House-Tree-Person Projective Technique: A Validation of its Use in Occupational Therapy

• Published in: Canadian journal of occupational therapy (1939) 1986-10, Vol.53 (4), p.197-207
• Main Authors: Polatajko, Helen, Kaiserman, Ethel
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Clients; Comparative Analysis; Comparative studies; Nursing; Occupational therapy; Projective Measures; Therapy
• ISSN: 0008-4174; 1911-9828
• DOI: 10.1177/000841748605300405

The purpose of this study was to determine if the House-Tree-Person Projective Technique (H-T-P) was a valid and efficient method for identifying a problem list for occupational therapy (OT) treatment. In order to do this, a comparative study using blinded procedures was carried out. Forty acute psychiatric clients were administered the H-T-P by a trained research officer who knew nothing about the clients. They were also given an OT assessment by their therapist and a nursing evaluation by their assigned nurse. In each case, a problem list was generated. These were compared for percentage agreement between problems, percentage of problems accounted for and the length of time required to generate the various lists. The percentage agreement between H-T-P and Nursing and between H-T-P and OT generated problem lists was 32.88 and 47.18, respectively. Percentage of problems accounted for was 66.42 and 75.19, respectively. The differences were discussed. The time required to administer the H-T-P was considerably less than administration time for the traditional occupational therapy assessment. In conclusion, the H-T-P was found to be a valuable screening tool.