European Journal of Personality

Eur. J. Pers. 16: 283294 (2002)

Published online 17 June 2002 in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI: 10.1002/per.457
The Defence Mechanism Test (DMT) Revisited:
Experimental Validation Using Threatening
and Non-threatening Pictures
BO EKEHAMMAR
1
*, IRENA ZUBER
2
and
MARGARETA SIMONSSON-SARNECKI
3
1
Uppsala University and Stockholm School of Economics, Sweden
2
The Ofce of Cognitive Psychotherapy, Stockholm, Sweden
3
Stockholm University, Sweden
Abstract
Although the Defence Mechanism Test (DMT) has been in use for almost half a century, it
is still unclear what it actually measures. The psychodynamic theory on which the test is
based states that the threatful DMT pictures activate various defence mechanisms. To test
this proposition, the original DMT pictures were redrawn by a professional artist,
changing the emotional content without altering the structural properties. In this way, a
neutral and a friendly variant were shaped. Sixty participants were randomly assigned to
the threatful, neutral, and friendly stimulus conditions. In contrast to predictions made
from psychodynamic theory, that the threatful picture would activate more signs of
defence than the others, the results disclosed that the three conditions activated the same
amounts of signs of defence and the same levels of various perceptual thresholds. Thus,
rather than capturing psychodynamic defence mechanisms, our results suggest that the
DMT taps perceptual or information-processing difculties in correct identication of
brief stimulus exposures regardless of their emotional contents. Copyright # 2002 John
Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
INTRODUCTION
The Defence Mechanism Test (DMT) is a percept-genetic (cf. Kragh & Smith, 1970) and
projective test based on assumedly anxiety-provoking TAT-like pictures, which are
exposed through a tachistoscope using gradually increasing exposure times ranging from
5 ms (subliminal) to 2000 ms (supraliminal). The probably most often employed DMT
picture (cf. Olff, 1991) depicts in the centre a teenage person (the Hero, in DMT
Received 20 August 2001
Copyright # 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Accepted 2 April 2002
*Correspondence to: Bo Ekehammar, Department of Psychology, Uppsala University, Box 1225, SE-751 42
Uppsala, Sweden. E-mail: bo.ekehammar@psyk.uu.se
Contract/grant Sponsor: Swedish Council for Research in the Humanities and Social Sciences.
Contract/grant Number: F 617/94.
terminology) of the same sex as the person being tested, and in the background an older,
ugly, and threatening person (the Peripheral person or Secondary, in DMT terminology), of
the same sex as the Hero and the person being tested, lurking behind the Hero and being
apparently about to attack him or her. This situation is meant to depict an Oedipal threat
(an angry mother or father), which is supposed to induce different types of precognitive
defensive organization (Kragh, 1962) and activate defence mechanisms characteristic of
the perceiver.
The DMT was originally developed by Kragh (1955) and has since then been employed
for selection, especially in military settings (see e.g. Kragh, 1960; Harsveld, 1991; Stoker,
1982; Stoll & Meier-Civelli, 1991; Torjussen & Vrnes, 1991), and for diagnosis in clinical
contexts as well (see e.g. Armelius, Sundbom, Fransson, & Kullgren, 1990; Bogren &
Bogren, 1999; Rubino, Pezzarossa, & Grasso, 1991; Sundbom, Binzer, & Kullgren, 1999).
The rationale of the DMT as a selection instrument for stressful occupations is the
assumption that the psychological defences bind psychic energy necessary for coping with
stressful situations, and, further, that the defences give rise to perceptual distortions that
make adequate perception in dangerous situations difcult (cf. Kragh, 1985).
Although the DMT has been in use for almost half a century, opinions are still split as to
its reliability as well as construct and predictive validity. For example, Harsveld (1991,
p. 51) concluded that it became clear that the DMT is an extremely unreliable measuring
instrument whereas Cooper (1988, p. 381) stated that the DMT is the most elegant and
best-validated technique that exists for the study of defence mechanisms in normal and
neurotic persons. Further, Kline (1987, 1993) points out that the good predictive validity
gures associated with the DMT, especially in military selection setting (see e.g. Kragh,
1960), do not give any basis for concluding that the test measures those constructs it is
supposed to measure (it works but for wrong reasons). However, some non-Scandinavian
military-selection studies provide no empirical evidence for the DMTs predictive validity
(e.g. Harsveld, 1991; Stoker, 1982; Stoll & Meier-Civelli, 1991). Finally, Olff, Godaert,
Brosschot, Weiss, and Ursin (1990) failed to obtain signicant correlations between DMT
defences and corresponding defences measured by some other methods, which made the
authors suggest, among other things, that DMT might capture only visual defence
strategies and perceptual defences.
In a previous study (Zuber & Ekehammar, 1997) based on a non-clinical sample, we
examined various stimulus factors of the DMT by focusing on (i) when in percept genesis
the DMT defence signs occur (distribution in exposure duration), (ii) which part of the
picture is involved (distribution in location), and (iii) which signs co-occur (using
correlation and factor analyses). The results disclosed that the occurrence of signs of
defence was related to exposure duration (some defences are more frequent at brief,
some others at longer, duration), and to location on the picture. The location of
misperceptions to the central person (Hero) or the Peripheral person (Pp) of the picture was
the major explanatory principle for the distribution of signs of defence on factors. Rather
than capturing psychodynamic defence mechanisms, which is the theoretical basis of the
test, these results imply that DMT primarily tends to measure misperceptions linked to the
stimulus picture and to perceptual and attentional characteristics of the perceiver. Some
critical remarks on this study and its conclusions made by Kragh (1998) have been
responded to by Ekehammar and Zuber (1999).
The results of our previous empirical study (Zuber &Ekehammar, 1997) can be interpreted
as supporting the view (see also Harsveld, 1991) that the perceptual distortions revealed by
the DMT can be looked upon from a more general perception or information-processing
284 B. Ekehammar et al.
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perspective as difculties in correct identication or processing of brief stimulus exposures
regardless of their emotional contents. A rather direct test of this proposition would be to
compare peoples misperceptions of stimuli where the emotional content is systematically
varied. In a DMT context, this could be achieved by constructing pictures which are
structurally similar to the original DMT picture (which is supposed to be threatening and
anxiety evoking) but differ as to emotional content (e.g. non-threatening, neutral), for
example by changing the angry and aggressive expression of the Peripheral person to a
neutral and non-aggressive one. The psychodynamic theory, on which the DMT is based,
would predict that signs of defence (misperceptions, perceptual distortions) would
appear on the threatening but not on the non-threatening picture. Thus, if there is no threat
that evokes anxiety in the picture there is no need for the perceiver to defend him- or
herself against anxiety by using any of the psychodynamic defences. On the other hand,
the perception or information-processing perspective would lead to the prediction that the
number and character of perceptual distortions would be the same regardless of the degree
of threat in the picture.
In fact, two previous studies (Kragh, 1962; Cooper & Kline, 1986) have presented
results where comparisons have been made between perceptual distortions obtained from a
DMT-like picture and distortions obtained when employing a neutral or positive (a
friendly Peripheral person) version of the picture.
Kragh (1962) employed TAT picture No. 1 (a boy with a violin) where a threatening and
ugly male person had been inserted behind the boy. Thus, this picture was not the same as
the ofcial (Kragh, 1985) and probably most often used DMT picture. Moreover, the
number of exposures (12), their durations (20500 ms), and the gradual increase in
exposure duration were not the same as suggested in the DMT manual (Kragh, 1985). One
group of participants were exposed to the threatening picture whereas another group was
exposed to the same picture with the exception that the ugly face had been retouched and
changed into a smiling face (Kragh, 1962, p. 66). Kragh excluded those participants from
the last mentioned group (around 51%) who had perceived the smiling face as threatening
or unsympathetic, which seems to make the nal comparison of groups questionable.
Thus, those participants were excluded from further analyses who, in opposition to
psychoanalytical theory, had misperceived a non-threatening person as threatening. From
a perceptual-distortion hypothesis, this outcome is not unexpected when people under
brief stimulus exposures are forced to assess the emotional character of a stimulus gure.
In any case, the nal analysis disclosed that of the (only) three psychodynamic defences
investigated (repression, isolation, turning against the self ), there were signicant
between-group differences on two. Thus, participants exposed to the threatening version of
the picture expressed more often signs of repression and isolation as compared with those
exposed to the non-threatening variant. However, a closer look at the data reveals that, in
contrast to expectations from psychoanalytical theory, quite a few participants displayed
signs of defence to the non-threatening version as well.
Cooper and Kline (1986) let an artist draw two peripheral persons, one relaxed and
friendly, the other angry and tense. Two Hero gures were prepared, one adapted from the
same TAT picture as in Kraghs (1962) study, the other being a mandolin player. A Hero
and a Peripheral person were then projected simultaneously onto different parts of the
same screen. The authors used a within-persons design, with a threatening and a non-
threatening version presented in a balanced presentation order. Each picture was
presented seven times using exposure duration ranging from 20 to 500 ms. A 2 (threat/
non-threat) 10 (defence category) ANOVA disclosed a statistically signicant effect of
Experimental validation of the DMT 285
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threat with more signs of defence (weighted scores) when the picture was threatening.
The defences of isolation, turning against self, opposite-sex introjection, and projection
were, according to the authors, markedly higher in the threatening condition, whereas
repression, regression, and polymorphous introjection were not. However, the authors
provided no statistical information (means, frequencies, etc) or signicance tests on any of
the ten single defences. It is conceivable that the statistically signicant overall effect of
the threat/non-threat factor might be due to those defences (reaction formation, denial, and
identication with the aggressor) that were coded in the non-threatening condition where
the participants in fact provided completely accurate reports of the pictures.
Thus, from the review above one may conclude that the previous attempts to test the
basic proposition of the DMT through experimental variation of the stimulus picture have
had some shortcomings. In the present experiment we have tried to overcome these
problems and, in contrast to the two previous studies, we have employed the ofcial
(cf. Kragh, 1985) and probably most frequently used (cf. Olff, 1991) DMT picture, which
was described above. Provided the psychodynamic theory behind the DMT is valid, signs
of defence (misperceptions) would appear to a greater extent in responses to the
threatening than to the two non-threatening pictures (neutral, friendly) that we constructed.
Further, perceptual thresholds would be higher in the former case than in the two latter. On
the other hand, if the perception-distortion hypothesis is valid, we predicted that the
number and character of misperceptions as well as the level of perceptual thresholds would
be the same for the three pictures.
METHOD
Participants
Sixty (30 men and 30 women) rst-semester undergraduate psychology students took part
in the study voluntarily and in return for course credits. Their mean age was 27.9 years
with an age range from 19 to 48 years.
Picture construction
A professional artist was given the original DMT picture in a male and a female variant as
described in the introduction. The male variant showed, in the centre, a teen-age boy
sitting behind a table on which is placed a toy cardenoted the Instrument in DMT
terminologyand, in the background to the right, a middle-aged, angry, and ugly male
peripheral person apparently about to attack him. The female variant showed, in the centre,
a teen-age girl sitting behind a table on which is placed a plate with a fried eggthe
Instrumentand, in the background to the right, a middle-aged, angry, and ugly female
peripheral person being apparently about to attack her. The artist was instructed to draw
two new pictures for each variant, one with a peripheral person having a neutral (instead of
angry) facial expression, and one with a peripheral person having a smiling and friendly
facial expression. All other parts of the pictures were untouched so the structural
properties were the same as in the original pictures. After some trials, we approved four
drawings that satised the instructions given to the artist. Finally, in order not to let artistic
style affect the comparison between the original and new pictures, the original (threatful)
pictures were also redrawn in the same style as the new pictures, with the structural
properties the same as in the original.
286 B. Ekehammar et al.
Copyright #2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Eur. J. Pers. 16: 283294 (2002)
Design
The 30 female participants were randomly assigned to the three stimulus conditions
(threatful, neutral, and friendly, respectively), with ten women in each condition. The same
procedure was applied for the 30 men. Thus, there were 20 participants (ten men and ten
women) in each of the three conditions. However, two female participants (in the friendly-
picture condition) reported after the test session that they had taken the DMTon a previous
occasion, and their data were thus excluded from further analyses.
Procedure
One picture (either a threatful, neutral, or friendly) was administered to each participant
individually and in accord with the DMT manual (Kragh, 1985), employing two
psychologists trained in the method. Each participant was randomly assigned to one of the
two psychologists. The test procedure took on the average around 30 min to complete. The
DMT protocols were coded and scored blindly by another psychologist trained in DMT
scoring.
The pictures were exposed 12 times without masking for each participant using a
tachistoscope especially constructed for DMT use (see Kragh, 1985). The exposure
duration was 5, 10, 17, 30, 55, 95, 165, 290, 500, 870, 1500, and 2000 ms, respectively.
Thus, the number of exposures deviated from the 22 exposures suggested in the DMT
manual (Kragh, 1985) but was the same as in the Kragh (1962) and Cooper and Kline
(1986) studies. However, in contrast to their studies, the exposure duration was gradually
increased in our study in line with the DMT manual (Kragh, 1985).
The instruction told the participants to try to verbalize and to make a drawing of what
they had perceived after each exposure of the picture. The participants were asked, from
the rst time they reported that a person was perceived in the picture, to report the persons
sex, make an estimate of the persons age, and judge the persons mood (sympathetic,
neutral, or unsympathetic).
Variables
Ten different defence mechanisms were coded in accord with the DMT manual (Kragh,
1985, p. IV:3) on the basis of participants verbal responses and drawings:
(i) repression (e.g. the stimulus persons have a quality of rigidity and inanimateness),
(ii) isolation (e.g. hero and pp are separated from each other in the eld; parts of the
conguration are excluded),
(iii) denial (existence of threat is denied explicitly),
(iv) reaction formation (the threat is turned into its opposite, positive relation between
hero and pp),
(v) identication with the aggressor (hero is the threatening person),
(vi) introaggression (turning against the self, e.g. hero is sad, hurt, or worthless),
(vii) introjection of opposite sex (incorrect sex of hero/pp),
(viii) introjection of another object (incorrect age of hero/pp),
(ix) projection (successive changes of hero before pp has become threatening), and
(x) regression (the structure breaks down to a structure of an earlier phase level).
Two score variants, unweighted and weighted, were then computed for each defence
category. The unweighted score was simply the sum of all coded signs of defence for that
Experimental validation of the DMT 287
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category (cf. Kragh, 1985; Olff, 1991). The weighted score was a weighted sum of all
coded signs of defence, with a weight of 1 assigned if the sign was observed early in the
series (at short exposure times), a weight of 2 if it occurred in the middle of the series, and
a weight of 3 if it occurred late (at long exposure times). The logic behind this weighting
procedure is that misperceptions observed at longer exposure times imply more rigid
psychological defences, and thus more severe psychological problems, than mispercep-
tions coded at shorter exposures. In the present case, we followed Kraghs (1985)
suggestion and divided each participants P-phase responses (i.e. when a percept had been
established) into an early, a medium, and a late level, with an (as close as possible) equal
number of exposures within each level. The three levels were then given the weights 1, 2,
and 3, respectively (see also Olff, 1991).
RESULTS
As a check of the experimental manipulation of the picture, we followed a procedure in
line with that suggested by Kragh (1962). Thus, based on the last and longest
exposure duration (2000 ms), we made a blind classication of the content of participants
responses as to the affective valence of the total picture and/or the peripheral person. In
this way, a positivitynegativity (gladthreatful) scale was formed with the scale steps
dened as follows: 1glad, friendly, 2pleasant, good, positive, 3neutral, everyday,
expectant, 4contradictory, 5serious, cheerless, sad, 6unpleasant, angry, awful, and
7threatful. The classication was made independently by a senior and a junior
researcher and the interjudge reliability expressed as a Pearson correlation coefcient was
found to be 0.91, which was regarded as quite satisfactory. Based on the senior judges
scoring, the mean on this scale was found to be 2.50 (SD1.15) for the friendly, 3.40
(SD1.31) for the neutral, and 4.80 (SD1.64) for the threatful version of the picture.
Thus, the rank order of the pictures was as expected, and a one-way between-subjects
ANOVA disclosed that the differences were highly signicant as well, F(2, 55) 13.27,
p 0.0000. A chi-square analysis of the Condition Category contingency table
sustained the ANOVA results,
2
(12) 38.22, p 0.0001. Further, the contingency table
showed that only one participant perceived the threatful picture as predominantly positive
(categories 1 and 2) whereas none of the participants perceived the friendly picture as
predominantly negative (categories 6 and 7). Thus, our conclusion from these analyses was
that the experimental manipulation of the picture had been successful.
Table 1 presents the outcome of the main analyses by showing the mean unweighted and
weighted scores, computed as described above, for each stimulus condition (threatful,
neutral, friendly) and type of defence. A one-way between-subjects ANOVA was carried
out on seven of the ten defence categories. As noted by Cooper and Kline (1986), coding of
signs of defence is not relevant for three of the present defence categories when using
non-threatening pictures. Thus, when there is no threat in the picture, the defences of
denial (the threat is denied explicitly), reaction formation (the threat is turned into a
positive relation between the two persons in the picture), and identication with the
aggressor (the non-aggressive person in the picture is perceived as the aggressor) lose their
meaning. Consequently, no statistical comparisons between conditions were made for
these three defence categories, and in two of them (denial, identication with the
aggressor) there were no signs of defence in any case. As shown in Table 1, there were no
signicant differences between the scores in the three conditions for any of the single
288 B. Ekehammar et al.
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defence categories or for the total number (across all relevant defence categories) of signs
of defence. This conclusion is valid for unweighted as well as weighted defence scores. In
fact, the results were far from statistical signicance, and in only one of the comparisons
did the magnitude of F exceed 1.0. In addition to the ANOVA, a chi-square analysis was
carried out on the condition number-of-signs contingency tables for the relevant defence
categories. The results of these analyses supported those above and yielded no signicant
differences between the three conditions for any of the defence categories (repression,

2
(6) 4.52, p 0.61; isolation,
2
(4) 3.21, p 0.52; introaggression,
2
(6) 8.42,
p 0.21; introjection of opposite sex,
2
(16) 16.49, p 0.42; introjection of another
object,
2
(22) 20.25, p 0.57; projection,
2
(2) 1.93, p 0.38; regression,
2
(2)
1.93, p 0.38).
Table 2 presents a comparison between conditions for various perceptual thresholds that
are regarded important in the DMT (see e.g. Kragh, 1985). If the reasoning behind the
DMT is valid, it seems reasonable to predict that a heightened perceptual threshold would
characterize the threatful stimulus condition as compared with the neutral and friendly
ones. As shown in Table 2, there was no signicant difference in any of the thresholds that
were meaningful to compare. Thus, the thresholds for Percept (P
1
the rst time a
meaningful percept was reported), Hero (H
1
the rst time the hero was perceived), and
Peripheral person (PP
1
the rst time the peripheral person was perceived) were not
signicantly different in the three stimulus conditions. Further, the proportion of
participants who gave a correct description of the main characteristics of the picture at the
Table 1. Mean unweighted (u) and weighted (w) scores (SDs in parentheses) on the DMT defence
categories as a function of stimulus condition, and F-ratios and p-values for the effect of condition
Defence Score Threatful Neutral Friendly F p
(n 20) (n 20) (n 18)
1. Repression u 0.45 (0.69) 0.45 (0.83) 0.17 (0.38) 1.12 0.33
w 0.55 (1.00) 0.45 (0.83) 0.22 (0.55) 0.79 0.46
2. Isolation u 0.15 (0.49) 0.10 (0.31) 0.17 (0.38) 0.15 0.87
w 0.20 (0.70) 0.15 (0.49) 0.28 (0.67) 0.20 0.82
3. Denial u 0.00 (0.00) 0.00 (0.00) 0.00 (0.00) not relevant
w 0.00 (0.00) 0.00 (0.00) 0.00 (0.00) not relevant
4. Reaction formation u 1.35 (1.09) 0.65 (0.81) 1.67 (2.06) not relevant
w 2.60 (2.42) 1.60 (2.16) 4.28 (5.21) not relevant
5. Identication with u 0.00 (0.00) 0.00 (0.00) 0.00 (0.00) not relevant
the aggressor w 0.00 (0.00) 0.00 (0.00) 0.00 (0.00) not relevant
6. Introaggression u 0.20 (0.52) 0.40 (0.68) 0.17 (0.17) 0.76 0.47
w 0.55 (1.39) 1.05 (1.84) 0.33 (1.41) 1.05 0.36
7. Introjection of u 3.45 (2.80) 2.40 (2.35) 3.22 (3.14) 0.79 0.46
opposite sex w 6.75 (5.60) 4.85 (5.30) 7.11 (6.96) 0.81 0.45
8. Introjection of u 2.50 (3.07) 2.95 (3.12) 3.28 (3.53) 0.28 0.76
another object w 4.55 (6.35) 5.75 (6.50) 7.33 (8.33) 0.74 0.48
9. Projection u 0.00 (0.00) 0.05 (0.22) 0.00 (0.00) 0.95 0.39
w 0.00 (0.00) 0.15 (0.67) 0.00 (0.00) 0.95 0.39
10. Regression u 0.00 (0.00) 0.05 (0.22) 0.00 (0.00) 0.95 0.39
w 0.00 (0.00) 0.05 (0.22) 0.00 (0.00) 0.95 0.39
Total u 6.75 (4.67) 6.40 (4.59) 7.00 (5.56) 0.07 0.93
w 12.60 (9.50) 12.45 (8.89) 15.28 (12.09) 0.45 0.64
Comparisons between conditions on defences Nos 3, 4, and 5 are not relevant for reasons explained in the text.
The total score (Total) is computed after omission of the non-relevant defences.
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last (2000 ms) exposure was 0.32, 0.21, and 0.28 in the threatful, neutral, and friendly
condition, respectively. These differences were statistically nonsignicant as well,
F (2, 53) 0.26, p 0.77.
DISCUSSION
We tested the proposition that, provided the psychodynamic theory behind the DMT was
valid, signs of defence or misperceptions would appear to a greater extent in responses to
the threatening than to the neutral and friendly variants of the picture, and further, that
perceptual thresholds would be higher in the former case than in the two latter. On the
other hand, if our proposed perception-distortion hypothesis were valid, we expected the
number and character of misperceptions as well as the level of perceptual thresholds to be
the same for the three variants of the picture. Employing parametric and non-parametric
statistical tests, we found that all tested between-picture effects were far from statistical
signicance. Thus, we failed to reject our perception-distortion hypothesis. Evidently,
this situation leads to a discussion of the power of the statistical tests. Unfortunately, a
more sophisticated examination of this issue is not easy to carry out because a power
analysis requires a specication of an alternative hypothesis and an estimation of the effect
size. The two previous studies of a similar character (Kragh, 1962; Cooper & Kline, 1986)
did not actually employ the ofcial DMT picture (Kragh, 1985), tested other DMT
variables than those employed in this study, or did not provide necessary statistical
information for the present DMT variables to permit a meaningful comparison.
Consequently, an appropriate specication of the effect size and a satisfactory estimation
of power seems difcult. In this case, one could use Cohens (1988) guidelines and equate
a small, medium, and large effect size with 0.20, 0.50, and 0.80, respectively. Looking at
Kraghs (1962) data, one might guess that the threatfulnonthreatful picture effect is large
because in that study, which was based on a large sample (N113 60), a comparatively
low percentage (023%) of participants displayed DMT defences in the non-threatful
condition whereas a comparatively large percentage (2665%) displayed the same
defences in response to the threatening picture. Assuming, thus, that the effect size here is
large, and that we focus on the comparison of the threatful (M
1
) versus the non-threatful
(M
2
) pictures using a directed hypothesis (i.e. M
1
>M
2
) with an alpha 0.05, the power
would be 0.88 (Cohen, 1988, pp. 30, 42), which is quite satisfactory. Evidently, assuming
smaller effect sizes will lead to lower power estimates, decreasing from 0.88 to 0.54 when
the effect size moves from large to medium.
Some previous research on the DMT has also questioned the proposition that perceptual
distortions in the test are reections of defence mechanisms in a psychoanalytical sense
Table 2. Mean perceptual thresholds in ms (SDs in parentheses) as a function of stimulus condition,
and F-ratios and p-values for the effect of condition
Threshold Threatful Neutral Friendly F p
(n 20) (n 20) (n 18)
Percept (P
1
) 24 (16) 23 (14) 26 (21) 0.09 0.91
Hero (H
1
) 25 (14) 42 (68) 29 (27) 0.79 0.46
Peripheral person (PP
1
) 52 (69) 41 (42) 39 (33) 0.36 0.70
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(e.g. Cooper & Kline, 1989; Eriksen, Nordby, Olff, & Ursin, 2000; Eriksen, Olff, Mann,
Sterman, & Ursin, 1996; Kline, 1993; Stoll & Meier-Civelli, 1991; Zuber & Ekehammar,
1997). As empirical evidence, Cooper and Kline (1989) disclosed that a DMT which was
objectively scored (i.e. on the basis of naturally occurring response categories) was a
successful predictor of trainee pilots performance. Based on Q-factor analysis, the authors
labelled the major factor general defensiveness, because those scoring high on this factor
reported only a few details about the persons in the picture. Further, no response category
dealing with perception of threatening details in the picture loaded on the factor, and
nally, the factor correlated signicantly with an independent measure of perceptual
defence but not with the traditional DMT defences (Cooper & Kline, 1989).
In a similar way, our previous study (Zuber & Ekehammar, 1997) disclosed that the
location in the DMT picture, rather than similarity according to some known criteria of
psychodynamic theory, was the major explanatory principle for the distribution of
perceptual distortions (signs of defence) on factors. Thus, the rst factor in our factor
analysis was denoted perceptual defence and was dened by late perception of threat (i.e.
high perceptual threshold for threat) and, in addition, variables linked to misperceptions of
the Hero. A striking similarity between the results of our previous and Cooper and Klines
study is the appearance of late perception, including late perception of threat, as a major
source of variance in the DMT. At the same time, the original DMT defences did not seem
to contribute in a predicted and systematic way to the results. These outcomes taken
together indicate that perceptual distortions in the DMT are not mainly due to
psychodynamic defence mechanisms as maintained by Kragh (1998, 2001), for example.
The results of the present study also sustain the view that the DMT signs of defence are
perceptual distortions that cannot be understood as reecting psychodynamic defence
mechanisms. Thus, our results showed that amount of perceptual distortions, and levels of
perceptual thresholds, were the same regardless of the pictures emotional content and
threatfulness. The friendly and neutral pictures, having no anxiety-evoking elements, gave
rise to the same type of perceptual distortions (signs of defence) as the threatful, and
assumedly anxiety-evoking, original DMT picture. This outcome could hardly be
explained from the view of psychoanalytical theory on which the DMT is grounded.
Instead, and in accord with the previous results discussed above, the results imply
that individual differences observed in the DMTare not linked to the threatful and anxiety-
evoking elements in the pictures but are of a more general character that has to do with late
perception, that is, whether the person is quick or slow in his or her perceptual ability
or visual information processing. Some recent evidence supporting this view can be
found in two neuropsychological studies (Eriksen et al., 1996, 2000) where peoples
DMT scores have been related to their brain activation as measured by electroencephalo-
gram (EEG).
Thus, Eriksen et al. (1996) found that participants with high DMT scores disclosed
higher cortical arousal during the rst two seconds following a DMT exposure than those
with low DMT scores. Further, these differences in stimulus processing appeared to be
independent of the psychological content of the pictures, which made the authors suggest
that it was the novelty rather than the threatfulness of the stimulus that caused the
differences in cortical arousal. The differences seemed, according to Eriksen et al. (1996),
to be related to the general orienting response (OR), which operates regardless of the
content of the stimulus. In a follow-up study also based on EEG recordings (Eriksen et al.,
2000), the authors compared DMT low- and high-scorers on event-related potentials
(ERPs) obtained from processing of neutral stimuli (sine-wave tones with different
Experimental validation of the DMT 291
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pitches). The results disclosed that those with high DMT scores showed less ability to
perceive the environment correctly immediately after a sudden event, [and t]hey seem to
rely more on later associative mechanisms for the nal perception of the stimulus
(Eriksen et al., 2000, p. 266). The authors nal conclusion from this study read:
The differences between the two groups, classied as having high or low
psychological defense, occurred to simple tones, rather than complex and threatening
visual material, as in the Kragh tests. This suggests that the two groups differ in basic
neurophysiological mechanisms connected with the way these subjects orient to new
stimuli (Eriksen et al., 2000, p. 267).
Thus, compared with other projective techniques, such as the Rorschach and TAT, the
DMT seems to tap general information-processing and perceptual factors reecting basic
neurophysiological mechanisms. This might be an advantage when it, for example,
comes to selecting people who in their professions must be able to perceive quickly
complex, visual stimuli (like drivers, pilots, divers). It might be a disadvantage, however,
when it comes to drawing conclusions about peoples personalities (Zuber & Ekehammar,
1997, p. 93). Further, if there is a basic difference between the DMT and other methods
aimed at measuring defence mechanisms, one would not expect to nd a relationship
between DMT defence scores and other defence (or coping) measures. We examine this
issue in a study in progress (Ekehammar, Zuber, & Konstenius, unpublished manuscript),
which is primarily focused on the construct validity of the DMT.
As a nal theoretical conclusion, it must be emphasized that the results of the present
study do not contradict the existence of unconscious psychological processes in general.
However, in line with the view of Kihlstrom (1999) and others, our results suggest that the
study of unconscious processes using subliminal and other techniques do not support
psychoanalytical theory. In a review of experimental studies on the psychological
unconscious, Kihlstrom (1999, p. 435) concluded that
None of the experiments reviewed involve sexual or aggressive contents, none of their
results imply defensive acts of repression, and none of their results support
hermeneutic methods of interpreting manifest contents in terms of latent contents. To
say that this body of research supports psychoanalytic theory is to make what the
philosopher Gilbert Ryle called a category mistake.
As a nal methodological conclusion from the present study, we suggest that in order to
measure efciently what the DMT in fact seems to tap (i.e. perceptual factors reecting
basic neurophysiological mechanisms) the test could protably be substituted by a
procedure where various (not necessarily one or two) pictures (not necessarily anxiety
evoking or TAT-like) are presented briey (not necessarily during 5 to 2000 ms) a couple
of times (not necessarily 22), after which peoples perceptual distortions are evaluated
according to some simple scoring scheme (not necessarily based on psychoanalytical
defence theory).
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The study was supported by a grant (F 617/94) to Bo Ekehammar from the Swedish
Council for Research in the Humanities and Social Sciences. The authors are obliged to
Jeanette Wennergren and Sophia Marongiu Ivarsson for administrating the DMT, to Nazar
292 B. Ekehammar et al.
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Akrami for judging the DMT protocols in the manipulation check, and to three anonymous
reviewers for valuable comments on a previous draft of the paper.
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