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		Draw-a-Person  and  Bender-Gestalt

			    of Carol P.













	Merle Lenat
	Psychological Testing
	July 15, 1975

IDENTIFYING DATA

The name  of my client  is Carol P.,  a twenty-four year  old married
woman.   She is currently  a Masters degree candidate  in the reading
program here  and  has  been  my  friend for  about  six  years.    I
administered the  Draw A Person test  to her on June  24 around eight
P.M. at her home in the bedroom.  (My husband and her husband were in
the kitchen talking at the time.) A few weeks later on  July 6 I gave
Carol the  Bender Gestalt test again  in her house around  one in the
afternoon in the kitchen. 

CLIENT'S PHYSICAL AND EMOTIONAL APPEARANCE

Carol is in good  physical health.  However  she is not the  outdoors
type and she looks pale.   Her physical energy level is  not all that
high.    She  is  an  intelligent  woman  and,  although  not  at  all
particularly good  looking, she does  the best  (re: dress,  make-up,
etc.) she can with what she has.   She is left handed and uses it all
the time. 

She  was willing to  take these tests  for me as a  favor because she
knew it was an assignment.   She wanted me to do a tape with  her for
her class assignment in return.   She was suspicious and skeptical of
what tests could show even before we started. 

TESTS RESULTS -D.A.P. 

During the  administering  of  the  D.A.P.  Carol  did  not  ask  any
questions at all.  Her attitude was I will do this silly task as fast
as I can to  get it over with.  Hence she completed the first picture
of a girl in sixty seconds and the second picture (the boy)  in ninty
seconds.   She did express two  or three times her  anxiety about not
being  able to draw.   She drew her pictures  from the head downwards
--head, arms,  trunk,  legs, feet.   She  giggled  when she  drew the
female's feet which I think  was her task anxiety coming through.  As
she drew  the male  she laughed  and said,  "This boy  looks like  my
girl." She then added, "This boy looks like a gorrilla."

ANALYSIS OF THE FEMALE PICTURE

Carol's first picture  was that of the  woman.  The thing  that stood
out the most  with me was the very broad shoulders and the suspicious
looking eyes.  The picture does not  look at all like her.  The  mood
of the  picture --  one of  suspiciousness or  cautiousness --looking
around  to see who or what  is out there is  accompanied by a mood of
embarrassment about her body.  Her hands are covering  up part of her
she does not want seen by others (her abdomen). 

The  placement of the  figure is in  the middle  of the page  and the
picture is  quite big.   This  may be  indicative of  a balanced  and
expansive person.  She is looking towards  my right which may suggest
a need to be reality oriented. 

The head, the first thing drawn, is small compared to the rest of the
body.  The emphasis  on the hair -its  fullness and shading --  makes
the head area look bigger than it is.  One could suppose this to mean
that  her "control area" is inadequate for  her impulses and that she
needs support  from  her hair  (which  is a  symbol of  virility  and
strength) to help control her impulses. 

The  treatment of  the eyes  is elaborate  and, as  mentioned before,
looking askance.  One cannot see into her eyes which are the  windows
of the soul.  The eyes are big and  this suggests a need to know what
is  going on  around  her.   Since the  eyes  are stressed  with long
eyelashes I feel that this is one of the most important parts  of her
body. 

The  nose  is  long  and  straight possibly  suggesting  a  need  for
masculine or aggressive striving. 

The mouth is full and does not suggest to me any tenseness.  Possibly
it  indicates  an  oral  personality  with  oral  strivings.  (Carol,
herself, does talk a mile a minute repeating herself often.  She also
loves to eat.)

Her neck is very long and thin and incompletely drawn suggesting that
her control  area is inadequate  and far from  her impulse  area (the
trunk) Her neck  is reinforced by a button-like necklace which is not
choking her.  The button on the necklace reinforces the hypothesis of
a need for oral dependency. 

There is  a suggestion of  a midline  emphasis with the  nose, mouth,
necklace, a v-neck on her shirt being all in one line.  This suggests
a preoccupation with the body and some dependence. 

The ridiculously broad shoulders  and chest of the body  suggest that
the  impulses of  her body  are about  ready to  explode  and totally
dominate her.  This again  suggests the need for better  control from
her  head area.   Carol  did  not draw  breasts  on her  lady  perhaps
suggesting an area of anxiety or conflict.  Perhaps she is saying she
needs more nurturance. 

Her arms and hands are very stiff holding or hiding her stomach area. 
I  hypothesize  that   she  is  anxious  and   embarassed  about  her
reproductive  or genital area.   Also I  get the feeling  that she is
separating her reproductive area from her impulse area.  Her arms are
very short and no elbows  or forearms are drawn.  Her hands look very
stubby and both her hand and  arms look very ineffectual in  carrying
out the commands of the control area. 

The exposed part  of her legs  are short perhaps again  suggesting an
ineffectual  mode  of  transportation  or  mobility  in carrying  out
commands of head.  Her legs are completely shapeless unlike a female'
legs.  Her legs are pretty close to the ground suggesting that she is
down to earth. 

INQUIRY - D.A.P. 

Carol's inquiry was interesting because she described herself mostly. 
She even recognized this to a degree and said that  she would like to
be  like this  fantasy  person in  most  ways.   In  this setting  of
answering questions Carol did need  some structuring.  She would  ask
me, "What do you mean by bad habit?" or "Do you want a number?", etc.
One  other interesting thing about  her inquiry was  that she noticed
that her hands were the worst  part of the drawing and that the  eyes
are the best.   This suggests to  me that perhaps her  hands are very
ineffectual  and her eyes are  the most useful  and effectual part of
the body. 

BENDER GESTALT

For the Bender  which Carol completed  in five minutes she  expressed
more need for  structure.  Examples of this  were questions like "How
many papers should  I use?" or  "Where should I  start?".  Again  she
expressed anxiety about her drawing ability. 

The placement  of design A  in the middle  of the page  suggests that
perhaps she  is the center of her world or needs  to be.  This can be
expressed as a strength; she takes care of herself first. 

The arrangement of all of her  figures shows a good use of space  and
some expansiveness.   She used both sides of the  paper pretty fully.
The  points in  her figures are  fairly sharply  pointed suggesting a
tendency towards aggressiveness or  assertiveness.  This is  true for
figures 3,4,7, and reinforced greatly in 8. 

In figure A the square  is not quite closed as it touches the circle.
Perhaps this  suggests  the  "male"  in  her  life  is  engulfing  or
clutching at her  greatly.  This is a  true fact right now  since her
husband  is being  laid off  from his  job  and is  in need  of great
emotional support especially from her. 

Carol counted the dots on figures 1,2, and 5, suggesting a compulsion
to get the job  done right.  On figure 2 her  mood variability was to
start out low and then raised a little, leveled of, and then raised a
drop more.  All  in all her mood is  pretty steady and if  it changes
the tendency is to swing towards optimism or denial. 

The figure  that is the  biggest is number  6 -the emotional  curve -
which suggests that emotions play a  big role in her life at  present
and perhaps dominate her.   Another possibility is that  she needs to
control all these  big feelings she is having.  The second hypothesis
is  supported  by  the  fact  that  her  bottom  vertical  line  (the
instinctual) is much bigger than the top (the control part). 

The  dependency  figure #7  is  darker  than  some figures  and  this
suggests  that she still needs some  dependency on a strong authority
figure. 

Figure #8 shows  again that she  is the center  of her world and  the
points that are  reinforced here suggests a need  to be aggressive in
order to survive. 

SUMMARY 

Carol shows through her Draw-A-Person and Bender Gestalt that she  is
an aggressive woman  who needs some  more control and support  in her
life against  her exploding impulses.  Perhaps  her aggression is her
way of controlling.  Carol also  shows that she is the center of  her
world and needs to care for herself first.