Untitled Flashcards Set

Regression

Retreating to an earlier psychosexual stage, where some psychic energy remains fixated

Wants to go to his grandma’s house to play cards and eat her chocolate chip cookies

Reaction formation

Switching unacceptable impulses into their opposites

Makes a big show of expressing indifference about being on “the stupid soccer team”

Projection

Disguising one’s own threatening impulses by attributing them to others

Talks a lot about how mad his parent is at the coach

Rationalization

Offering self-justifying explanations in place of the real, more threatening unconscious reasons for one’s actions

Explains that he wasn’t working very hard in the tryouts and could have made the team if he really wanted to

Displacement

Shifting sexual or aggressive impulses toward a more acceptable or less threatening object or person

Yells at his little brother for no real reason

Sublimation*

Transferring of unacceptable impulses into socially valued motives

Decides instead to join the cross-country running team, where all are accepted

Denial

Refusing to believe or even perceive painful realities

Insists that there was an error on the team list and he’s going to set things right with the coach