Use of “Three Boxes,” A Psycho-Imagination Therapy Special Image, with a Schizophrenic Population

Abstract

The Three Boxes, a special image developed by Joseph E. Shorr (Shorr, 1983), and used as a projective test item, was administered to 27 schizophrenic residents at Hanbleceya, a therapeutic community established for the treatment of schizophrenia. The results were used in the following two ways. First, to confirm or deny from quantitative data the premise that conflict, as measured by The Three Boxes, and their associated sentence completions, would be reduced as residents moved through the phases of the program toward a non-psychotic way of relating to others. And second, to provide qualitative descriptions of how three of the modal members of the population want to be seen, feel about themselves at core and their defenses and coping mechanisms, as revealed by interpretations of their responses to the test items.