The Association Test as a Measure of Delinquency

In 1925 H. R. Laslett published the results of an attempt to diagnose delinquency by means of the word-association test technique.2 His results indicated that the list of words he had chosen might be expected to distinguish individual delinquents from non-delinquents. The present paper is a report of the application of Laslett's test to 546 Chicago boys, selected so as to represent various gradations of delinquency and non-delinquency. The word-association test technique involves the presentation to a subject or a group of subjects of a series of words, one at a time, with instructions to respond to each word with the first word that comes to mind. The technique was originally devised for use with psychopathic patients as a help in discovering complexes, etc., and has recently been used with considerable success by Crosland4 and others in the detection of guilt. The method had not been used so far as we know prior to 1925 as a tool in the diagnosis of general delinquency, although Eastman and Rosanoff in 1912 had reported the results of some general work done on delinquent and feebleminded children with the association test. Their groups were not specifically defined enough as to delinquency, and their words not specially chosen, so that their results have little bearing on the present problem

Biology · Criminology · Data mining · Juvenile delinquency · Psychotherapist · Computer Science · Crime Patterns and Interventions · Deception detection and forensic psychology · Psychology · Psychopathy, Forensic Psychiatry, Sexual Offending

• Rorschach and the Free Association Test

  F L Wells•The Journal of General Psychology•1935

  Add to list