S74: Neurotic Screen Test (A Pretest)

The study included: two groups of normals; one a group of new recruits who had been in training 10 days and the other a group of trainees who had been training 10 weeks; two groups of neuropsychiatrics; and two groups of AWOLS.

a. Aberdeen: 220 recruits with 10 days training. 212 trainees with 10 weeks training

b. Belvoir: 68 patients in neuropsychiatric ward. 106 A.W.O.L. cases in stockade

c. Meade: 112 A.W.O.L. cases in stockade

The AWOL’s were not used in developing the screening test, but the questionnaire was administered to those two groups in order to gather further data for an AWOL study which was in the planning stage.

Only the normals and neuropsychiatric groups will be considered in this discussion.

a. The screening device was developed on the basis of an analysis of two groups:

1. 100 normals . . . Group I: Half of a group of trainees with 10 weeks of training.
2. 88 neuropsychiatric patients from Hospital A

b. As a check on the reliability of the results the following additional groups were used:

1. 100 normals . . . Group II: The other half of the group of trainees with 10 weeks of training.
2. 200 normals . . . Recruits with 10 days of training (from the same camp as Group I and II) who signed their schedules.
3. 118 neuropsychiatric patients from Hospital B. This group was further sub-divided into:

c. Class I (58 cases) — a group in which there was some tittering and disturbance during administration of the schedule

d. Class II (60 cases)

a. Personal adjustment Measured by a scale of five items:

1. "On the whole, do you think the Army is giving you a chance to show what you can do?”
2. "Are you ever worried and upset?
3. "In general, what sort of a time do you have in the Army?"
4. "In general, how would you say you feel most of the time, in good spirits or in low spirits?”
5. "Do you think you can make good in the Army?" The final scale has a maximum value of 9 (highest adjustment), being a trichotomous scale except for the last item.

b. Psychosomatic complaints Eleven questions were used here.

1. One was general: "Do you have any particular physical or health problem?"

2. The other ten asked about the presence of specific symptoms:

   a) shortness of breath

   b) hands sweating

   c) upset stomach

   d) nightmares

   e) cold sweats

   f) fainting spells

   g) heart palpitations

   h) hand tremors

   i) nail biting

   j) sick headaches

3. A score of 22 indicates the absence of all these complaints, one of zero, the presence of all of them.

c. Group-Rorschach Multiple Choice Test.

1. The problem of developing a score for this and the following areas was somewhat different from the simpler solutions available in the first two cases where

   a) in one case, a scale was found to exist

   b) in the other, the criterion (complaining - not complaining) was clear-cut and predetermined.

2. Three steps were used in determining scores:

   Categories were defined as:

   a) positive 2

   b) neutral 1

   c) negative (0)

   on the basis of differences in marginals between normals and neurotics.

3. On the basis of this preliminary scoring, a curing [sic] point was established which approached, as closely as possible, the goal of scoring 90& of the neurotics and 25% of the normals below the cutting point.

4. The joint occurrences of the various items in the score were examined in an attempt to increase further the discrimination obtained in b.

5. If, by rescoring a given category, it was possible to Increase the proportion of normals or to decrease the proportion of neurotics above the cutting point without securing a proportional change in the other group the category was rescored.

6. In practice there were two limits to the amount of rescoring done.

   a) Since the samples being worked with were small, it was feared that pressing this technique too far would capitalize on chance errors in the samples and make the score unstable from sample to sample.

   b) Further, some attempt was made not to do too much violence to the usual theoretical interpretation of content.

d. Childhood Background. The components of this are were:

1. School adjustment (2 questions)

2. Fitting temperament (4 questions)

3. Sociability (3 questions)

4. Heterosexual relationships (3 questions)

5. Emancipation from parental ties (3 questions)

6. Childhood fears (1 question)

7. Childhood psychosomatic symptoms (4 questions)

   No attempt was made either to analyze these sub-areas separately or to weight them differentially. The twenty questions involved were scored by the procedure previously outlined.