ABSTRACT

The recent emphasis on object relations theory as an explanatory model for personality development has been paralleled in the psychological test literature by measures that assess the quality of object-representations. The author reviews one such measure – the Mutuality of Autonomy (MOA) scale – in its research applications with adults and children. He then extends the scale to the psychotherapy of children and suggests that Rorschach object-representation scores can be of heuristic value in understanding the treatment process.