okay let's talk defense mechanisms so defense mechanisms is a category that you may see on either level of the exam so we're going to talk about what a defense mechanism is and how do they manifest and I'm going to do that by giving scenarios for each of our different defense mechanisms I do want to preface this by saying I'm not going to go over every single defense mechanism there's tons of them I'm going to go over some of the main or most common ones seen myp for studying defense mechanisms is that it's going to be more than just memorizing the definitions of these remember we're always looking to take our knowledge of the content to the next level because that's what is required in this test memorizing definitions is not going to be enough so I'm going to give examples and even better if you can come up with your own examples for each one because as we know taking real life examples and creating real life examples from content it's going to help our retrieval on test day to memorize that information because we're using it and applying it to different scenarios so I encourage you to come up with your own examples as we're going through these what is a defense mechanism a defense mechanism is something that we use to protect ourselves from unpleasant feelings actions and thoughts key thing here that's why it's in bold these are unconscious reactions that we might not even be aware of and why do we use defense mechanisms it's a way to protect ourselves and our ego from pain hurt painful memories and it's really to protect oursel from harm and vulnerability defense mechanisms were first proposed by Freud and then later developed by his daughter Anna okay we're going to jump on into compensation making up for a real or perceived weakness so if you perceive you have a weakness you're going to do something to make up for that deficit my example here is someone who has problems in their marriage may excel and go above and beyond at work so maybe they're really bringing home a big paycheck and able to provide for their family because there's other ways that they're trying to compensate for those marriage problems studying is a defense mechanism that we actually use and that's compensation studying right we might have a perceived weakness in a certain area um when we're studying math is not a strength of mine so to compensate for that weakness I would have to study even harder in that category I'm making up for that weakness I'm compensating for that area that I know I'm not as strong in okay conversion repression of an aventor feeling is expressed in a bodily function or disruption in the body when you see conversion a memory trick is that you should automatically think of some physical symptoms we know that our way sometimes of trying to repress certain feelings or memories it will come out in certain ways in the body right that might be in headaches that might be in chest pain we know that there is a definite Mind Body Connection so my example here is someone who is unprepared for a test gets physically sick with nausea and headache the day of the test right probably some subconscious anxiety stress about not being ready to take this test conversion also can look um like a variety of different things it could be issues with feeling in the limbs it can be problems with eyesight fogginess all because there's repressing of a certain feeling and it's having a physical symptom denial blocking events from our awareness denial of actions or feelings in the ability to admit something has happened so in denial we are denying that this some sort of external stimuli has even occurred we're blocking that out of our awareness we can't even admit to ourselves that something happened very common thing is just to deny right also very common amongst Children and adolescents right did you do this no it wasn't me right that's the first thing they say is that they're not going to admit that they were the ones to do it why that is is because subconsciously we're trying to prevent some sort of negative feeling my example here is a student is caught cheating on a test by the teacher in denial what would be the response it was not me I didn't do it so denying cheating and is adamant he did not do it dissociation dissociation is when someone has almost like an outof Body Experience they're having a momentary loss of connection to the world you might even hear people say I felt like I was not connected to my body I I know I was doing I was committing acts but I didn't feel like I was part of myself being separated from oneself or being separated from reality um you might have an example I've seen where someone commits an act of aggression and an act of violence and they're like I was having an outof body experience it's kind of this blind rage they did not even remember doing it my example here is someone who gets into an auto accident cannot remember driving or being involved the next day it happened right but they had this kind of outof Body Experience probably due to Adrenaline or ways you know we need to protect ourselves from this traumatic event dissociated from self dissociated from reality displacement versus projection this is a I put these two together because these are ones that people commonly get mixed up or have difficulty understanding the difference between the two so I'm going to go through them and give an example um make sure you spend a little extra time on displacement versus projection because it can be tricky displacement transfer of negative emotion from one person to an unrelated person or thing I'm mad so I'm going to take it out on someone else I'm mad so I'm going to take it out on an object right I what this could mean is I'm mad I'm punch the wall I'm transferring that negative emotion into the wall when I punch it example here you've had a bad day at work and come home and yell at your wife and children obviously they were not at work with you they had nothing to do with it you're displacing your anger with work onto family members right often with displacement we displace our negative feelings onto the people we love the most right happens very very frequently in any sort of relationship projection when you project your thoughts and feelings on on to someone else I'm not displacing it onto them I'm projecting my feelings and associating it to you example here you have a drinking problem but suggest that is really your wife who struggles with her drinking so I don't have a drinking problem it's you that has a drinking problem I don't have trouble with finances you must have trouble with finances so it's your thoughts and feelings and your um giving them ownership to someone else I'm feeling anxious I'm feeling frustrated you must be feeling anxious and frustrated projecting thoughts and feelings onto someone else identification with aggressor so this is when a victim takes the role of the aggressor and imitates their behavior why this happens this defense mechanism it's a way to protect oneself from harm right it's this very situational thing of if you can't beat them join them right I need to protect myself so I'm going to do the same behavior that you're doing to me victim taking on some of those behaviors of the negative behavior that's being done to them common example here a child's being abused by their father comes to school and is physically aggressive to other students remember if you see children acting out in some cases it might be what they see modeled for them at home so maybe they're seeing aggression at home they're identifying with the aggressor introjection accepting another person's attitudes beliefs and values as their own especially the ones that they find desirable this is very common amongst adolescents right they want to be just like their friends they want to fit in so my example here is a teenager buys all name brand clothes because they perceive all the popular kids wear designed clothes I want to be a popular kid I want to have their values and beliefs as my own so I'm going to go out and buy all those brandname clothes another example is a it's when someone's internalizing the ideas of someone else so someone a child might be crying and they might be trying to stop that crying and you might say what's going on and they might be saying um my family members said that I can't cry it's weak they have heard these attitudes they've heard these beliefs and they're now taking it on as their own isolation of affect screening out painful Feelings by recalling a traumatic or painful event without experiencing the emotion associated with it so this is going to be those people that really are able to separate their emotions or don't show outwardly emotions I'm sure everyone knows someone that's like this they just cope with things in a different way so their way of expressing is not by expressing maybe they're not crying maybe they're not showing sadness or anger they might have flat affect they're isolating the event from the affect that they're presenting separating thoughts from feelings while accepting reality so this could be people that you know they really are stone-faced despite having had something really traumatic happen to them my example here is I should be upset that I wrecked my car on the way here but I don't really care right have you ever had a session where someone comes in and drops this really emotional bomb but they just have flat effect they don't seem to be showing any emotion related to it some people are really able to take out the emotion and it's so that they don't have to feel those feelings it's subconsciously that they're isolating those feelings from the way that they are presenting rationalization is one that happens so so so frequently right everyone has rationalized something at some point in their life rationalization is providing reasonable explanations to justify actions so rationalization is something to protect myself from admitting or allowing something negative to happen to me I'm going to find some sort of reason why this happened to me failures are a threat to the ego so we pick certain elements of the truth and deny others a lot of times rationalization can look like making excuses right um I was going to go to the gym but it was too cold outside right um reasonable explanation to justify my action but at the end of the day I did not go to the gym my example here is I would have won the race but the track was wet and I didn't really try that hard it's a way to kind of protect our ego from admitting that we didn't were not successful at something so if you failed a test oh I didn't really try that hard on that test um I didn't put much effort into it finding some justifiable explanation to protect ourselves from failure reaction formation expressing the opposite of your inner feelings in outward Behavior so I feel some sort of way but on the outside I'm acting the opposite behaving or reacting the opposite of your true intentions so my example here a woman expresses that she despises her sister and then buys her a best sister ever card internally despises her sister has all these negative feelings about it and then on the outside doing the EXA exact opposite right you are the best sister ever I love you so opposite of how feeling on the inside similarly this happens a lot in the workplace right internally I hate going to work I really don't want to be here this is the worst at work happy smile I love it here I love my job you're acting outwardly opposite of how you're feeling on the inside okay regression reversion to an earlier state of development when faced with unacceptable fearful or threatening thoughts so with progression a person usually goes back to a developmental stage that they have mastered and they go back to that developmental stage because it's safe and comforting um this is of course done subconsciously a lot of times we have regressions in things right um say a child was doet trained something is stressful for them traumatic for them they regress and now they're starting to have accidents an example of regression here is a college student who is stressed about upcoming finals be begin weding the bed at night right college students have mastered toilet training but maybe there's a lot of stress and this person is regressing to that earlier stage wetting the bed repression repression is often confused with denial repression is unconscious forgetting of painful ideas events or conflicts so you've repressed this so that when you go to talk about it it's as if you don't even remember it right you've put this thought so far away out of your memory it's as if you forgot it um whereas denial you're denying or not even admitting that something happened with repression it's not that you're denying that something happened but you're restraining the reaction to it repression is very common with people who are experiencing PTSD and why do we repress thoughts it's because it has been it's been helpful in stopping us from reliving that painful experience again my example here and is an adult may not recall that their parent died in a car accident 10 years before because they pushed the incident away into their unconscious that was probably a very painful and hurtful event for them so then it's almost as if they forgot it not not consciously right unconsciously they are did that forgetting subconsciously because they were probably trying to restrain those negative feelings associated with so repression often seen in like very traumatic things in someone that has experienced a lot of trauma sublimation redirecting or channeling strong emotions into an activity that is safe and production so sublimation is actually a very positive defense mechanism we have these strong emotions that might manifest in negative ways but we're turning it into a safe productive and positive opposite so most common example here someone who has anger issues takes up boxing as a way to channel their aggression someone who has anxiety channels that into yoga channels that into mindfulness so taking those negative emotions and putting it into a safe productive and healthy um activity we encourage our clients to do this all the time right we're always encouraging them to explore activities that are going to be safe and productive as a way to kind of Channel those energies undoing taking back in unconscious behavior that is unacceptable or hurtful so you might have done something and you realize that it was not acceptable or hurtful and now you want to take that back after insulting someone you spend the next hour praising them and showering with compliments I want to undo that action of insulting you so what I'm going to do is now I'm going to praise you with compliments I want to take that back so you're trying to undo the negative thing that you did because you knew that it was unacceptable or you know it was hurtful um undoing also is kind of like digging yourself out of the hole right happens to everyone you're trying to get out of it so you're trying to undo that negative thing that you did here are a few additional resources for defense mechanisms there there is a YouTube video that you can watch and then if you really want to get deep into these there's tons of defense mechanisms but this website here is going to give you 31 different ones with explanations um I definitely encourage you to refresh yourself on these defense mechanisms and test your knowledge with some practice questions okay let's go through some practice questions and remember with defense mechanisms there's going to be some you know for sure are not right so we will eliminate those but these are going to be more of those application questions so let's go ahead and jump in number one a man has been having difficulties at work when the wife inquires further about these problems he gets upset and accuses her of having issues of at work the husband is most likely using the defense mechanism of a reaction formation B projection C conversion or D displacement which one do you think here it's not reaction formation we're not seeing um an outward action that is different than our inside feelings there's no physical symptoms it's not conversion we're down to those two ones are we projecting here or displacing here remember displacement is usually I feel some sort of we and displace that anger onto someone else that's not what's Happening Here D is out what is happening is projecting I'm having difficulties at work so I'm projecting this insecurity onto my wife B is projecting number two Jessica was an aggressive child in elementary school who frequently got into trouble in high school she joined the track team and no longer displays aggression or gets into trouble at school Jessica is most likely using the defense mechanism of reaction formation sublimation intellectualization or dis placement was getting into trouble no longer having aggression since joining the track team it's not displacement no displacement of anger onto an object not finding out information about something and not the opposite of what we're feeling on the inside sublimation remember is when we take these um negative thoughts feelings or impulses and put them to use toward something positive joining the track team number three Eric is very dependent on his mom she does many things for him including washing and iring his clothes and making him dinner when asked about this by a friend Eric becomes defensive and says his friend is a mama's boy Eric is most likely using the defense mechanism of a rejection B denial C intellectualization or D displacement he's not outwardly denying as if this does not happen it's not denial not intellectualizing not finding out more information about something we once again left with projection or displacement his mom's doing a lot of things for him ironing clothes making him dinner and then instead he's asked about it by his friend and he says you're a mama's boy he's projecting onto the friend he's not displacing his anger okay number four what is an example of regression a someone who has experienced trauma begins to act out towards his family through aggression B someone who has been physically assaulted is not able to recount the attack in her therapy session someone who did not get the job they wanted begins crying and pout and cannot be consoled D someone who was embezzling money claims he was set up and denies having been involved we're looking for regression here key word regression is going back to an early developmental stage a acting out towards family through aggression that would be displacement displacing that anger someone who has been physically assaulted is not able to recount their attack that's going to be repression someone who did not get the job they wanted begins crying and pouting and cannot be consoled that's going back regressing to an earlier developmental stage usually when people don't get a job they're not pouting tantruming those type of things someone who was embezzling money claims he was set up denies having been involved that would be denial okay number five a CEO of a major corporation was bullied as a child he was frequently manipulated and made fun of by his peers in the workplace he laughs at his employees and meetings and pressures them into completing tasks for him this is an example of what a displacement B identification with aggressor C reaction formation or D introjection so we know that the CEO was bullied and now what is this person doing laughing at employees and pressuring them to do things we see some bullying Behavior now what is going on here he's not displacing that anger he's not acting the opposite of how he feels not taking on the beliefs of someone else as his own but this is very common identification with aggressor with aggressor was bullied as a child and now is taking on those same behaviors and is bullying in the workplace defense Anna's husband dies and she continues to set a place for him at the dinner table this is an example of a dissociation denial b c repression or D redirection we know it's not redirection that's not even a defense mechanism it's not dissociation we're not seeing any of that outof body stuff happening so now we're down to denial or repression these can look very similar denial is when you're denying some sort of external stimuli repression is not that you're denying what happens but you have learned to restrain thinking about that or bringing up something because it's protecting you so here setting the place table her husband's death that's an external stimuli it's going to be denial remember with repression you're not acting as if it never happened you are trying to restrain it and we don't have that information here so we can go ahead and say denial is a better [Music] oh