Thematic

Apperception Test
: Administration
and Scoring
General Information

 Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) is a projective technique…

 ….involving projection based on ambiguous stimuli
 …premised on projective hypothesis

 Advantages of projective techniques

 Assessing subconscious personality traits, needs and desires
 It is felt that projective techniques provide insights into personality that
could not be obtained otherwise
General Information

 Popularity of the TAT

 The test is reportedly widely used and formal training is recommended by many graduate
program directors

 History and Current Availability

 The TAT was developed by Henry Murray, of Harvard University, with the assistance of
Christiana Morgan
 It is currently published by Pearson Assessment and may be purchased by qualified individuals –
a high level of qualification is required to use the TAT
Test Contents

 The current version of the TAT (Series D) consists of 31 picture cards and a manual

 The images on the picture cards are intentionally ambiguous to facilitate free projection

 The cards may be viewed at the following link:

  Murray established detailed test protocols, with
choice of protocol determined by age and sex of the
respondent
 All respondents are asked to provide an imaginative
story based on the picture cards

Test Contents  Current test protocol has this basic structure but is
more flexible, and variable, than Murray intended.
 Interpretation of the TAT is usually a matter of
clinical judgment – this was what Murray intended.
 There are several standardized scoring schemes for
the TAT but they do not appear to be widely used.
  Editions of the TAT
 Series A, B, C and D

Test  Selection and preparation of images for inclusion in

the TAT
Development  Selection of images from the arts and popular media
 Careful re-drawing of these images by Christiana
Morgan and others
  Most of the development work on the TAT occurred
within 10 years of its introduction in 1935

Test  Key influences on the TAT:

Development  Earlier picture-story tests, e.g. of Binet
 Ideas of Carl Jung
 Thomas Wolfe’s Look Homeward, Angel
Mandatory Conditions for Story

 Current Situation – what is happening at the moment

 Thoughts and feelings - of the characters
 Preceding Events – What has led to the events in the story
 Final Outcome – what was the outcome
Recording considerations

 Time – Latency and total time taken for story telling

 Behavioral Observation – exclamation, speech blocks / difficulties, level of involvement,

pauses, facial expression, non verbal cues

 Questioning and inquiry – questions should be asked at the end of the story not during
the free association phase
Recording considerations

 Complete responses presented by a subject should be recorded.

 behavioral observations: stuttering, voice tone, body posture, hand movements,

exclamation, and so on.
Interpretation

 Themes – noting the nature of conflicts, types of emotions elicited, the way conflicts are
resolved

 Outcomes – analyzing how the stories end, nature of the ending, extent to which ending is
controlled by hero and /or environmental forces
General considerations

 The main content of the stories

 Feelings and tone of the stories
 Assessee’s behavior apart from responses (verbal remarks, affective comments,
nervous gestures, stress gestures etc)
 Story content – inner conflicts, attitudes, fantasies, wishes related to the outside
world
 Story structure – feelings, assumptions related to world in general, inclination
towards pessimism or optimism)
Themes or Levels

 Descriptive level – mere description of the story

 Interpretative Level – extension of the story , added
inferences
 Diagnostic Level – clinical inferences are made
  The Hero – identifying the central character of the
story
 Needs of the Hero – needs, motives, and desires of
the hero
 Identifying presses – important environmental
Interpretation factor influencing or interfering the needs of the
hero
 Conception of environment (world- the perception
of the environment
 Figures seen as - understanding how the client
views other people in their environment
  Significant conflicts - The major conflicts within the
hero/heroine should be noted by reviewing the client’s current
feelings and behaviors (conflicts between id, ego and super-
ego).
 Nature of anxieties – like physical harm and/or punishment;
of disapproval of lack or loss of love; of illness or injury of
being deserted; of deprivation of being overpowered and
Interpretation helpless lonely; of being devoured.
 Main defenses – like repression, projection; undoing; reaction
formation etc.
 Adequacy of superego as manifested by punishment for crime
 Integration of the ego - indicated by the quality with which
the hero/heroine mediates between different conflicts.