Introduction to the Psychology of Defense Mechanisms
A - Z List of Defense Mechanisms
By Geoffrey W. Sutton, PhD 2023
Positive coping refers to adaptive responses that allow individuals to manage or resolve challenges effectively. In contrast, negative coping encompasses maladaptive strategies that may cause harm or impair functioning. Some defensive responses are so dysfunctional that they interfere with major areas of a person’s life. Defense mechanisms can shape how individuals experience the self (as subject), others (as object), thoughts or ideas (cognitions), or emotional states (Vaillant, 2000).
In many forms of psychotherapy, clinicians assess the presence and maturity of a patient's defense mechanisms to determine how best to support them in processing underlying anxieties or conflicts.
Studying defense mechanisms poses challenges due to a century of evolving terminology and theoretical variation. In recent decades, however, psychology and psychiatry researchers have aimed to clarify definable features of a core set of defenses, supported by empirical study.
This post presents one such classification. Readers may encounter other lists derived from different theoretical traditions. A more definitive approach emphasizes defenses supported by operational definitions and empirical evidence, such as those found in the Defense Mechanisms Rating Scales–SR-30 (Di Giuseppe et al., 2020) and the Q-Sort methodology (Di Giuseppe et al., 2014).
Historical Note
The concept of psychological defense mechanisms originated in the writings of Sigmund Freud and Anna Freud. Defense mechanisms were understood as unconscious patterns of cognition, emotion, or behavior that individuals use to protect themselves from distressing levels of anxiety or internal conflict—often with limited awareness.
In Freudian psychoanalysis, the ego defends itself unconsciously against anxiety and the conflicts arising from instinctual drives, moral constraints, and reality. Although early descriptions varied and used inconsistent terminology, Sigmund Freud referenced a variety of defensive operations throughout his work. Anna Freud later clarified these concepts in her seminal text The Ego and the Mechanisms of Defense (1936, as cited in Clark, 1998), emphasizing developmental differences in defenses based on how strongly they distort reality.
An A – Z List of
Psychological Defense Mechanisms
Follow
the links to learn more details about these defense mechanisms.
Acting out refers to a socially unacceptable or even
harmful behavioral reaction to distress rather than a more peaceful processing
of the painful thoughts and feelings associated with an event like divorce,
natural disaster, or an accident.
Affiliation is a generally adaptive defensive strategy
of finding support from others to cope with distress.
Altruism is a generally adaptive strategy for meeting
one’s own needs by fulfilling the needs of others.
Anticipation is a generally adaptive strategy to deal with expected distress or conflict in the future by planning a
reaction.
Avoidance is a strategy to protect oneself from real
or perceived painful experiences associated with particular people or places.
Conversion is a defense against dealing with distress,
which results in impaired physical functioning or physical symptoms that are
not explained by known biological causes.
Compartmentalization is a strategy to segment our
lives in order to limit the distressing effects in one area of life.
Compensation is a strategy of dealing with negative
feelings of inadequacy by investing energy elsewhere.
Denial is the refusal to accept the facts about a
highly distressing event.
Devaluation is an excessively negative appraisal of
oneself or another person when faced with stressors or conflicts.
Displacement is the transferring of a perceived conflict with one source to a
different source.
Dissociation is an extreme distancing of oneself from
a troubling context.
Distraction is a strategy of avoiding distress by
engaging in other activities such as shopping, talking with friends, or
scrolling on social media sights.
Fantasy (Autistic or Schizoid)
Fantasy is the excessive and unproductive use of
daydreaming to deal with stressors and conflicts instead of attempting to solve
a problem, take constructive action to deal with a conflict or source of
distress, or interacting with others to deal with conflicts or distress.
Help-rejecting complaining is a term that replaces an
older term known as hypochondriasis.
Humor can be an adaptive defense against distress.
Idealization is the process of coping with stressors
or conflicts by attributing exaggerated positive qualities to oneself or
someone else.
Identification is the process of taking upon oneself
the attributes of another person based on an association fantasy.
Intellectualization is a cognitive defense strategy of
avoiding distressing feelings by analyzing events as if there were no emotions
involved.
Introjection is a way of dealing with conflicts and
stressors by accepting the messages of others as true of oneself. In the
language of defense mechanisms, these messages are introjects.
Isolation of Affects is a defense against distressful
emotions by attending only to the cognitive rather than the emotional aspects of a distressing experience.
Omnipotence defends against stressors and conflicts by
acting superior to others in terms of power, status, or ability.
Passive-aggressive strategies appear to help people
avoid the perceived effect of an outright conflict that might ensue if they
were to be blunt or forthright in expressing their hostility or true feelings.
Projection is attributing a negative quality about oneself to
someone else. A person who is unhappy with their appearance is highly critical
of the appearance of others.
Projective Identification misattributes unacceptable
feelings or impulses to someone else. People who deploy projective identification
confuse their actual role as causal agent of the projected content.
Rationalization is the use of reasoning to justify
behavior considered unacceptable according to one’s personal moral code or the
norms of their group
Reaction Formation is a strategy of replacing a
response to anxiety producing thoughts and feelings with their opposite.
Repression is an unconscious blocking of distressing
memories from awareness.
Regression is a strategy of dealing with a distressful
experience by reacting similarly to the way they responded during childhood.
Self-assertion is a generally adaptive strategy of
expressing emotional conflicts rather than keeping quiet.
Self-observation is a generally adaptive strategy for
managing internal conflicts or coping with external sources of distress by assessing
the effectiveness of their behaviour and making modifications to better adapt
to a situation.
Splitting refers to splitting one’s self-image or that
of others into all good or all bad images, which avoid a realistic appraisal of
positive and negative images
Sublimation is a generally adaptive strategy of
managing potentially harmful urges into safe and acceptable activities.
Suppression is an active process of avoiding
distressful memories, thoughts, and feelings. Suppression is a generally
adaptive strategy of regulating one’s thoughts and feelings
Undoing is a strategy of performing some act to take
care of one feelings of guilt.
Defense Mechanisms Rating Scales
Clark, A. J. (1998). Defense mechanisms in the counseling process in groups. SAGE Publications, Inc., https://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781452204901 AMAZON
Select References
Cramer, P. (2002). The study of defense mechanisms: Gender implications. In The psychodynamics of gender and gender role. (pp. 81–127). American Psychological Association. https://doi.org/10.1037/10450-003
Cooper, S. H. (1992). The empirical study of defensive
processes: A review. In Interface of psychoanalysis and psychology. (pp.
327–346). American Psychological Association. https://doi.org/10.1037/10118-014
Di
Giuseppe, M., Perry, J. C., Lucchesi, M., Michelini, M., Vitiello, S., Piantanida,
A., Fabiani, M., Maffei, S., & Conversano, C. (2020). Preliminary validity
and reliability of the novel self-report based on the Defense Mechanisms Rating
Scales (DMRS-SR-30). Frontiers in Psychiatry, 11, 870.
https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2020.00870
Di Giuseppe, M., Perry, J. C., Petraglia,
J., Janzen, J., & Lingiardi, V.(2014). Development of a Q-Sort version of
the Defense Mechanism Rating Scales (DMRS-Q) for clinical use. Journal of
Clinical Psychology, 70(5), 452–465. https://doi.org/10.1002/jclp.22089
Vaillant, G. E. (2000). Defense mechanisms. In Encyclopedia
of psychology, Vol. 2. (pp. 454–457). Oxford University Press.
https://doi.org/10.1037/10517-166
Vaillant,G. E. (2011). Involuntary coping mechanisms:
A psychodynamic perspective. Dialogues in Clinical Neuroscience, 13,
366–370.
Geoffrey W. Sutton, PhD is Emeritus Professor of Psychology. He
retired from a clinical practice and was credentialed in clinical
neuropsychology and psychopharmacology. His website is www.suttong.com
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