PERSONALITY ASSESSMENT IN NORTH COUNTY SAN DIEGO · AGES 5+
Personality Assessment in North County San Diego
Anchored by the Rorschach. Read by a national expert.
Questionnaires can only tell us what you can already see in yourself. The Rorschach and a real clinical interview show us the rest. In person across Carlsbad, Encinitas, and Vista.
Serving North County since 2018 · Doctoral-level psychologists
Typical fee: $3,000–$5,000 · Out-of-Network · Superbill Provided · Free 15-Min Consultation
The process: Consult (Free) → Clinical Interview → Testing → Feedback. About 9 hours of your time across 3-4 sessions, with a written report.
What is Personality Assessment?
A comprehensive personality assessment at CTG is for:
- Adults who suspect something deeper is shaping their relationships, work patterns, or emotional life and want a real answer
- People stuck in therapy who feel something keeps not being seen by the work
- Clients with a long history of unclear or conflicting diagnoses (anxiety, depression, ADHD, BPD, bipolar, trauma, autism) who want clinical clarity
- High-functioning adults whose self-report doesn't capture what's actually going on internally
- Clients preparing for psychiatric, surgical, fertility, or fitness-for-duty evaluations who want a real workup, not a screening
- Anyone who has done personality testing once and walked away thinking "that wasn't me"
If your gut says checkboxes won't catch it, you're probably right. The Rorschach is built for what self-report can't see.
What the Rorschach actually does (and why most clinics skip it).
Self-report measures (the MMPI, the PAI, the NEO, the PID-5) ask you to describe yourself. They're well-validated, and they're the foundation of a good personality battery. But they share one limit: they can only tell you what you already know or are willing to admit. They can't see what you can't see in yourself.
The Rorschach is a performance-based measure. We aren't asking what you think about you. We're watching how your mind organizes ambiguous information in real time, which is the closest thing psychology has to looking under the hood at thought process, emotional regulation, reality testing, self-perception, interpersonal patterns, and stress response. Combined with self-report, it gives us two views of the same person and lets us see where they agree, where they diverge, and what that divergence means.
Most clinics don't include the Rorschach for one reason: it takes years of training to code and interpret correctly. We include it on every personality battery because skipping it means skipping the answer to the question most clients are actually asking.
Every case is read twice.
Doctoral training in personality assessment is unevenly distributed in this country, and Rorschach training especially so. CTG's solution is that we do not interpret these reports alone.
Every personality assessment we administer is reviewed in consultation with Dr. Elizabeth Laney, an expert in personality assessment and Rorschach interpretation. She trains our team weekly and consults directly on cases before reports are finalized. Every case is anonymously presented to Dr. Laney and the rest of our psychological testing time. This is a time that is intellectually challenging and deeply enjoyable for our team to use each case as an opportunity to continue learning and get a little better, each week, at sitting with what's unclear before we name it.
What that buys you, practically:
- Multiple psychologists looking at your data, not one
- A national specialist's eye on the part of the battery most clinicians find hardest to interpret
- A written report that says what it can support and stops where the data stops
- Diagnostic clarity that holds up to a second opinion before the second opinion gets asked for
This is the part of the service that's hardest to find in San Diego and the reason most of our personality referrals come from other clinicians and clinics.
What a CTG personality assessment actually looks like.
Every personality assessment is doctoral-level and tailored to the referral question. A typical battery includes:
- Clinical interview covering developmental, relational, occupational, medical, and psychiatric history
- Self-report personality measures such as the MMPI-2, MCMI-IV, or PAI selected for the referral question
- Rorschach Performance Assessment System (R-PAS) administered, coded, and interpreted by trained clinicians
- Cognitive and emotional functioning measures as clinically indicated
- Differential rule-outs to distinguish personality patterns from mood, trauma, ADHD, autism, and other contributors
- Expert consultation review with Dr. Elizabeth Laney before the report is finalized
- Feedback session that's a real conversation, not a paperwork handoff
- Integrated written report suitable for treatment planning, accommodations, second opinions, or documentation
Typical time investment is six to eight hours of in-person testing across two or three sessions, plus the intake and feedback meetings.
What we can answer that a screener can't.
- Is what I'm experiencing personality, mood, trauma, or some combination?
- Is this a personality disorder or a long-term coping response to something specific?
- Why does therapy keep stalling for me?
- Why do my relationships keep going the same direction?
- What's my actual capacity for insight, and how is that shaping treatment?
- What's the structural picture underneath my anxiety/depression/ADHD diagnosis?
- Could this be a bipolar pattern, a thought-process issue, or something else that's been mislabeled?
- What kind of treatment will actually fit me as a person?
If the question feels too big for a checklist, this is the assessment built for it.
The team
Six psychologists & one psychological associate who do personality assessment.
Every assessment is conducted, scored, and written by the same doctoral-level clinician, with consultation review from a national expert before the report goes out. No interns. No handoffs to a writer.
Chelsea Dudley, PsyD
Director of Psychological Testing
Lindsey G. Robertson, PhD
Co-owner & Director of Professional Development
Clare Edwards, PhD
Vista Site Director
Jessica Kim, PsyD
Director of Couples Therapy
C. Julieta Aguilera Rice, PhD
Trilingual (English/Spanish/French)
Julia Avila, PhD
Bethany Ling, PsyD
Transparent pricing.
These are estimates based on typical assessment scope. We'll give you a working estimate at the free consultation based on the referral question. If testing surfaces a more complex picture and additional measures are clinically warranted, we'll talk with you before doing any work outside the original scope.
- Personality assessment — from $3,000
- Locations: Carlsbad, Encinitas, Vista
- Timeline: typically 3 to 6 weeks from intake to feedback
Insurance: We are out-of-network with all insurance plans. We provide a superbill you can submit for partial reimbursement under CPT codes 96136, 96137, 96130, and 96131. HSA and FSA accepted directly.
When you're ready
Let's figure out whether a personality assessment is the right fit.
Fifteen minutes on the phone with our Director of Psychological Testing, Dr. Chelsea Dudley. No pitch, no pressure. By the end of the call you'll know whether a personality assessment is the right answer, what it would cost, and whether we are the right people for it.
Common questions
Frequently asked questions.
The questions below come up almost every week. If yours is not here, the 15-minute call is the place for it.
What is a personality assessment?
A personality assessment is a comprehensive evaluation of how a person thinks, feels, relates to others, and responds to stress, conducted through a structured clinical interview combined with validated self-report measures and (in our practice) the Rorschach. It produces a written report with diagnostic conclusions, treatment recommendations, and a clear description of the patterns that shape day-to-day life.
What is the Rorschach test and how is it used?
The Rorschach is a performance-based personality measure. Rather than asking you to describe yourself, it presents a set of standardized inkblots and asks what you see, then codes your responses using a research-validated system (we use the Rorschach Performance Assessment System, R-PAS). The data tells us about thought process, emotional regulation, reality testing, self-perception, interpersonal patterns, and stress response. It's most useful when paired with self-report so we can compare two views of the same person.
Why do you include the Rorschach when most clinics don't?
Because it answers questions self-report cannot answer. Self-report measures only see what you can see in yourself. The Rorschach sees how your mind actually works under conditions of ambiguity, which is what most personality questions are really asking about. Most clinics skip it because it takes 10 to 15 hours of clinician time per case. We include it because skipping it means skipping the data most clients are actually paying for.
Who reviews my report before I get it?
Every personality assessment is anonymously reviewed in consultation with Dr. Elizabeth Laney, a nationally recognized expert in personality assessment and Rorschach interpretation, before the report is finalized. Practically, that means multiple doctoral-level clinicians look at your data, not one.
How long does a personality assessment take?
Typically four to six hours of testing across one or two appointments, plus a 60-minute intake and a 60-minute feedback session. From intake to written report is usually 3 to 6 weeks.
How much does a personality assessment cost?
Personality assessments start at $3,000. We'll give you a working estimate at the free consultation based on the referral question. If testing surfaces a more complex picture and additional measures are clinically warranted, we'll talk with you before doing any work outside the original scope.
Do you take insurance?
We are out-of-network with all insurance plans. We provide a superbill you can submit for partial reimbursement under CPT codes 96136, 96137, 96130, and 96131. HSA and FSA accounts are accepted directly. We recommend calling your insurance company before scheduling to confirm what they reimburse for out-of-network psychological testing.
What ages do you assess?
We evaluate ages 5 and up. Personality testing for children and adolescents uses age-appropriate measures and weighs parent and school input more heavily.
Can a personality assessment tell me if I have a personality disorder?
When that's the clinical question, yes. We can also tell you when the data does not support a personality disorder diagnosis, which is just as important. A real assessment distinguishes long-standing personality patterns from mood, trauma, and adaptive responses to specific situations.
Can I do this online?
Some components can be conducted via telehealth, but the Rorschach is administered in person for the data to be valid. Most of our personality assessment work happens at our Carlsbad or Vista offices. We'll discuss the right format for your case at the consultation.