Technical Foundations for Measuring Ego Development: The Washington University Sentence Completion Test

Prior to the 1950s, most subjects for psychological research in the United States were normal, white, native-born men or children. The few studies of girls and women tended to be about the nature and extent of sex differences in intelligence or occasionally other abilities. In the 1950s and 1960s, several investigators independently began studies of women’s attitudes towards problems of family life. Evidently it was their function as mothers that finally brought women to the attention of research psychologists. This is the complete history of the Washington University Sentence Completion Test (WUSCT), beginning with the Family Problems Scale, an objective test of mothers’ attitudes. Results with that test led to a concept of ego development. The SCT was meant to test that concept and its results led to the elaboration and redefinition of the concept of ego development. This volume presents a new version of the WUSCT - the WUSCTY - developed specifically for testing children and adolescent youths. In addition, it includes a review of cross-cultural applications of the SCT, including SCTs given in translation and SCTs given in English in other cultures or subcultures, as well as instructions for how to give the test in translation.