of the sex to which the examiner belongs. The prestige and attitude
of the examiner can also affect to some extent the course of some of the stories. One might
predict that standard scores will not be exactly the same for all examiners, that some, for
example, will, in the long run, instigate more affiliation and less aggression than will others. (xi)
Still more important as determinants are the life situation and the momentary emotional state of
the subject. The average college man about to enter the armed forces will introduce the theme
of war into at least two of his twenty stories. Marital conflicts will be prominent in the stories of a
woman contemplating divorce. A young man who has just been refused by his girl will receive
an uncommonly high mark on the variable Dejection, and so forth.
Depth Interpretation. Being informed that the chief value of the TAT resides in its power to evoke
fantasies which are susceptible of translation into unconscious repressed tendencies, one might
expect to find this manual largely devoted to the technique of such translations. But the
necessary limitation of space forbids so ambitious an endeavor. To summarize in a few
paragraphs the theories and practices of psychoanalysis, a knowledge of which is necessary for
depth interpretation, would be both presumptuous and misleading, since a little information
might influence some amateurs to believe that they were Magi of the unconscious. Depth
interpretation requires the examiner to orient himself so that he views each story and parts of
each story, as if the teller were a child trying with imagery to objectify his own body, or certain
functions or organs of his body (f. a psychosomatic symptom), or to represent the body of
another person, or as if the teller were trying to depict in a disguised form a certain encounter
with one of his parents or siblings, or to suggest some.
traumatic event experienced in childhood. Inferences of this sort can be validated only by data
derived from some kind of psychoanalysis, and it would be better if expert workers submitted
their depth interpretations only to those analysts and others, who have the ability and the
opportunity to verify them.
Formal Analysis. Under this heading we include the discrimination of a variety of attributes
descriptive of the topic, structure, style, mood, degree of realism and power of the plot and of
the language of the stories. It is among these attributes that we look for evidences of
temperament, emotional maturity, observational ability, intellectuality, aesthetic imagination,
literary ability, verbal facility, psychological insight, reality sense, intra-ception-extraception,
integrity (normality) of cognition and so forth. Ob-sessional, manic and depressive trends are
not difficult to recognize.
Disjunctivity of theme and language and the occurrence in the narrative of incongruities of
feeling and action and of bizarre elements - these bespeak mental disorientation. The first
valuable contribution in this area of research was made by Masserman and Balkan. Much work
remains to be done.
Reliability: Seeing that the TAT responses reflect the fleeting mood as well as the present life
situation of the subject, we should not expect the repeat reliability of the test to be high, even
though the bulk of the content objectifies tendencies and traits that are relatively constant. Data
on this point are lacking.
Description of Pictures. Below is a list of the pictures constituting the first and second series of
the four sets (B for young boys; G for young girls; M for males over 14 years; F for females over
14 years). A number that is not followed by any letter (B, G, M or F) designates a picture which
is suitable for both sexes and all ages (Nos. 1, 2, 4, 5, 10, II, 14, 15, 16, 19,
20). "BM" means that the picture is suitable for boys and older males;
"GF" that it is suitable for girls and older females. "B" means that the picture is for young boys
only; "G" for young girls only; "BG" for boys and girls; "M" for males over fourteen; "F" for
females over fourteen; and "MF" for males and females over fourteen. (The serial number is
printed on the back of each picture.)