Ethnopsychological Method and the Psychological Assessment of Mexican Americans

This article reviews the theoretical and methodological development of ethnopsychology, which is founded on the principle that distinct cultural groups share basic common beliefs and values that differentiate them psychologically from other cultural groups. The distinctness of a cultural group is rooted in a series of historical, sociocultural experiences and perceptions of oneself and the group as a whole. The development of ethnopsychology is summarized through the contributions of Rogelio Diaz-Guerrero and his early exploration of the fundamental premises and tenets that guide ethnopsychological theory and method. The contributions of other theorists, focusing on the uniqueness of bicultural/bilingual groups such as Mexican Americans, are also summarized. The author supports the application of ethnopsychological theory and method to enhance psychologists’ understanding of bilingual/bicultural groups in the United States. Specifically, she reviews current psychological assessment methods and their ethnopsychological adaptation for Mexican Americans.

Tell-Me-A-Story (TEMAS) Assessment for Culturally Diverse Children and Adolescents

The Tell-Me-A-Story (TEMAS) narrative test is a multicultural measure developed for both minority and nonminority children and adolescents. As the off-spring of the Thematic Apperception Test (TAT), it enhances several narrative features, including the use of chromatic cards, diminished ambiguity and structured pictorial stimuli of the cards, familiar and contemporary themes, problem-solving situations, and an objective scoring system. This article describes the standardization of the TEMAS in the US, the validation of the Orthodox Jewish version of the TEMAS, and the internal reliability of the Argentinian version of the TEMAS. In the US, the test was normed on a sample of 642 children (281 boys and 361 girls) from public schools in the New York City area, ages 5–13 years, with a mean age of 8.9 years (SD = 1.9). The total sample represented four ethnic/racial groups: Puerto Rican and other Hispanic, Black, and White children. The TEMAS measures 10 personality functions, 18 cognitive functions, and seven affective functions. This paper presents two studies. The first study describes the reliability of the TEMAS measurement, using the Argentinian version of the TEMAS. The second study provides the rationale as well as the procedures for developing culturally suitable pictures, and also presents novel data for the cultural validity of the Orthodox Jewish version of the TEMAS. Overall, these results provide support for TEMAS as a reliable and culturally valid tool for the measurement of cognitive, personality, and affective functioning.

Clinical utility of the TEMAS with nonminority children

The Tell Me a Story (TEMAS) Test is a thematic apperception technique composed of 23 chromatic pictures, depicting either minority or nonminority characters interacting in primarily urban and familial settings, and is scored for perceptual and cognitive style, affective state, and personality functioning. Previous research has supported the reliability and validity of the ethnic minority version of the TEMAS test for Hispanic and Black children and adolescents. In this study, we investigated the validity of the nonminority version by discriminating public school (n = 49) and outpatient (n = 36) samples of White examinees from inner city, low to lower middle socioeconomic status, largely female-headed households. Results indicate that TEMAS profiles significantly discriminated between the normal functioning and clinical groups (p < .001), with 86% classification accuracy. The results, which provide some support for the general clinical utility of the TEMAS technique, are discussed in terms of the need to develop and validate unbiased projective techniques for both ethnic minority and nonminority children.