A theory and methodology for measuring fantasy and imaginative expression.

The article focuses on a theory and methodology for measuring fantasy and imaginative expression. Most current personality theories agree on the assumption that human behavior is a multilevel phenomenon. Many of the contradictions and paradoxical complexities of human nature can be theoretically understood by use of such concepts as depth, levels, and convert motives. This paper has presented a theory of and measurement method for dealing with imaginative, preconscious behavior. Some functions of imaginative expressions were presented. These included reduction of anxiety and internal tension, and maintenance of the feeling of self-esteem and uniqueness through the time-binding postponement of impulse. The Kaiser Foundation method for rating the interpersonal aspects of imaginative expressions was applied on two samples to test the hypothesis that fantasy expressions predict the amount and kind of change to be expected in future conscious self-descriptive behavior. The results tended to support the notion that the kind of structural variability between levels in pretesting predicts to the land of variability to occur in the future. The hypothesis that the amount of structural variability is related to the amount of temporal variability was found to hold for one sample and not for the second.