OBJECT RELATIONS AND PHYSICAL ABUSE - A TAT ANALYSIS

Selected Thematic Apperception Test (Murray, 1943) stories of 39 physi cally abused children and a clinical group of 39 children with no reco rded history of abuse were examined using the Social Cognition and Obj ect Relations Scales (Westen, Lohr, Silk, Kerber, and Goodrich, 1985). As predicted, a history of physical abuse was associated with a more malevolent object world; a lower level capacity for emotional investme nt in relations and moral standards; and less accurate, complex, and l ogical attributions of causality in understanding human interaction. T hese impairments in object relations were manifest both as a typical l evel of functioning and as a propensity for more grossly pathological functioning. Results are discussed in terms of clinical and theoretica l implications.