house tree person test a psychological test.pptx

HOUSE – TREE –
PERSON TEST
PROJECTIVE
TECHNIQUES

Development:
 HTP was developed by Buck and Hammer
(1969)
 Buck felt that artistic creativity represents a
stream of flow onto graphic art
 He believed that through drawings, subjects
objectified unconscious differences by sketching
the inner image of the primary process.
 projective techniques reflect the influence of
traditional and modern psychoanalytic concepts

Usage
 Designed to aid clinician in obtaining information
concerning:
individual’s sensitivity
 maturity
 flexibility
 efficiency
degree of personality integration
and interaction with the environment.

Usage
Used for personality assessment
Use in combination with other projective
measurement instruments, usually given first as
an “ice-breaker”
Can be apply on Anyone over 3 years of age
Especially appropriate for individuals who are
non-English-speaking, culturally different,
educationally deprived, or developmentally

Purpose
 Provides a structured context for the
projection of unconscious material.
 It can be use for diagnosis
 To check adjustment of the subject
 Projective methods originated within a
clinical setting
 evolved from therapeutic procedures

Advantages
 It requires little time and it is simple to
administer.
 This is culture-free technique
 It is also good for patients with limited
education, limited intellectual ability,
culturally deprived backgrounds

Disadvantages
1. Lack of extensive research
2. Verbal patients less responsive
3. Psychomotor difficulties
4. Highly trained interviewers and skilled
interpreters are needed.
5. Interpreters’ bias can be there.
6. It is a costly method.
7. Not be representative of the entire
population.

PROJECTIVE TESTS
HOUSE-TREE-PERSON TEST

Administration
Material Required:
 An A-4 sized paper, pencil, rubber, crayons and
stopwatch
Instructions:
The test will be completed in following steps:
 Client will ask to draws three objects: a house, a
tree, a person on plain paper
 Client will ask to draw a good house (as good as
possible), take as much time as needed, erase
anything you need to.
 Then the pencil is taken away & you can use
crayons in anyway to shade in or draw.
 The client will ask to define or describe his

Administration types:
I. Achromatic ( without colors)
Simply examiner has to ask to draw the
drawings as good as possible
I. Chromatic ( with colors)
For this type of administration you have to provide
colors:
red, green, blue, yellow, brown, black,
orange, purple and others)
At the completion the examiner has to ask the
client to identify the colors
 if he is unable to identify it indicates color
blindness and other problems it will affect the

Details about the drawing
Examiner would ask following
formal questions for every
drawing:
Phase II

Person
1. Is that man or a women?
2. How old is he?
3. Who is he? she?
4. What he is doing? ( where he is doing this)
5. What does he fee? (why)
6. What sort of person he is?
7. What is the weather like in this picture?
8. What deos the person need the most?
9. What kind of clothing does that person have
on?
Phase 2: detailing

Tree
1. What kind of tree is that?
2. How old is that tree?
3. Is this tree is alive/ dead? (Which part
is died, cause of death, hope for life if
yes when)
4. What does this tree look more like to
you; 9 a man or a woman)?
5. What is the weather like in this
picture?
6. Show me in what direction the wind is
blowing?

House
1. How many stories this house have?
2. Whose house is that?
3. If it is your home;
which room will you like to live in?
whom you like to have live with you?
4. What is the weather like in this picture?
5. What does the house need the most

There are two methods for the
scoring and interpretation of HTP:
1.Quantitative scoring and analysis
2.Qualitative analysis and
interpretation
Phase III:
INTERPRETATION OF HTP TEST:

Qualitative analysis and
interpretation:
 This is the most productive for valuable way for diagnosis
and personality assessment
 It involves the evaluation of :
1. Graphic productions form the major stand
points of the details
2. The verbal phase (post drawing interrogation
phase)
3. The total concepts ( graphic and verbal)

Client responses are organized under 8
categories
1) General Observations
2) Proportion
3) Perspective
4) Detailing
5) Nonessential Details
6) Irrelevant Details
7) Line Quality
8) Use of Color

Qualitative scoring criteria based on
four major portions:
A. Detail
B. Proportion
C. Perspective
D. Line quality
E. Tome consumption
F. Color

Details
1. Type and
quantity
2. Presentation
method
3. Detail
sequence
4. emphasis
5. consistency

Details:
A. Type and Quality:
1. Relevant details:
a) Essential:
a) House must have 1 door, window, wall and roof
and chimney
b) Tree must have trunk and at least one branch
c) Person must have head, trunk, two legs and two
arms
d) For facial characteristics : 2 eyes, a nose ears
and mouth
 Absence of even single essential regarded as
serious

Details:
A. Type and Quality:
b) Non essential details:
secondary details that enrich the drawing
 In House: window curtains, furniture, decoration
materials
 For tree : foliage, branch system, bark etc
 For person: neck, hands, feet hair and clothing
Limited use of these details implies good
reality testing and well balanced interaction
with environment

Details: A. Type and Quality:
2. Irrelevant details:
 They are not integral part of the drawing
1. Nearby irrelevant details:
For house: near by pathways, shrubs
For tree: grass, birds perched on branches
For the person: ball, dog on the leach and bicycle etc
2. Distant irrelevant details: sun, moon, clouds,
background mountains, birds etc
Limited use indicated mild insecurity to structure the
situation
Excessive use indicates pathoformic and anxiety
related to that detailing area

Details: A. Type and
Quality:
3. Bizarre details:
Suggests personality disorders
Use by Subjects whose reality testing is
pathologically deficient
Examples:
Human legs supporting house
Eyes, nose and mouth draws upon the sun etc

Details: B. Presentation Method
1. One dimensional
Use by relatively low- grade mental defectives
2. Two dimensional:
Most dull average to average adult
Less imaginative and less flexible adult
3. Full shading:
Quite normal in case if showing wall material, or tree bark
or foliage or persons clothing
4. Partial shading:
Shaded diagonally to show the walls or trunk and bark or
shades of persons dress

Details: B. Presentation Method
 Interpretation guide lines:
 Healthy shading : produces lightly with few random
strokes
Indicates;
high level of intellectual function, high level of sensitivity
in relationships
 Unhealthy shading: unwarranted use of time,
excessive force, inferior control and heavy shading
Indicates:
unfortunate hypersensitivity at worst and crippling

C. Details sequence
House
 Mostly begins with house wall and roof and than
baselines
 Insecure subjects draw two chimneys, two
windows and two doors
 Pathological sequence for house is :door and
windows of ground floor was the last:
implies a distance for inter-
personal contacts and tendency of with drawl

C. Details sequence
Tree
 Normal sequence is : trunk than branches
than stem or the foliage
Pathological sequence:
 two dimensional branches without touching the
trunk
 the branches are not attached with each other
 Branches in vague fashion

C. Details sequence
Person
 Normal sequence is: the head features the
neck trunk the arms with fingers and hands
and than the legs and feet and so on
Pathological sequence
 starts from foot and ends at face
 Delayed presentation of facial characteristics
connote:
A tendency to deny receptors of external
stimuli

C. Details sequence
 If whole drawing does not indicate miss
sequence it will not consider as sign of
pathology or abnormality
 It may be intellectual in-capacity or mental
defectiveness
 It may be due to emotional disturbance or
organic change because all this cause

D. Emphasis:
Positive emphasis:
1. Overtly exhibiting emotion before and after
drawing the detail or combination of detail
Unusual points should be noted:
2. By presenting a detail or combination of details
in the deviant sequential order
3. By exhibiting unusual concern over the
presentation of whole or part of detail by:

 Positive emphasis:
D. Emphasis:
a) By erasing excessively when erasure is
not followed by improvement
b) By returning to some specific detail
again and again after its completion
c) By using excessive time in drawing a
detail or parts of that detail

D. Emphasis:
4. Giving details in bizarre manner ( drawing arms
producing from head) by dull or low intelligent
5. by perseveration ( change or add the shapes in the
drawing or draw beyond the limits)
6. On asking question , give frank or detailed answer
to examiner

D. Emphasis:
7. Using traumatic detailing
 Tree trunk bearing a jagged scar or deep scars
 On detailing they will asked about these scars and they
will hesitate to answer indicate the traumatic
experiences in their life's
 It may regard as incident in early childhood
Negative emphasis
1. By omitting one or more essential details
2. By presenting incompletely a detail or part of detail
3. By commenting evasively, or flattery refusing to

Interpretation of house ( detailing)
A. Relevant details:
House:
• portrays psychological self portrait
• Associations concerning home-life
• Interfamilial relationships.
• Attitude toward their home situation
(children)
• Relationships to parents and

 Peripheral walls and boundaries indicates peripheral
boundaries of personality
 Over emphasis on boundary lines indicate conscious
effort to maintain control
 If first detail is baseline on ground and it is reinforced
implies feeling of insecurity
 Faint peripheral lines show inadequate, feeling of
impending breakdown and weak ego control
 Meticulous detailing indicates obsessive compulsive
tendencies
• Meticulous(extremely accurate way/
excessive care in consideration of details)

 Roof : indicates thinking and fantasy
 Emphasis on eaves
 by reinforcement or extension indicates over
defensive, usually suspicious attitude
 Door or doors is mode of ingress and egress
oFront door is accessibility
oBack and side door egress (escape)
 emphasis on doors facing (locks, hinges) indicative
of defensive sensitivity
 Emphasis on door knob indicates over
consciousness of door function phallic preoccupation

 Windows: provides less modes of interaction than doors
 Multiplicity or window with interstices implies that for
subject the room behind the window is prison
 Many windows without shade or curtains indicates
subject tends to behave bluntly and he will mot mask his
feelings
 Multiplicity with shades or curtain to only specific
windows indicate over concern about interaction with
environment and interrogation is needed by examiner
 Decorated with(curtains, shutters & shades) which
are not shut implies controlled interaction with anxiety &

 General emphasis on windows and doors by
reinforcement indicates over interaction but
suspiciousness
 Emphasis on windows lock: implies over
defensive attitude
 Sexually maladjusted draw windows and doors as
oral vaginal or rectal substitutes
 Easily and non compulsively drawn indicates

 Chimney: quickly, easily and well drawn implies
subjects satisfactory sensual maturity and
balance
 Omission of chimney is not serious
maladjustment
 Over emphasis on chimney as ( size
enhancement, reinforcement, difficulty in
presentation ( excessive erasure), mal

B. irrelevant details:
Generally irrelevant details indicate subject tends to
structure environment more completely connotes the
feeling of in security and inadequacy
 The more the over emphasis on irrelevant details the
more the pathoformicity
( nearby irrelevant details)
A) Mid wall line: horizontally or vertically indicate
undesirable compartmentalization with any
personality
B) Ground line : discussed
C) Walkways: Wide and direct to the door: accessible
personality
D) V. long walkway: lessened personality

 ( nearby irrelevant details)
 Shrubs: (like trees they represents persons in
subjects life) indicate need to erect defensive
barriers, to make contact with others
 Flowers: usually made by schizoid or very small
child
 Shadows: depict conflicting situation produces
anxiety
 Shadow on ground indicates reality on the
conscious area
 Shadow before the sun indicates
subconscious recognition of something
conflicting

Distant details
 Sun: represent the figure of great authority or
emotional valance may be positive or negative in
his environment
 Clouds: indicates generalized anxiety
 mountains: in back ground indicates defensive
attitude and need for dependence (often maternal
dependence)
 Rain or snow:

Interpretation of tree ( detailing)
B. relevant details:
 Branch system:
subject source of seeking satisfaction from
environment
 Absolute symmetry of branches
indicates inability to grant dominance to others
 Detached branches : difficulty in communication
 Broken/ dead branches: traumatic experiences
 Trunk: indicates basic strength ego
oReinforced peripheral lines: continues need
to maintain integrity
oFaint peripheral lines : feeling of impeding

 Bark: indicates well balanced interaction
heavily shaded indicated anxiety
meticulously & pain staking produced indicate
compulsive over concerned with his
relationships
 Vines: vines on the trunk indicates the subjects
feeling:
 He Is loosing or lost control of certain
compelling drives

 Fruits: usually drawn by children and pregrents
 Leaves: cosmetic and functional
Indicate most immediate direct contact with
the environment
Drawn meticulously and pain stakingly :
obsessive compulsive tendencies are present
Nearby
 Ground line: box like having no contact with tree
: reality testing is inadequate
 Arc like ground line elevation at centre
indicates maternal dependence ,
helplessness

Nearby
 Shadow: indicates anxiety and unsatisfying
relationship in past
 Birds and animals: occasionally subject indicate
bird or animals with a person with high positive or
negative valance for him
Example a squirrel head is producing from trunk hole
implies personality problem, unhappy subject or

 Person near tree: rarely done
 Severely disturbed people can draw that any one
is destroying the tree with axe in his hand or tree
is laying down due to that person
 Human face in branch structure indicates strong
negative valance towards that face
 Other trees: pathological draw two dimensional
more trees spontaneously

 A child may draw two and indicate as one his
mother and other his father
 Roots: which taper easily and gently into
ground imply god reality contact
 Talon like roots that seems to clutch the
ground indicate strong paranoid, aggressive

Distant details
 Sun: same interpretation as In the
house
 Distant all irrelevant details will be same
as the house

Interpretation of person ( detailing)
 Head: represent the area of intelligence( control
and fantasy)
 Emphasis on peripheral lines for head: stronger
effort to maintain an acceptable social front
 Emphasis on face implies: conscious effort to
maintain an acceptable social front
 Eyes: ( receptors of visual stimuli)
 Eyes as hollow sockets: ( no eyeball or pupil) :
reluctance to accept stimuli
 Eyes drawn closed: stronger desire to avoid
unpleasant visual stimuli
 Complete omission of eyes: pathological and
visual hallucination

 Nose: ( over emphasis): phallic
preoccupation and castration fear (impotency
fear)
 Ears ( over emphasis): usually indicates
paranoid
Over whelming desire to hear distantly what
others say about them
Under-emphasis: indicates desire to shut
criticism
Omission : possible auditory hallucinations

Schizophrenic
 drew person eyes only ignore other facial
characteristics indicate suspicious watchfulness
 Absence of nose, ears and mouth symbolizes
limited contact with reality
 Absence of mouth: reluctance to communicate

 Chin: muscularity symbol
 Over emphasis indicate need for dominance, often
social more than sexual
 Under emphasis: feeling of impotence, again often
more social than sexual
 Hair: gives expression of virility and virility striving
 Hair on chest of nude male: subjects seems very
expressive
 Heavily shaded hair: anxiety over thinking or fantasy

 Long and un-shaded hair: highly ambivalent
fantasy concerning sexual matters)
(ambivalent :simultaneously contradictory attitude feelings towards a
person or thing
 Beard and mustaches: symbolizes phallic
substitutes
 Neck: area joining the ( head: control area) and the
body ( so called impulse area
 Neck is the coordination area b/w head and body
 Omission of neck: implies conflict between control
and expression of emotion
 omission of chin line: unhappily free flow of body

 Trunk: seat of basic physical needs and drives
Absence : denial of body derives
 Shoulders: expression of subject feeling of basic
strength and power
 Over emphasis of breasts of female(by male
subject):
 Oral eroticism and maternal dependence
 If subject is female: exhibitionism and narcissism

 Arms: tools for attempting to control or make
changes in the environment
 Omission of arms: (if subject is not mentally
defected) indicates:
 strong feeling of inadequacy
 Suicidal tendencies
 Powerful castration fears would be suspected
 Arms look like wings without fingers: drawn by
schizophrenic

Interpretation of person (detailing) (B. relevant details)
 Hands: tools for offensive and defensive action within
the environment
 Omission : high level of feeling of inadequacy
 Heavily shaded hands: (patho-gnomonic sign)
(specifically characteristic of indicative of a
particular disease or condition of masturbatory guilt
 Light shade is not interpreted (its normal)
 Spike like fingers with rudimentary hand or drawn
as protruding from the end of forearm :connote
hostility ( fight)

 Petal like presentation: infantile childish
presentation)
 Fingers enclosed by looping line : suppression
of aggressive impulses
 Drawing fingers at very last in the drawing:
marked reluctance to make immediate and
intimate contact with environment
o Also indicate desire to avoid revealing
feelings of inadequacy
Waistline: coordinator of the power drives (
upper trunk) and sexual drives (lower trunk)
Interpretation of person (detailing) (B. relevant
details)

 Over emphasis (showed by difficulty in drawing a
belt, or by heavily shaded belt): implies strong
conflict between expression and control of sex
drives
 Frank presentations of the genitals: will not
considered abnormal if client is young child
Reason
Drawing carefully outlined genitals of a nude person
is more pathoformic
Than:
drawing a nude full faced without

 Buttocks: ( emphasis by male subject in making male
person): implies homosexual impulses
 Example :a sexually maladjusted male adult draw nude
male, omitted genitals and spend much time in decorating
person with large deeply shaded neck tie : a phallic
substitute
 Legs: implements for locomotion : indicates subjects
view of his autonomy with his environment
 Absence of legs: strong feeling of constriction and
castration feelings

Interpretation of person (detailing) (B. relevant
details)
 Feet ( refined tools for modifying &
controlling locomotion) at times used as
assaultive weapons
Many psychologists believe feet to be phallic
substitutes
 Omission of feet: strong feeling of constriction
 Over detailing of feet: e.g. minute detailing of
shoe laces toe design on shoes : indicates

Interpretation of person (detailing)
B. relevant details)
 Clothing
Certain items of clothing appear t o be specific
implications:
1. Belt: overemphasis indicates sexual
preoccupation
2. Tie: over emphasis connotes phallic
preoccupation and subjects feeling of
impotence
3. Buttons: multiplicity of buttons by average
or higher intelligence suggests regression
( drawn by child indicates strong

Interpretation of person (detailing)
B. relevant details)
Positions
 Person squatting on the ground clad only in lion
cloth:
indicates
 a view of one too busy in contemplating to be
concerned with worldly affairs that are conflicting for him
 Person clad in uncommon fancy dress or military
uniform:
Indicates
 subject has well developed feelings of superiority over
his fellow man
 Or powerful need fore dominance coupled with feelings

(detailing)
B. irrelevant details)
 Some details are irrelevant but they have
to interpret like:
 Cigar, a pipe, a cigarette indicate mild
eroticism
 Cans, swords, axes as weapons indicates
aggressive tendencies

Progress in therapy
 As depression ,manic or schizophrenics getting
therapy will progress their drawings
 For example they would nit give bizarre details

Proportion
Draw whole to
drawing form
Intra whole
consistency

Proportion
A. Draw whole to drawing form
 Evaluation of size of house tree person w.r.t page
 from stand point of average there are two deviation:
1. The whole occupies extremely small available space
Indicates
Feelings of inadequacy, a tendency to withdraw
environment
2. The whole occupies almost all the allotted space, even
chopped out the page margins
Schizophrenics: show there limited interaction with
environment by drawing tiny wholes

Proportion
A. Draw whole to drawing form
 Space constriction ( draw v large whole)
Indicates
 Feeling of great frustration produced by restrictive
environment
 Feeling of hostility
 Desire to react aggressively usually against the environment
 Feeling of great tension and irritability
 When legs or feet are chopped out side the margin of
page:
Indicating feeling of hopelessness immobility
 Represents ego centric
 Huge tree with large house: over compensatory
satisfaction-seeking in action or in fantasy
 Also indicates hypersensitivity

Proportion
B. intra whole
 Identification and interpretation of any unusual size
relationship detail to another detail
HOUSE
 Roof overly large in relation to other details of
house indicates subject devotes much time to fantasy,
presumably seeking satisfaction therein
 Horizontal dimension is more emphasized as
compare to vertical indicates: subject functioning and
efficiently past or future is interfering
 In case vertical in overly emphasized: satisfaction
presumably is sought in fantasy, minimum contact with
reality

Proportion B. intra whole
 Extremely tiny door: Like rat hole portrays
reluctance to contact and inadequacy
 A larger door more than whole but still small
Implies less reluctance
 Very large door: suggests over dependence and
over concerned
 Windows: may varying size without pathoformicity
 Very huge chimney: subject is over concerned
about virility and well developed exhibitionistic

 Disproportionately tiny chimney:
subject feels home situation lacks satisfying
warmth
It may indicates doubts about masculinity or
castration fears
 Walkway very narrow at junctions with
the house and very broad and farthest
from the house:
Connotes
attempt to cloak with the apparent but
superficial friendliness and desire
to remain aloof

 Very slender or tiny trunk and large branch structure
Implies
Precarious personality due to excessive satisfaction seeking
 Small branch structure with much large trunk
Implies
Precarious personality due to inability to satisfy strong basic
needs
 trunk with broad base and slender a short distance
above the base
Implies
Early environment lack of healthful stimulation
 The trunk narrower at base than higher points
Implies
Strongly pathoformic sign, striving beyond the subject strength
Tree

 Well adjusted people of superior intelligence net
draw person with disproportionately large
drawings
 Disproportionately small head: mostly made by
OCD”S
It may represent obsessive expression of desire
to deny to sight of painful thoughts and guilt
feelings
 Disproportionately small eyes: desire to see as
little as possible
 Overly large mouth: oral eroticism and oral
aggressive tendencies
person

 Disproportionately large trunk: presence of many
un satisfies drives that subject feels acutely
 Disproportionately small trunk: denial of body
drives or feeling of inferiority
 tall narrow trunk: carried schizoid connotations
 Shoulder: index of feeling of basic strength or power
physical as well as psychological
 Disproportionally large shoulders: feeling of
strength & over concern about need for strength and
power
 Tiny shoulders: feeling of inferiority
person

 Marked difference b/w right and left side of
body: sexual role confusion specifically and
personality imbalance in general
 Inequality in arms and shoulder size: personality
imbalance
 Overly long arms: implies over ambitious striving
 V. short arms: connote basic feeling of strength for
striving
 Thin arms: portray feeling of weakness
 Disproportionally large hands: imply impulsivity
& ineptitude in more refined aspects of social
intercourse
person

 Disproportionally long legs: connotes strong
striving for autonomy
 Very short legs: imply feeling of constriction
 Disparity in size ( width, length, or both)
between legs implies ambivalence concerning
the striving for autonomy or dependence
 Long feet: need for security & need to
demonstrate virility
 Disproportionally tiny feet: imply constriction
and dependence
person

 It is not expected that all proportional relationships
are consistent
 Marked deviation from average should be
interpreted
 The greater the number of wholes In which
deviant proportional relationship is there.
More Will be more generalized as disturbance
presumed to be
Proportion C. consistency

 Hypertensive, hostile and often
aggressive improve as:
1. The whole becomes smaller
2. Intra whole proportions improve
 As therapy succeeds for subject
exhibited withdrawals or depressive
tendencies:
1. The whole becomes larger
2. Intra whole proportions will be
improved
Proportion Progress in therapy

Perspective
Whole to drawing
from page
relationship
Whole to viewer
relationship
Intra-whole
Transparency
Movement
consistency

Perspective (spatial relationships In
drawings)
 Indicates the ability to grasp
 React successfully to the tough, complex and abstract
aspects of life
 It also measures the insight of the subject

A. Whole to drawing from page relationship
1. horizontal axis
 Left of the midpoint indicates that subject tends to
behave impulsively, and to seek immediate, frank
and emotional satisfaction of his needs and drives
 Right from the mid point subject exhibit stable,
rigidly controlled behavior and willing to delay the
immediate satisfaction of needs and desires
Perspective (spatial relationships In
drawings)

 Vertical axis
Below the average midpoint indicates insecure and
inadequate and depressive feelings
If the whole drawing is below the average it
indicates the constricted personality
Paper margins:
 Paper topping indicates fixation upon thinking and
fantasy as source of satisfaction
 Paper siding indicates insecurity
 Paper siding for tree implies space constriction ,
high sensitivity and aggressive- reactive tendencies
Paper siding of house and person indicates
basic insecurity

Paper chopping: for a part of house indicates the
unpleasant feeling related to that part of house or its
customary occupant
Paper chopping is case of tree indicates desire to
seek fantasy satisfaction and denied reality
Amputation of feet or part of legs indicates helpless
immobility or top of the house indicates pathology
Paper margins:
On whole drawing paper chopped from one
side and paper siding from other side
indicates the feeling of hyper sensitivity
and loss of control

C. Intra-whole
Interpretation of spatial relationship of detail to
detail and detail to whole
House
 Roof the house extended from ground indicates
fantasy usually made by schizophrenics
 Huge chimney unattached to house beside the house
indicate phallic preoccupation and inability to accept
his sexual desires
 Door is v above the baseline of house and not
assessed by the stairs indicates the person is
inaccessible
 The higher the door the more remote the relationships
 A irrelevant tree close the house indicates the string
rejection from parents and great need for affection

C. Intra-whole
Tree
 The greater the flexibility of the tree structure the
greater the ability to attain satisfaction from the
environment
 Branch structure leaning to the left indicates
imbalance in personality in desire to get frank
 Branches leaning towards right indicates fear to
be frank emotional expression with the
environment
 branches reaching towards the sun indicates
need for affection

C. Intra-whole
Person
 Person drawn with its back indicates strong is
pathoformic
( paranoid-schizoid-withdrawal)
 The positions of ears ( extended vertically or
horizontally indicates the suspiciousness of listening)
 Nose is turned up indicates phallic preoccupation
 Neatly rounded shoulders indicates a well balanced
expression of power
 Sharply squared shoulders connote over defensive,
hostile attitudes
 Relaxed arms indicates good adjustment
 Tense arms suggests rigidity
 If legs are drawn tightly together with rigidity and

C. Intra-whole
Person
 If legs are chopped by bottoms edge subjects
feels lack of autonomy
 Feet in Tip-toe state connote tenuous grasp
upon reality or strong need for flight
 Feet opposite in opposite directions indicate
ambivalent feelings

D. Transparency
 Transparencies implies a failure of critical function
 The pathological significance depends upon which part
is transparent and their gravity
In case of house:
 Transparency of walls indicate serious violation of
reality
 Common in mental defectives and disturbed adults
 If chimney is transparent & no depth indicates phallic
denial and feeling of impotence and castration
(impotent or deprive of vitality psychologically
In case of tree:
 Roots showed as ground is transparent indicates
pathology

D. Transparency
In case of person:
 Pathology indicates when heart and lungs and
other internal organs are visible
 But arm seen through a covering sleeve is normal

E. movement
 Motion due to wind or moving person are quite
normal
 Following things should be considered while
interpreting movement
1. The intensity or violation of motion
2. The pleasantness and un pleasantness in the
motion
3. The degree to which the movement is voluntary

E. movement
House
 Walls flying off, walls toping of is expression f
collapse ego as result of extra personal and
intra personal pressures
 Smoke rising straight up from chimney to one
side indicates environmental pressures
 if smoke is moving from page right to left
implies that subject presumed future
pessimistically
 House in motion ( as tilting or collapsing)
indicates psychological pathology

E. movement
Tree
 Tree is bending on one side due to wind
indicates the extreme environmental
pressures
 But he still resists and struggles to maintain
the balance
 Barren Tree is broken and of halfway up from
the ground, tree tip touching the ground
indicates shattered ego
 Falling branches indicates subject is loosing
ability to cope with the environment
person

E. movement
Person
 Movement of person is of pathological
 indicates satisfactorily adjustment
 Person walking easily indicates good adjustment
 Controlled running implies need to achieve
 Epileptic subject draw falling person with seizure

Consistency w.r.t perspective
 Absolute consistency indicates pathology
 A reasonable consistency needed
 But unfortunately reasonable amount is not
objectively defined

D. Line quality
Interpretation

Line
quality
Motor control
force
type
consistency

Line quality
A. Motor control:
 Normal person can draw straight or curved
lines easily
 His lines will free-flowing and controlled
 Impairment in motor control indicate
personality maladjustment and organic
disorder
 But this will interpret according to
occupation

B. Force:
 Heavy black lines in whole drawing indicates
generalized tension
 If heavy lines are only used I specific area it
indicates fixation
(hand indicates the feeling of guilt)
 Heavy peripheral lines indicates that subjects is
striving to maintain ego integrity
 Extremely faint lines feeling of inadequacy by
indecision and fear of defeat
 Faint lines for specific details indicates reluctance
to express some specific feeling related to them
 If lines becomes fainter from house to person
indicated anxiety and depression

C. Type
 Decisive, free flowing and well controlled lines imply
good adjustment
 Curving lines is healthy sign
 Broken and indecisive lines indicates pathoformic
 Rigid straight lines is overt expression of internal
rigidity
D. Consistency
normality:
House need straight lines
Person needs curved lines
Tree needs combination of curved and starlight
Variation from conventional type indicates

E. Time consumption
Interpretation

Time consumption
•Time consumption can
provide a valuable
information

Consumed time vs. quality of
drawing
 Superiority of the drawing will be related to time
 If time is less than 2 minutes and more than 30
min it indicates abnormal factor is interfering
 Schizophrenics can go to both extremes
 Less time :to get rid of unpleasant test
 More time: obvious reluctance to produce
anything
Intense emotional significance
 Manic and OCD patients will also take a lot of
time to produce irrelevant details or all relevant
details

B. Initial latency:
 Anastasi and Foley said that abnormal tended to have
longer initial latency than normal's
 If the subjects delays after 30 seconds of instructions t
indicates conflict, pathoformic and it should be identified
In detailing
C. Intra whole pause
 Cessation of drawing for more than few seconds
 More than 5 seconds will indicate conflict
 The part at which subject stopped will provide clue
 That specific are will be indicate the conflict

D. Comment pause
 In detailing or questioning if subject pauses
it indicate blocking
1. The subject is too concrete for abstract
imagination
2. The subject is over imaginative he has
difficulty in choosing what to share
 Follow up questioning needed
E. Consistency
 The subject has to reasonable consistency
in the drawing

Characteristics of healthy drawing
 Security and self confidence
 There are grounded drawing.
 Place in the centre of the page.
 Potential for movement, not rigid postures.
 Line quality is firm, not sketchy.
 Openness
 Potentially interact with environment postures is
open.
 Stability and order of the drawing.
 Sexual identification
 Sexual identify should be clear either it is male or
female.

Indicators for maladjustment
 Omissions
 Transparency
 Distortion
 Vertical imbalance of stance
 Head simplification
 Body simplification
 Poor overall quality
 Sexual differentiation and elaboration.

Color
choice
Application
conformity
Symbolism
consistency

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