[Mirror-drawing technic as a diagnostic element in the study of personality]

This paper begins outlining a short history of mirror-drawing used as a psychological technique, related at fist to the learning process, then extended to the field of personality. From this later point of view, the obligatory inversion of the spatial schemes acts as a conflictual and frustrating stimulus and elicits specific responses based on the personality traits. As a psychological test the mirror-drawing may be evaluated according to the speed and accuracy in tracing, as well as can be judged in terms of qualitative reactions (blockage, task abandonment, effort to control, etc.) After such an introduction our first personal experience with this technique 11, 12 is commented. It consisted in exploring the relations between the motivational level, the manifest anxiety and the mirror-drawing performance, all this within the Yerkes-Dodson Law formulations. The main conclusions emphasize the interaction of the two independent variables (motivation and anxiety) as they affect strongly and differentially the speed and accuracy in the mirror-drawing. However, the principal purpose of this paper is to present a study in which a voluntary sample of 39 adults is described according to their speed and accuracy performance in tracing a star-shaped figure in two trials. Owing to this learning progress in both aspects can be evaluated. Our main findings do not agree with Fraisse's postulate of a hypothetical dimension between "speed-inaccuracy" and "slowness-accuracy" ends and our resultas rather suggest a "speed-accuracy" and "slowness-inaccuracy" continuum. It seems that a good performance involves the two requirements, and the subjects do not show preference for either of them. It also seems that the speed may be due to the situational factors and more influenced by learning, while the accuracy stems from the personality characteristics and can hardly be improved by a voluntary effort.