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Defense Mechanisms

Terms in this set (15)

Displacement
Redirection of emotional feeling from original idea, person, or object to a less threatening one

Ex: Supervisor berates a head nurse, and when she goes back to her unit, speaks harshly to her staff
Identification
Unconscious attempt to change oneself to resemble an admired person

Ex: Adolescent dresses like a rock star & mimics his behavior
Rationalization
Attempt to make unacceptable feelings & behavior acceptable by justifying the behavior

Ex: Student fails the examination and says the lectures were poorly organized & presented unclearly
Repression
Involuntary & unconscious forgetting of unbearable ideas & impluses

Ex: Accident victim does not remember the details of an accident
Substitution
Replacement of an unacceptable need, attitude, or emotion with one that is more acceptable

Ex: Woman rushes into marriage following a breakup with her boyfriend
Undoing
Attempt to actually or symbolically take away a previously consciously intolerable action or experience

Ex: Mother who has just punished her child gives him a cookie
Compensation
Attempt to make up for real or fancied deficiencies

Ex: High school student does poorly in academics but becomes a talented artist
Sublimation
Diversion of consciously unacceptable instinctual drives into personally & socially accepted areas

Ex: Strong sexual urges are diverted into created arts like painting and sculpture
Conversion
Expression of intrapsychic conflict symbolically thru physical symptoms

Ex: Student develops diarrhea on the day of NCLEX exam
Denial
Conscious refusal to accept reality or fact, acting as if a painful event, thought or feeling did not exist

Ex: Person who is a functioning alcoholic will often simply DENY they have a drinking problem, pointing to how well they function in their job and relationship
Dissociation
Separation & DETACHMENT of emotional significance & affect from an idea or situation

Ex: Client grins & chuckles when telling about his automobile accident and its tragic consequences
Projection
Attributing intolerable wishes, emotional feelings, & motivations to other persons

Ex: Reviewee blames the review center for his failure in the board exam
Regression
Returning to an earlier and more comfortable level of adjustment

Ex: A 4 year old begins to wet his pants following the birth of his baby brother
Reaction Formation
Developing conscious attitudes & behaviors that are the opposite of what one really feels or desires to do

Ex: Woman who is very angry with her boss and would like to quit her job maya instead be overly kind and generous towards her boss and express a desire to keep working there forever
Suppression
CONSCIOUS, deliberate forgetting of unacceptable or painful thoughts, ideas, and feelings

Ex: Young women says she is not ready to talk about her abuse as a child
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