Role Construct Repertory Test-Assessing Personal Constructs
Kelly developed the Role Construct Repertory Test known more simply as the REP test to identify the important constructs a person uses to construct, (interpret) significant people in his/her life. The Rep test was originally devised as a diagnostic instrument to understand the client's construct system and the way he uses it to structure his personal environment. Many forms of Rep test individual and group exist like list form and Grid-form. Essentially, the Rep test permits a person to reveal constructs by comparing and contrasting a number of significant persons in his or her life. The subject is first asked to name people who fit certain roles (Boss, successful person, disliked teacher). Another phase of the Rep test involves eliciting the subjects constructs about the people in his/her life. In a clinical interpretation of the Rep test the examiner considers the number of different constructs, the manner in which various figures are related to the constructs and the relationships of the constructs to one another.Clinical experience with public schools and college students provided the basis for Kelly's theory of personal constructs. Most of the empirical studies based on Kelly's work concern the Rep test. Several studies like Bannister and Fransella (1966) and Bannister and Salmon (1966) suggest that Rep test and Kelly's constructs help us to understand the disturbance of thought in schizophrenic are less interrelated and more inconsistent that other people's particularly interpersonal constructs. Kelly was particularly interested in using Rep test as a basis for facilitating Psychological counseling.
The Rep test has also been used to explore the complexity of an individual's construct system and changes in the construct system through out the life span. Such research has focussed on cognitive complexity-the ability to perceive differences in the way in which one construes other people. Individuals who are high in cognitive complexity are better able to predict what others will do and to relate with them.
Applications-Emotional States, Psychological Disorders and Fixed Role Therapy
Kelly had redefined may psychological concepts of emotions like anxiety, guilt, threat and hostility in terms relevant to his cognitive theory. Guilt is awareness of having deviated from the important roles by which one maintains relationships with others. Threat is awareness that one's construct system is drastically changed. Hostility is an attempt to hold invalid construct within the form of contradictory. A hostile person makes others behave in ways which fit into his unrealistic expectations. Anxiety is feeling of apprehension which result when one realizes that never no constructs with which to interpret the events we encounters. According to Kelly (1955) psychological disorders arise when a person clings and continues to use personal constructs even though they are invalid. Such a person has difficulty anticipating and predicting events and is unable to learn from experiences. The neurotic fails to develop new ways to interpret the world or rigidly holds on to constructs, that are useless. Instead of developing more successful constructs and solving problems the neurotic develops symptoms.Kelly conceives of his therapeutic methods as 'reconstruction' rather than psychotherapy. The client is encouraged to reconstruct the world in a manner that would foster better predictions and control. The maladaptive constructs are replaced with more useful ones.
Kelly's unique contribution to therapeutic methods is developing and fostering the use of role playing. He encouraged the use of role reversal having the client play the role of the significant figures while he is a client. Role reversal allows the client to understand his/her participation more fully and also to understand the framework of the other person. Kelly also used fixed role therapy in which the client had to enact the role of someone else for a more protracted period of time because behaviour is the result of the individual's construction of a situation, playing a new role requires that one first temporarily adopt a new construct view point. This principle is applied in this therapy technique-fixed role therapy for a shy person might be asked to play confident and assertive role for 2 or 3 days to think and act like a confident person. The client has to practice the fixed role within the therapy situation to be certain that he has adopted the required behaviours and view of the world that a confident person has. By trying out a new role the client can appreciate the ways in which different constructions and behaviours lead to more satisfying life outcomes. Fixed role therapy has proved to be a very creative way to reconstrue the self under professional guidance.
Kelly's theory has wide implications for social and interpersonal relationships by alternative constructions Kelly suggested more creative ways of dealing with a problematic situation.
Kelly also encouraged the use of group therapy to help solve individual and common problems. The technique of role playing is particularly well adapted to group where several people may assist an individual in acting out a scene. Kelly also suggested ways in which his theory could be applied to solve social and international problems by understanding how different events are construed or interpreted variously by people in different countries.
Evaluation of the Theory
Kelly considered the human beings as scientists but the ways in which we validate the personal constructs involve also philosophical insights. His view of a person as a scientist is based on the philosophical position or constructive alternativism device in industry.Kelly emphasized the rationality of the human beings. He did not believe that science can comprehend the real person. It can only provide useful constructions that can assist us in making predictions.
Kelly developed a theory that encompass cognitive, emotional behaviour, perception and motivational aspects of personality by viewing personal constructions as the primary factors governing personality. That's why his theory was classified differently by different personologists.
His theory continues to attract attention due to its emphasis on construction which is compatible with trends in cognitive psychology. His technique of assessment and role playing have proved very useful tools in psychotherapy, education, and industry.
It is also more positively regarded by psychologists who believe in a person as an information processor and interpreter of events.
However, Kelly has been criticized for being too intellectual in his view of the individual and therapy. His failure to deal adequately with emotions and instances on dichotomous concepts. He has also failed to deal with the whole of personality.
Summary
- Although Kelly's theoretical concepts have stimulated directly little research to date. He devised a personality test the Rep test which has been widely used in a number of studies to assess personal constructs. Kelly's personal construct theory is applicable in psychotherapy, education and industry. His techniques of assessment and role playing have proved to be useful tools.
- Kelly's view of a person as a scientist is based on the philosophical position of conservative alternativism the way we validate the personal constructs involve both scientific methods and philosophical insights.
- His theory failed to deal with personality and emotions, it was too intellectual in its view of the individual as therapy.
