The Reaction to Group Situation Test (RGST) developed by Thelen (1954) and his colleagues was translated into Japanese, and used to conduct a few pilot studies. These first attempts met with two main difficulties, namely, a lack of clear and precise scoring manual, and a complex scoring procedure that were maybe at the roots of the neglect of the RGST. Therefore, the test was revised, developing thus a new scoring manual and a simple scoring procedure. The purpose of the present study was to test the validity of this scoring manual, and the internal consistency reliability of the Japanese version of the RGST, or the RGST-Nu (Nara University). A number of 241 undergraduate students participated in the study. Three trained caters were asked to score the protocols. To test the inter-caters reliability, the three caters were compared, using ANOVA and Pearson Correlations. The results of ANOVA did not reveal significant inter-caters differences, and the correlations between caters were highly significant. These findings demonstrated thus the validity of the new scoring manual. Regarding the internal consistency reliability of the RGST-Nu, it was demonstrated by the results of Cronbach's alpha and item analysis. These findings suggest thus the usefuleness of the RGST as a tool for the measurement of valency and work tendency, and for the study of group emotionality in general.

Key words: basic assumptions, valency, RGST, Wilfred Bion, group dynamics