# The Rorschach Test taken seriously? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 30, 2004, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rorschach-test-taken-seriously/266825 "2004-09-30T12:38:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2004, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rorschach-test-taken-seriously/266825/21 "2004-09-30T22:46:39Z")
It’s my understanding that what you say you see isn’t particularly significant; it’s why you say you see the things you do. Your decision might, for instance, be based on the colors, or the symmetry, or the fine details of the edges, each of which means something different. ---
**Author:** ![threemae](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/5f9b8f/32.png) [@threemae](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/threemae)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 5:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rorschach-test-taken-seriously/266825/22 "2004-10-01T17:59:23Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > It’s my understanding that what you say you see isn’t particularly significant; it’s why you say you see the things you do. Your decision might, for instance, be based on the colors, or the symmetry, or the fine details of the edges, each of which means something different. Yeah, that’s what my prof said was supported by extensive studies, but I’m still searching for the extensive studies half of the equation. ---
**Author:** ![RiverRunner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/977dab/32.png) [@RiverRunner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RiverRunner)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rorschach-test-taken-seriously/266825/23 "2004-10-01T19:14:48Z")
[Monty Python] \* Here’s my diploma in psychiatry from the University of Oxford. This here shows that I’m a member of the British Psychiatric Association, a very important body indeed. Here’s a letter from another psychiatrist in which he mentions that I’m a psychiatrist. This is my Psychiatric Club tie, and as you can see the cufflinks match. I’ve got a copy of ‘Psychiatry Today’ in my bag, which I think is pretty convincing. And a letter here from my mother in which she asks how the psychiatry is going, and I think you’ll realize that the one person you can’t fool is your mother. So if you’d like to ask me any questions about psychiatry, I bet I can answer them. \* [/Monty Python] ---
**Author:** ![audreyayn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@audreyayn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/audreyayn)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rorschach-test-taken-seriously/266825/24 "2004-10-01T19:30:58Z")
> [@EJsGirl](#): > > My SIL is a PhD doing her post-doc internship at a major CA university. She has a superior (term used very loosely) who just drools for those inkblots. This person has one in particular that s/he swears by- if you see the blot one way, you are straight, another way, you are gay. There is no dissuading this person from their POV. This sounds like a test we used to give each other when we were children, to find out how male and female we are. Apparently I’m 25% male because I look at my nails from the palm side, not the back side. (The others were: circle or square, look up, and I forget the fourth. For looking up, I think you were female if you looked up with your whole head and male if you looked up with only your eyes.) IANAPsychatrist, but I thought this test was only part of testing for schizophrenia. And even then, artists give similar answers to schizos. ---
**Author:** ![Roches](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bc8723/32.png) [@Roches](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roches)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rorschach-test-taken-seriously/266825/25 "2004-10-01T19:42:55Z")
audreyayn: In elementary school I recall being told there was something on my shoe as an infallible test of sexual orientation. If you lift up your foot in front of you and look down at the bottom of your shoe, that means you’re straight. If you’re gay, then of course you’ll lift up your foot behind you, and look behind you at the bottom of your shoe. (This only works for males, but then girls don’t seem to be so fascinated by this sort of thing around this age.) threemae: “I can’t tell you so that I won’t bias you in case you need to take the test” is one of the worst possible excuses one could give to someone studying psychology. Even if the test never comes up in your studies, you could always do a literature search to learn about the test. Maybe you could do a search (or just read the webpage about the old interpretation) then ask about the new interpretation, saying that you’ve already learned about the test. ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rorschach-test-taken-seriously/266825/26 "2004-10-01T19:55:57Z")
> [@Roches](#): > > audreyayn: In elementary school I recall being told there was something on my shoe as an infallible test of sexual orientation. If you lift up your foot in front of you and look down at the bottom of your shoe, that means you’re straight. If you’re gay, then of course you’ll lift up your foot behind you, and look behind you at the bottom of your shoe. (This only works for males, but then girls don’t seem to be so fascinated by this sort of thing around this age.) I know another one but this was used in _high school_ so it must be even more accurate. Ask a male to inspect his fingernails. If he holds his plam up and curls his fingers inward to look at them then he is straight. If he holds his palm done and holds his fingers straight then he is gay. ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2004, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rorschach-test-taken-seriously/266825/27 "2004-10-01T19:56:59Z")
That should say “palm down” not done. ---
**Author:** ![noname](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/58f4c7/32.png) [@noname](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/noname)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2004, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rorschach-test-taken-seriously/266825/28 "2004-10-07T17:58:54Z")
> [@alice\_in\_wonderland](#): > > Well, the reason the test probably “worked” for you is simple. You had opened up to the person giving the test, and probably revealed a lot more about yourself than you thought. Also, parts of your personality that you feel are “hidden quite well” may be totally obvious to everyone else - they just don’t comment on it. First of all, sorry for the very late reply. About opening up, I just replied to what the blots looked like. Didn’t say anything else. And the answeres very quite general in nature, as in ‘this looks like a shoe’, and not, ‘this looks like a shoe of mr. xxx, whom I don’t like’ . So I doubt I was very open to the person. In fact, I was quite wary and guarded about the entire exercise. And if people know about the hidden aspects of my personality, they are damn good actors!! And the person who took the rorschach test was not my friend, so couldn’t have known about my “hidden personality” (now I’m imagining my self as Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde). If I am correct, one of the requirements for taking a Rorschach is that the persons should not know each other, since that may cloud the judgement. > [@](#): > > (Can you imagne _that_ conversation…“Bill, can you pass the salt, and have I mentioned that you seem like you have a fear of commitment possibly steming from abondonment issues surrounding your mother?”) Very funny 🙂 But I don’t have any abandonment issues. In fact, I have the opposite (over attachment issues) > [@](#): > > Really, what you see in a blob is not particularly significant - unless of course in every blob you see horrible scenes of people being decapitated - that might give cause for concern… 😉 Sometimes, a rose is not just a rose. The Rorschach test is an indicator of how our sub-conscious feels and perceives things. That said, I don’t believe that the Rorschach results should be viewd as etched in stone. People change, and so do their perceptions. What I perceive in a blob may be significant at that point of time. But I cannot base my life on these deductions. Oh, and do you think that the decapitations might point towards a feeling of abandonment? 😉 > [@Shagnasty](#): > > Right, but how much information about yourself were you given? Astrologists and psychics are known to give people results that seem uncanny but that is known to be a sham. I studied psychometrics in both undergrad and grad school and the consensus was that the Rorschach was never valid and while we touched on it, our professors never gave it much credibility at all. Quiet a lot, in fact. Though not all (I do hope to discover myself fully some day, though. AUM… ;)) I don’t believe in astrologers and psychics at all, so they are never uncanny to me, at least. You having studied these subjects may be more knowledgeable, but as a layman, I was quite impressed by it. I would like to emphasize it again, though, that I don’t believe that it is the best psychometric test out there, but pretty accurate, for me and my friend. ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2004, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rorschach-test-taken-seriously/266825/29 "2004-10-07T18:17:56Z")
> [@moriah](#): > > So what about the test in which one is shown a picture (like that of a man fishing with a youth) and asked what is happening in the picture? Is that a valid test? > “They’re waiting for the Loch Ness Monster.” That’s the Thematic Apperception Test. Searching [skepdic.com](http://skepdic.com), I see a reference to one article saying that it (along with the inkblots and other tests) shouldn’t be used to diagnose mental illness, determine suitability of a parent for child custody, etc. I know when I was getting my psych degree, they recommended it as part of therapy to pick up on possible issues that might be going on in the person’s life, but not as a hard-and-fast diagnostic tool. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rorschach-test-taken-seriously/266825.md?page=1)