This second edition of Irving Weiner's classic comprehensive,
clinician-friendly guide to utilizing the Rorschach for personality
description has been revised to reflect both recent modifications in the
Rorschach Comprehensive System and new evidence concerning the soundness
and utility of Rorschach assessment. It integrates the basic ingredients
of structural, thematic, behavioral, and sequence analysis strategies
into systematic guidelines for describing personality functioning. It is
divided into three parts.
Part I concerns basic considerations in Rorschach testing and deals with
conceptual and empirical foundations of the inkblot method and with
critical issues in formulating and justifying Rorschach inferences.
Part II is concerned with elements of interpretation that contribute to
thorough utilization of data in a Rorschach protocol: the Comprehensive
System search strategy; the complementary roles of projection and card
pull in determining response characteristics; and the interpretive
significance of structural variables, content themes, test behaviors,
and the sequence in which various response characteristics occur. Each
of the chapters presents and illustrates detailed guidelines for
translating Rorschach findings into descriptions of structural and
dynamic aspects of personality functioning. The discussion throughout
emphasizes the implications of Rorschach data for personality assets and
liabilities, with specific respect to adaptive and maladaptive features
of the manner in which people attend to their experience, use ideation,
modulate affect, manage stress, view themselves, and relate to others.
Part III presents 10 case illustrations of how the interpretive
principles delineated in Part II can be used to identify assets and
liabilities in personality functioning and apply this information in
clinical practice. These cases represent persons from diverse
demographic backgrounds and demonstrate a broad range of personality
styles and clinical issues. Discussion of these cases touches on
numerous critical concerns in arriving at different diagnoses,
formulating treatment plans, and elucidating structural and dynamic
determinants of behavior.
