Please Draw a Picture of a House, A Tree and a Person
In the movies a “shrink” presents his patient with a series of “Ink Blots” on 8x11 cards and asks, “Tell me what you see”. This is known as a Rorschach test. At first glance this may not seem much different from looking at clouds and describing the shapes and forms you see passing by; only the clouds are constantly changing and cannot be controlled.
The Rorschach test belongs to a family of tests called “Projectives”. The name refers to the projection of one’s own personality traits into a task or stimulus. The test presents an ambiguous task or stimulus, such as selected inkblots, that is responded to by the individual. The task or stimulus and the directions given are standardized. Then 1000’s of individual responses are subjected to statistical analyses that allow the clinician to give valid interpretations of an individual person’s response within a .05 to a .01 level of confidence. In other words your response to such a test may be interpreted accurately 95 to 99 times out of 100.
An expensive example of such a test would be to give an individual $1000 with directions to shop a minimum of 10 different stores looking for a watch for themselves. The watch the individual buys would, to some degree, say something about him or her. In other words, the person would project some of his or her personality in to the choice.
Another way to look at personality within an individual’s choices would be to ask a person to take three sheets of paper and to draw a picture of a house on one sheet, to draw a picture of a tree on another sheet, and to draw a picture of a person on the third sheet. This test is known as “The House, Tree, Person” or the “HTP”. If you ever meet a psychologist, therapist, or counselor who went to graduate school at Central State University, now the University of Central Oklahoma, who is skilled in this test and other projective tests, it is very likely that Dr. Al McCormick taught those students psychodiagnostics. Dr McCormick is one of those individuals who can look at data from a few tests and tell your whole life story.
Dr. Mac, as we refer to him at Edmond Family Counseling, is a colorful character to say the least. The fact that he ran off at the age of 17, lying about his age in order to join the Flying Tigers, “Black Angels” Squadron of the CACW, was just the beginning of many adventures. Mac served in WWII and during the Korean War. He holds the Distinguished Flying Cross, the Purple Heart, the Air Medal, the Asiatic-Pacific ribbon with three major battle stars, a National Chinese Air Force Medal, and two Presidential Unit Awards. During his professional life, Dr. McCormick has taught at Central State University, Oklahoma State University, and Tulsa University. Mac also taught psychopathology to the Oklahoma Highway Patrol and developed the MMPI profile for hiring patrolmen in Oklahoma. Mac’s latest “claim to fame” was in serving, at age 82, for three months on the USS O’Kane, a destroyer, in the Persian Gulf. He was teaching freshman psychology while onboard the O’Kane.
I am one of many therapists trained by Dr. Mac and would like to take this opportunity to invite any and all therapists who know Dr. Mac to join the staff of Edmond Family Counseling in celebrating and honoring this unique individual on Friday, May 1st. Please contact Edmond Family Counseling at 341-3554 for further information on the celebration for Dr. Al McCormick.
