Psychoanalytic treatment entails an intense exploration of one's beliefs about self and other as these are played out with significant others in one's life, including the therapist. This exploration requires that a person be capable of such intensive and extensive self-exploration. Ordinarily, this assessment is made by the clinician on the basis of interview. However, an interview does not match the emotional rigors of an actual psychoanalytic experience and hence, can miss the detection of latent and subtle ego defects that can potentially have a deleterious effect on the patient and the analysis. The analysis of a person's response to the Rorschach blots can be a helpful adjunct in this assessment.