Lindner (1943) asserted that the individual Rorschach record of the psychopath is unmistakable. This assertion of the ability of the Rorschach to identify psychopathy was examined. In pursuit of this aim, archival data was utilized to analyze Rorschach response patterns of two groups of men: psychopathic antisocials – incarcerated men given a diagnosis of antisocial personality disorder who obtained a score of 30 or more on the PCL; and non-psychopathic antisocials – incarcerated men given a diagnosis of antisocial personality disorder who obtained a PCL score of below 30.

The process involved in validating Lindner's Theory of psychopathy began with the operationalization of one of Lindner's five predictive factors, superficiality – the first and most important qualitative Rorschach predictive factor of psychopathy. The findings of the correlational analysis demonstrated that the psychopathic antisocial individuals produced Rorschach patterns that were consistent with Lindner's proposed theory and further refined the identification of the psychopathic personality by establishing specific Rorschach variables as a reliable and valid measure to distinguish psychopathy from antisocial personality.