Rorschach Responses of a Group of Adult Asthmatics

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Abstract
Personality characteristics of patients suffering from bronchial asthma have attracted considerable attention. Most clinical observations suggest that asthmatics present a characteristic difficulty in emotional expression. Reporting on the behaviour of 23 children with either asthma or eczema, Rogerson, Duguid and Hardcastle (5) state that these children were more shy than others in play therapy. Harris et al. (3) compared asthmatic children to children with allergic rhinitis. They suggested that half of the asthmatic group showed more difficulties than the rhinitic group in crying and confiding to the mother. These observations were made on children. On the adult side we have the inferences of French and Alexander (2) (based on psychoanalytical situations) that the asthmatic attack is the equivalent of a suppressed cry. However, as Leigh (4) has pointed out in his recent review of the psychiatric aspects of asthma, little valid evidence has in fact been presented that this feature of personality or any other is characteristic of asthmatics. This paper is a report on findings which may be related to this lack of evidence.

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