Defense Mechanisms Flashcards
Repression
Painful feelings are conscious initially and then forgotten but return occasionally repression can range from momentary memory lapses to forgetting the details of a catastrophic net such as a murder or an earthquake
Ex: forgetting the snow mobile accident
Denial
Unpleasant reality is ignored and a realistic interpretation if potentially threatening events are replaced by benign but inaccurate ones
Ex: pretend to not be upset about a death
Suppression
Unpleasant feelings are suppressed through a conscious effort to ignore them
Suppression differs from repression and denial in that the undesired feelings are available but deliberately ignored
Mature healthy
Ex: happy place
Projection
Undesired feelings are attributed to another person
Ex: an angry person believes other are angry at them, a person who is critical of others believes they are critical of them
Displacement
Objects displacement, emotion felt towards against a person who deist deserve it
Ex: taking out emotions on people or objects that didn’t do anything to desrrve it
Reaction formation
Doing the opposite of what you actually feel
Ex: treating someone nicely even when you don’t like them
Regression
When confronted by stressful events people sometimes abandon coping strategies and revert to patterns of behavior used earlier in development
Fixation
Ex: people with an oral fixation have problems with drinking smoking and nail biting when they are expecting stressful events
Me: smoking when stressed
Identification
Taking on the characteristics of someone else
Me: Katrina, Katie,
Rationalization
Is an attempt to deny ones true motives by using a reason that is more logical or socially acceptable than ones own reasons
Ex: pretending not to care about not getting accepted, or making excuses
Isolation
Becomes separated from feelings that relate to events,allowing it to be part if your conscious mind without the threat of painful feelings
Ex: Grieving after a loss
Sublimation
Re channeling the energy connected with an unacceptable impulse into one that is more socially acceptable
Ex: angry put it into a sport
Compensation
Devoting unusual efforts to achievement in order to overcome feelings of inferiority
Someone who can’t read try harder to get to read
