A serial visual afterimage (AI) test was administered to 136 normal and 75 anxiety-ridden children 4-16 years of age. The scoring of the AI serials involved signs of primitive functioning (size-constant and positive AIs), anxiety (large and dark AIs together with primitive AIs in older children) and process discontinuity (intermittent regressions…

The Meta-Contrast Technique (MCT) was used to project, at the concrete perceptual level afforded by the test, two of the dilemmas confronting anxiety-ridden children: the threat against their uncertain sense of identity (revealed as fusion between the threat and the hero in the test) and the insufficiency of their defensive resources (revealed as…

The Meta-Contrast Technique (MCT) was used for a differential diagnosis of anxiety-ridden children aged 4-16 years. Signs of open fright in the test situation showed the greatest correlation with symptoms of paroxysmal anxiety (in older children). Other severe signs of anxiety were fusion between the hero and the threat, leaking defense…

An attempt to operationally define depressive retardation in 72 inpatients aged 4-16 used two percept-genetic tests. In a serial visual afterimage (AI) test retardation was defined as a successive reduction of AI size, and in a serial tachistoscopic presentation using the meta-contrast technique (MCT) it was seen as stereotyped repetitions of…