Measurement of ego development by sentence completion and personality test

Abstract

Study aims were (a) to compare the characteristics of the ego development stages as reveated by incomplete sentences and personality inventory scales; and (b) to ascretain how well a structured inventory can estimate ego development as assessed by Loevinger's Sentence Completion Test (SCT). Ss were 423 girls and 225 boys from five high schools five high schools, who were administered the Interpersonal Style Inventory (ISI) and the SCT. The ego development groups to which the boys and girls were allocated on the basis of the SCT scores were compared by means of discriminant function analysis. The 27 self-report scores from the ISI and a supplementary form were used as predictors. The analyses revealed two dimensions of differences for the girls and one for the boys. The first dimension, defined primearily by level of socialization, was essentially the same for girls and boys. The second dimension for girls involved degree of rule-boundness.