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Contents
- Abstract
- “Ups and Downs” of Interest in Defense Mechanisms
- Where Are Defenses Today?
- Defenses in Cognitive Psychology
- Memory Without Conscious Awareness
- Decision Making Outside of Awareness
- Selective Attention
- Defenses in Social Psychology
- Renaming of Defense Mechanisms
- Evidence for Defense Mechanisms
- Defenses in Developmental Psychology
- Attachment and Abuse
- Self-Esteem
- Emotions
- Moral Development
- Defenses in Personality Psychology
- Identity and Identity Status
- Gender Role Conflict and Sexual Identity
- Defense Mechanisms and Clinical Psychology
- Therapeutic Noncompliance
- Assessment of Coping Strategies and Outcomes
- Anticipating the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition
- Defenses and Symptoms
- Facilitating Differential Diagnosis
- Demonstrating the Benefits of Psychotherapy or Other Interventions
- Are Defenses Adaptive?
Figures and Tables
Abstract
Although the concept of the defense mechanism was rejected from academic psychology for a number of years, recent empirical studies show renewed interest in defenses. Cognitive psychologists have confirmed the existence of unconscious psychological processes, a requisite for defenses. Developmental, personality, and social psychologists have all found evidence for defense mechanisms that explicate psychological functioning. The relevance of this new information for clinical practice is discussed.
In many studies of human reaction to stress, it is assumed that adaptation occurs as a result of coping processes. In this article, I consider a second process used for adaptation: the defense mechanism. Following a brief review of the history of the defense mechanism in academic psychology, I discuss current renewed interest and findings regarding defenses in the areas of cognitive, developmental, social, and personality psychology. The final section focuses on the importance of defense mechanisms for clinical problems, including therapeutic noncompliance, diagnosis, and demonstration of positive treatment outcome.
Although there may be points of overlap between coping and defense mechanisms, there are also clear theoretical differences, as outlined in Table 1. Coping and defense mechanisms may be differentiated on the basis of their status as conscious or unconscious processes and on the basis of their being intentional or nonintentional operations. Two other characteristics sometimes thought to differentiate between coping and defense mechanisms—whether they are determined by situation or disposition, and whether they may be hierarchically arranged—are in fact more a matter of emphasis than critical differences. In addition, the idea that coping is related to psychological or...