Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t8hqh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T09:13:18.810Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Recognition of Psychopathology on the Repertory Grid

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

Anthony Ryle  and
Dana Breen
Anthony Ryle
Affiliation:
University of Sussex Health Service, Falmer, Brighton
Dana Breen
Affiliation:
University of Sussex Health Service, Falmer, Brighton
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Repertory grid testing (Kelly, 1955; Slater, 1965) of psychiatric patients, using people of significance in the patient's life as elements and eliciting the patient's own constructs has been employed in the clinical setting to demonstrate aspects of psychopathology (Ryle, 1967; Ryle, 1969), to measure change with treatment (Ryle and Lunghi, 1969; Rowe, 1971a) and to assess how far a therapist could predict a patient's responses (Rowe, 1971b). However, no systematic examination has been reported so far into the characteristic features of the construct systems of neurotic as opposed to normal subjects, although some apparent equivalences between grid features and psychological or psychopathological formulations such as identification or splitting have been described. While repertory grid testing remains an essentially ideographic exercise, it is important to identify features characteristic of neurosis if the method is to have more than a descriptive function in the investigation of patients. As a contribution to this we have tested with an identical method a series of students consulting with neurotic problems and a control sample of new students tested on arrival at the University.

Type
Research Article
Information
The British Journal of Psychiatry , Volume 119 , Issue 550 , September 1971 , pp. 319 - 321
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1971 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Kelly, G. A. (1955). The psychology of personal constructs. New York: Norton.Google Scholar
Rowe, D. (1971a). ‘Changes in the construct system with the cessation of transvestite activities following aversion therapy.’ Unpublished.Google Scholar
Rowe, D. (1971b). ‘An examination of a psychiatrist's predictions of a patient's constructs.’ Brit. J. Psychiat., 118, 231–4.Google Scholar
Ryle, A. (1967). ‘A repertory grid study of the meaning and consequences of a suicidal act.’ Brit. J. Psychiat., 113, 1393–1403.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ryle, A. (1969). Student Casualties. Allen Lane, The Penguin Press. London.Google Scholar
Ryle, A. and Lunghi, M. E. (1969). ‘The measurement of relevant change after psychotherapy: use of repertory grid testing.’ Brit. J. Psychiat., 115, 1297–1304.Google Scholar
Slater, P. (1965). ‘The use of the repertory grid technique in the individual case.’ Brit. J. Psychiat., 111, 965–75.Google Scholar
Submit a response

eLetters

No eLetters have been published for this article.