Journal of Projective Psychology and Mental Health: Volume 13, Number 2, July 2006 Editorial |
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| 1.Editorial : Somatic Inkblot Series: Assessment and Therapeutic Tool, B.L.Dubey, Page 83-84. After 14 memorable years serving you as Editor in chief of the SIS Journal of Projective Psychology and Mental Health, I wish to take this opportunity to sincerely thank all members of the Editorial Board, from 1994 to the present, for their continuous support during the journal’s birth phase. I wish to highlight the contribution of Dr Wilfred A. Cassell for his excellent thought provoking papers in almost every issue, without which our endeavor would not have been so widely recognized. Since its introduction, it has been regularly published bi-annually in January and July. We anticipate as interest in this publication grows internationally, that it will be eventually published monthly. As it has gradually gained acceptance, the Professional membership has risen to over 270 and the Institutional Membership to 40. It has met the publication standards of the American Psychological Association and is abstracted in “Psychological Abstracts”. We are fortunate to have Professor Amool R. Singh, Ph.D., Head Department of Clinical Psychology, Ranchi Institute of Neuro Psychiatry and Allied Sciences (RINPAS), Kanke, Ranchi to serve as the new Editor-in-chief. Over the past twenty years, I have had the privilege of knowing him personally in many roles: as a student, a practitioner, clinician, researcher and now professor at one of our two leading psychiatric institutions. While I leave my present editorial position with sadness in my heart, I am extremely pleased with the Editorial board’s awarding the future leadership role to him. He is an excellent academician and fine man. It affords me great pleasure to welcome him and his wife Archana Singh, who has played an important role in his professional success. I am very excited about the future of our journal. In addition, it also gives me great confidence for our journal’s scientific prestige to welcome Col. Professor Suprakash Chaudhury, M.D., Ph.D., Head Dept of Psychiatry, at RINPAS, Ranchi and editor of the SIS journal. I also welcome the many faculty members and students at RINPAS, Ranchi who are devoted to the journal’s continued success. Consistent with the early international interest the original Manual for the SIS-I has been translated for publication in Italian and Russian. More recently Dr Cassell and I published a Manual for the SIS-II Video (Cassell and Dubey, 2003). This included normative data on different populations such as students, business executives and army personnel. Norms are also available as guidelines for assessing clinical cases. The latter visual stimulus presentation system now is available for a computer monitor presentation format. Much further work needs to be done in standardizing these procedures as well as scientifically evaluating their multiple assessment and treatment applications. Early on in clinical situations it was first observed that the various applications of the SIS provided a unique opportunity to examine subjective percepts related to the human body. These enable the examination of previously illusive concepts related to health and sexuality as well as physical symptoms. Moreover, the projective technology has the capability of triggering the release of short term, intermediate and long-term visual memories. The validity of this became established in clinical situations involving severe psychological stress. Through direct and symbolic content analysis, the trained SIS clinician can reprocess these with cognitive psychotherapy for optimal outcome. In further introducing applications of the SIS to established professionals, I anticipate further resistances in their general adoption. One area that seems to have been particularly troublesome for those grounded in physical scientific facts, involves the spiritual healing applications. Traditionally there has been a wide gap in the thinking of those with a scientific orientation to body-mind processes. Yet for many of us, religious principles provide fundamental compass directions for civilized life. Unfortunately, in the world scene, historically and in the present, religious rationalizations have provided a sick basis for heinous crimes and aggression. It has been repeatedly observed in clinical situations (but not based in scientifically based statistical studies) that the SIS can sometimes serve as a “Spiritual dream catcher”. Individuals grieving the death of a loved one, when shown the SIS at bedtime, often experience contact dreams. Through the physical medium of the SIS stimulus, either paper or electronic, the dreamer is able to visualize and emotionally experience healing emotions from the deceased person’s spirituality. “Since projective tests in general and somatic inkblot images in particular are not based on verbal communication, they have power to penetrate the “outer shell” of defenses and surface behavior. They use the language of dreams, visual imagery and symbolic thought, the most basic forms of thinking and expression. The SIS images take you back in time when you start processing the unconscious material. The SIS document then works as an aide to this journey. The symbolic and content analysis of the responses helps in hearing the inner cry of the suffering individuals and planning for the therapeutic aid (Cassell and Dubey, 2003)”. Dr.Cassell deserves our congratulations for this innovative contribution to humanity. I sincerely approach you to actively support this noble venture. Please continue to send research papers and clinical studies. I also appeal to you to help us expand our professional and institutional membership. We also deeply appreciate all forms of financial support to our non-profit SIS Society and this international journal. 2. Tracing the Roots of Violence by associating Dream and SIS Images: A Vicarious Visit to an Adolescent’s Birthday Party, Wilfred A. Cassell and B.L.Dubey. Pages 85-106. The Somatic Inkblot Video was administered to two cases: The first study examines the case history of a severely traumatized seventeen 17 years old girl whose homicidal behavior led to psychiatric hospitalization. The second case was a fourteen-year-old Black youth with a history of violent behavior. The Somatic images were able to bring out aggressive imagery and relevant unprocessed repressed material helpful during therapeutic intervention. The interview with patients and significance of somatic images are discussed in the paper. 3. Impulsivity in eating disorders: analysed through Wartegg test. Silvia Daini, Carlo Lai, Giuseppe Manuel Festa, Francesca Maiorino, Massimiliano Pertosa and Sergio De Risio, pages 107-119. Psychological and psychopathological characteristics in eating disorders (ED) were analyzed by a Wartegg projective test on one-hundred ED female patients. Thirty-five patients diagnosed with Anorexia of restricting-type (ANrt), twenty-two patients diagnosed with Anorexia of purging-type (ANpt) and forty-three patients with Bulimia diagnosis (BL) (DSM-IV criteria and EDES questionnaire) were compared with eighty-one control subjects (CN). Wartegg test results, by a quantitative scoring system, show significant differences between ED patients and CN on depression, impulsivity, reality testing and aggressiveness. ANrt presents anxiety, perfectionism and impulsivity; ANpt shows lower formal quality than other groups, and BL shows depression and low self-realization. Wartegg projective test shows a significant unconscious or disguised impulsivity in restricting anorexic patients. 4. SIS-I and Rorschach in Schizophrenia: A Correlational Study, S.Kumar, R.Singh, S.Mohanty and R.Kumar, pages 120-124. The study was designed to compare the response pattern of SIS-I and Rorschach in schizophrenic patients. The study sample consisted of 30 schizophrenic patients drawn from the inpatients of Institute of Mental Health and Hospital, Agra. 30 normal persons were also included for comparison. SIS-I and Rorschach were administered on each participant. Mean, SD, t-test and correlation were calculated on percent scores of Rorschach and SIS-I. 5. Psychoanalytic Conceptions of the Mind in Relation to Personality Disorders of Drug Abusers, Kristian Aleman, Pages 125-138. The purpose was to investigate whether signs of DMTm (Defense Mechanism Technique modified) could discriminate between the ten groups of DSM-III-R personality disorders (PDs) and DSM-III-R clusters among drug abusers. DMTm signs are interpreted as different kinds of defense and anxiety. The 65 subjects were recruited from Sabbatsberg Hospital, Sweden. Prominent affect defenses were projected intro aggression in paranoid and schizotypal PDs, intro aggression in borderlines, inhibition in avoidant PD and barrier/affect isolation in obsessive-compulsive PD. Prominent identity defenses were marked denial in narcissism, reversal II 1–2 in dependent PD and reversal IV in histrionics. Patients with antisocial PD (ASPD, n= 53 out of 65) were analyzed separately. Results underlined psychoanalytic conceptions of the mind in relation to PDs of drug abusers. 6. Personality Assessment 0f A Child With Emotional Problems: A Case Study, Nilanjana Sanyal, Manisha Dasgupta, Danae Marinakis and Olga Doukas, Pages 139-146. The paper highlights the clinical probing of a case, aged 12 years, second-born, belonging to a family of lower socio-economic strata, and having emotional problems. She was administered with the Fairy Tale Test (F.T.T.), which was readministered for checking the reliability of the findings. The Draw-A-Person Test (D.A.P.) was also administered in the second phase for cross validation of the findings. Results revealed striking congruence of the signs of the searches in relation to the clinical delving of the interview, the Fairy Tale Test and the Draw-A-Person Test, thereby hinting at the significance of the rich penetrative tapestry of projective tests in tune with the skilled “clinical lenses of the therapist.” 7. Novelty and Meaning Contexts of Creativity vis-à-vis Jensen’s Level I and level II Abilities, Umed Singh, Pages 147-165. The present study was designed to examine the relationship of novelty and meaning contexts of creativity with Jensen’s Level I and Level II. Psychometric measures of creativity like Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking are considered to measure novelty context of creativity, whereas projective indices, particularly inkblot techniques are taken to index the meaning context of creativity. Likewise measures of learning/memory viz. Forward Digit Span, Backward Digit Span, and Serial Rote Learning are the indices of level I ability; and Raven’s Progressive Matrices and Verbal measures of general mental ability like Hundal’s General Mental Ability Test are considered to tap Jensen’s level II ability. To realize the main objective of the study 202 high school male students were randomly drawn from Kurukshetra District of Haryana. The selected subjects were administered with Holtzman Inkblot Technique (HIT), Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking (both verbal and figural), Forward Digit Span, Backward Digit Span, Serial Rote Learning, Raven’s Progressive Matrices, and Hundal’s General Mental Ability Test. The obtained data were analyzed by applying descriptive statistics, Pearson’s Correlations, and Principal Component Factor Analysis. Analyses have clearly established the two contexts of creativity i.e. novelty and meaning, and differential relationships with Jensen’s level I and level II abilities. Analysis also supports Jensen’s hypothesis of factorial distinction between level I and level II abilities. Weak associations have been obtained between psychometric measures of creativity (novelty context) and the indices of level II ability. Overall, findings of the present study highlight the complexity of relationship between creativity and intelligence. |
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