Freud’s Defense Mechanisms
Displacement
According to Freudian psychology, displacement, meaning shift or move in German, is an unconscious defence mechanism. The mind offers a distraction as a new goal or object to divert away the original dangerous form.
Regression
Regression is when a person mentally retreats into an earlier stage. It may be temporary or long-termed for the ego to be reverted to an earlier stage of development. It is considered more of a coping mechanism than a defensive one to relax and cope with stress.
Rationalisation
Using logical reasoning and explanations to make sense of difficult situations and feelings that cause them stress.
Sublimation
It is considered one of the most beneficial defence mechanisms since it redirects energy from a socially unacceptable impulse or emotion into a more socially accepted one.
Reaction Formation
It is a form of self-expression denial as a person behaves the opposite way of what they think or feel as they subconsciously replace an unwanted anxiety-provoking impulse with an exaggerated opposing behaviour that denies the truth of their feelings.
Compartmentalisation
A process of systematisation and mental separation of conflicting thoughts, emotions, and experiences to avoid unnecessary contradiction and confusion.
Denial
It is one of the resulting defence reactions to disturbing events that could manifest in thoughts, memories, or feelings due to psychological factors that could have taken place internally or externally to refuse the external reality aspects that triggered the denial in the first place.
Repression
It is the subconscious repression of ideas, impulses, and memories to block them from resurfacing unnecessarily and hindering the person’s piece of mind.
Projection
It personifies one’s feelings onto another by refusing to own up to such unwanted thoughts, feelings, or memories. Hence, the person projects them onto another as a form of a shift in perspective to make such unwanted instances appear as an external threat directed from the external antagonistic outside world rather than relating it to its internal origin.
Intellectualisation
Using logic and reason to avoid uncomfortable emotions involves a form of detachment when speaking about an emotional experience, memory, or thought.
Dissociation
It is the disconnecting of one’s self from their own. It is when a person no longer relates to their sense of identity, their thoughts, feelings, and memories.
Dream Analysis
According to Freud, dream analysis is the royal road to the unconscious in his dream interpretation as a way of tapping into the unconscious.
