Imagine you're a parent in a child custody case, with the question hanging over your head

of how much you'll get to see your child, and imagine the court's decision goes against

you.

Unjustly, how torn apart you'd feel.

Then, what if you found out that part of the testimony that Judge relied upon was based

on an almost completely useless psychological test?

A skeptical look at the Rorschach inkblot test is coming up right now on Skeptoid.

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You're listening to Skeptoid. I'm Brian Dunning from Skeptoid.com.

A skeptical look at the Rorschach test.

You've seen it in pop culture a thousand times.

A psychologist holds up a card showing an inkblot, and a subject says what it looks like.

From this, the famous or infamous Rorschach inkblot test, it's said to be possible to make

accurate psychological diagnoses to uncover deep personality traits and even to predict future behavior.

But how much of this is mere Hollywood, how much is actual sound psychology, and is any of it unadulterated pseudoscience?

Well, we hope to find that it's sound a 2003 book, Critical of the Test, advises...

Rorschach is still administered hundreds of thousands of times each year in clinics, courts, and schools.

Psychologists often use the test to help courts determine which parents should be granted custody of a child.

...