Dr Manju Antil (Counselling Psychologist and Psychotherapist)

It can be observed that like all of the famous psychological tests, the RIT has also been changed and modified most over time since its proposition. After the death of Rorschach, there was no one designated by Rorschach organizing, developing, and advancing the original system, so many approaches emerged about the use of inkblots referred to as 'systems.' In the USA alone by the late 1960 five distinguished systems emerged, each of which yielded some changes in the use of original RIT. A brief description of the five systems is as under:

1. Marguerite Hertz System: Beck introduced Rorschach inkblot techniques to Hertz (1936), and she became interested and engaged herself in the development of a new system. She mainly worked on locations and composition of personality (Exner, 2003; Groth-Marnat, 2006). She prepared a detailed frequency table to score form quality and emphasized other factors such as personal history, involuntary judgment, and empirical data.

2. Klopfer System: Klopfer and Colleagues (1954, 1956) made significant contributions in Rorschachiana tradition of assessment and developed their own system that was widely used, and it encouraged to research and discussion in the field of projective assessment (Shadeland, 1986). Klopfer being Jung's follower began conducting a seminar on Rorschach and identified two main areas of discussion in the scoring process. One was about the location (how common or unusual area of blot used) and the other about shades (Exner, 1993). So this system primarily introduced new scoring of location and shading. Also, some rules for the administration of the test were set (Howard, 1989). Outline of Klopfer and colleagues’ system (1954, 1956) is under:

Location Scoring: It includes the scoring of W (Complete Response, for the area being used more than 2/3rd the total blot), D ( Usual large detail in response), d (Usual small details), Dd (Special category, i.e., tiny detail), edge details (De), inside details (DC), rare details (dr), White space response, and confabulatory whole response (DW).

Determinant Scoring: This system obtained four determinant scores; (1) Form- adequate form (F), poor form (F-), Superior form (F+), (2) Movement scores are obtained in terms of projection of human or animal action, movement of natural forces, inanimate forces, mechanical forces and sense of life. This category includes human movement (M), Animal movement (FM), Inanimate movements combined with shape (Fm, & mF), and inanimate movement without form (m).

Shading: This category includes responses indicating the use of black, grey, and white shades of the blot in creating the percepts to the inkblots in terms of surface, texture, depth, distance, and diffusion .storable sub-categories here are surface and texture response without form (C), vista (FK), diffusion without form (K), representative distance response combined with form (Fk, Kf) and representative distance without form (k), Form texture (Fe), Texture form (cF), and pure texture (c).

Color: Color s scores are assigned to the responses based on the color alone and or combined with form characteristics of the selected area in creating percept. Color responses are differentiated into chromatic (using Red, Green, Brown, and bright color s alone or combined with a form) and achromatic (black, grey, white, alone, or combined with form characteristics of blot area used). Color scores include chromatic Color combined with a form (FC, CF), chromatic color without form (c-), an arbitrary combination of chromatic Color with form (F/c, C/f), achromatic color combined with a form (FC', C'F') and achromatic without form (c').

Content Scoring: Klopfer's concept of content is almost identical to that of the beck, yet some of the symbols are different. This category includes a Whole or almost the Whole Human Figure (H) Human figures portrayed in drawings, sculpture and mythological (H), part living human body-HD; human parts as false teeth- Hobj; anatomy-At; Sex (sx), whole or almost Whole Animal Figure (A) Mythological Animal (a) Animal Deprived Of Reality (Ad) object derived from the body of the animal (A obj), Animal Anatomy (At), food (N), geographical concept (Geo), plant (PL) human-made objects (obj), architecture (act), art (art) and abstract (abs).

Popular and Original Response: It includes popular response (P), achromatic percept with vague form (CF'), and original (O). Obtained responses are subjected to form level rating on a scale ranging from -2 through + 5 in terms of criteria suggested

3. David Rapaport System: Rapaport, Gill, and Schafer (1946) developed their system different from the rest of the four emphasizing the importance of content, verbalizations, interactions between examiner and examinee then of a specific variable. Because of these properties, this system appears to be most psychoanalytically oriented (Howard, 1989). This system was basically oriented to propose a model to analyze the ego functioning, and hence Schafer (1954) added a psychoanalytic interpretation in Rorschach testing (Exner, 1993).

4.   Zygmunt Piotrowski System: Piotrowski (1957) developed a different system advocating the understanding of global personality rather than specific disposition. He published his interpretation of Rorschach in Percept Analysis emphasizing the importance of perception. He modified the scoring and interpretation of movement responses, particularly the inanimate movement. He differentiated between active and passive moments (Howard, 1989).

5.   Beck's system: beck (1944) is credited for carrying out a systematic investigation of the Rorschach test firstly after the demise of Rorschach (Exner, 1993). His contributions are considered more favourable as compared to the rest of the four systems. This system overlaps with other systems in some regard but also original in some ways. Beck emphasized each response's description and scoring in terms of its characteristics of what, where, and why. Each response is scored in terms of the following categories. (Beck et al., 1961)

Location: The subject can respond to whole inkblot (W), identifiable details (D), and rare details (Dd). Besides, the subject, when perceived the percept, white space (S). White space scoring is done in combination with different locations score (Ws, Ds, and Dds).

Determinants: The determinants are scored in terms of the inkblot characteristics, subjects used to see percept. Important determinants in Beck System Form (F). The form can be good (F+), Poor (F-), and undetermined.

Movement: Movement (M) represent the report of movement in human or non-human precepts. The movement can be scored for both active and passive movements

Color (Chromatic): Include pure color response, color form, and form color

Shading: (variation in light). This category includes the flat grey response, flat grey with vague form, flat grey response with a specific form, Vista response ( variation in shading), vista responses with Vogue form, Form Vista response ( bridge, etc.), texture response, pure texture response (fuzziness, softness, etc.), texture form responses, and form texture response.

Content: In this, associational contents are ascertained. Beck's system consists of the following content categories- whole human, human detail, animal, animal detail, anatomy, abstractions, religion, rural, architecture, art, geography, mythology, implemental, tool's, personal, recreational, moods, alphabet, antiquity, death', fire, food, music, household, nature, landscape, botany, clothing, clouds, science, sex, travel, astronomy, anthropology, emotion, minerals and vocational.

Popular Response: Popular response here is determined statistically, i.e., if a response is similarly given by more than 75% of subjects.

The Z- Score-Organizational Activity: The Z- score is obtained when the subject combines two or more percepts and an organized meaning is inferred from this combination.

Exner's Comprehensive System (CS): Even after the untimely demise of Rorschach in 1922, the Rorschach Test could not gain popularity and deserving status in the field of Psychological assessment for the coming 20 years. There was no designated successor of Rorschach who could take charge of the development and advancement of RIT, so various scholars of different academic backgrounds proposed many systems. In the USA alone, five different systems emerged by the 1960s. This state of affairs created volume and disorganization in the clinical and research literature. In response to this problem, Exner (1974) proposed and published the 1st edition of his famous comprehensive system (CS).