The Sentence Completion Method

Abstract

The sentence completion method of projective testing encompasses a wide variety of tests, all of which share a common format. In each instance, individuals being studied by this method are required to complete a number of sentence stems which are presented to them. Since the origination of this testing technique, a great many stems have been used, various methods of administration have been attempted, and a good deal of diversity has developed in the interpretation of the resulting material. The ease with which a sentence completion test can be constructed has proven to be both one of the strengths and one of the weaknesses of this method. Since the generation of the stems is not complicated, a great many sentence completion tests have been authored. While this often leads to the valid use of a test for the particular question it has been designed to answer, the number of such instruments has precluded the development of an extensive body of literature on a single sentence completion test. Without one dominant test on which to focus, it has been deemed expedient to deal with the method in general for the first part of this chapter. This is then followed by the specifics of a number of the most popular sentence completion tests in clinical use.