Excerpts from The Ego Freud Ego and t he Mechanism Mechanism s of Defense Defense by Ann a Freud Compiled by Phillip W. Weiss, LCSW
CHAPTER 1 – THE EGO AS THE SEAT OF OBSERVATION All Al l t he defen d efensi sive ve measu m easures res of the th e ego agains agai nstt the t he i d are ar e carri car ried ed out o ut silently and invisi bly. The most we can can ever ever do is reconstru ct them in retrospect: w e can can never really really w itness them in operation. … defini defini te indications of o bsessional exaggeration exaggeration suggest that it is of the nature of reaction and that it conceals conceals a long-standing confl ict. Here Here again, again, observation of th e particular mod e of defense does not reveal reveal anything of the process by whi ch it has been evolved. evolved.
CHAPTER 2 – THE APPLICATION APPLICA TION OF ANAL YTIC TECHNIQUE TECHNIQUE TO THE THE STUDY OF THE PSYCHIC INSTITUTIONS The transference transference phenomenon which we have interpreted interpreted falls into two parts, both of whic h have their origi n in the past: a libi dinal or aggressive element, element, which belongs to t he id, and a defense mechanism mechanism , which w e must attribut e to the ego ego – in the most ins truct ive cases, cases, to the ego of the same infantil e period period i n which t he id impul se first arose. When When the tr ansference ansference reaction reaction s take this form [transference of defense], defense], we cannot cannot c ount on the patient’s wi llin g cooperation, as we can can when they are are of the type first descri bed [transference of lib idinal impulses]. Wheneve Wheneverr the int erpretation erpretation touches on the unknow n elements elements of the ego, its activ ities in th e past, past, that ego ego is t otally oppo sed to the work of analysis. Only the analysis analysis of t he ego’s ego’s u nconsc ious d efense efense operation operation s can enable us to reconstruct the transformations which the instincts have undergone.
CHAPTER 3 – THE MECHANISMS OF DEFENSE It [the term term “ defense” defense” ] occur s for the first t ime in 1894 1894 … to describ describ e the ego’s stru ggle against against painful o r unendurable ideas or affects. Were Were it not for t he intervention of the ego or of t he external external forces which t he ego ego represents, every every insti nct wou ld kno w only on e fate fate – gratification.
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To these nine methods of d efense … (regression, repression, reaction formation, isolation, undoing, projection, introjection, turning against the self and reversal), we must add a tenth, which pertains rather to the study of the normal than to that of neurosis: subli mation, or displacement of instinctual aims. But repression is not only the most efficacious [mechanism of defense], it is also the most dangerous mechanism. The disassoci ation from th e ego entailed by the with drawal of conscious ness from whol e tracts of ins tinct ual and affective life may destroy the integrity of t he personality for good and all. Thus repression becomes the basis of compromise formation and neurosis. The consi derations which determine the ego’s choi ce of mechanism [of defense] remain un certain. These diff erences of opini on [ over emergence of defense mechanisms] bri ng home to us the fact that the chronology of psychic processes is stil l one of the most obscur e fields of analytic theory.
CHAPTER 5 – THE SOURCE OF ANXIETY AND DANGER In this cont ext it [th e superego] appears as the originator o f all neuroses. The cruci al point is t hat, whether it be dread of th e outside world o r dread of t he superego, it is the anxiety whi ch sets th e defensive process going. The prognosis for the solution of the psychic conflicts is most favorable when the motive for the defense against in stinc t has been that of superego anxiety.
CHAPTER 6 – DENIAL IN FANTASY In all these situations of co nfli ct the person’s ego is seeking to repudiate a part of hi s own id. Ultimately all such measures are designed to secure the ego and to save it from experiencing unpleasure. The greater the imp ortance of the outsi de world as a source of pleasure and int erest, the more opport unity is th ere to experience unpleasure from th at quarter.
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… the inner struggle between the instinct s and the ego, of which neurotic sy mptom s are the sequel. Under the infl uence of a shock, such as a sudden loss of a love object, it [t he ego] denies the facts and subs titut es for the unbearable reality some agreeable delusion. The ego’s capacity for denying reality is wholly inconsistent with another funct ion, greatly prized by it – its c apacity to recogn ize and crit ically to test the objects of reality.
CHAPTER 7 – DENIAL IN WORD AND ACT Just as, in the neurotic conflict, perception of a prohibited instinctual stim ulus is w arded off by means of repression, so the infantil e ego resorts to denial in order not to become aware of some painful impr ession from without. The organization of th e mature ego become unified thro ugh synthesis and this m ethod of denial is then discarded and is resumed only if the relation to reality has been gravely distur bed and the funct ion of reality testing s uspended. When employed to excess, it [d enial of reality] is a mechanism wh ich produc es in the ego excrescences, eccentrici ties, and idi osyncr asies, of which, once the period of primi tive denial is finally past, it is hard to get rid.
CHAPTER 8 – RESTRICTION OF THE EGO Instead of perceiving the painful impr ession and subsequently canceling it by with drawing its c athexis, it is open to the ego to refuse to encounter the dangerous external situ ation at all. It [the ego] can take to fl ight and so, in the truest sense of the word , “ avoid” the occasions of unpleasure. A person suff ering fr om a neuroti c i nhibit io n is defendi ng hims elf against the translation into action of some prohibited instinctual impulse, i.e., against t he liberation of unpleasure through some int ernal danger. … the diff erence between inhibit ion and ego restricti on is t hat in the former the ego is defending itself against its own inner pro cesses and in the latter against external stimu li.
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In many cases, if they [chi ldren] lack external guidance, their choice of occupation is determined not by their particular gifts and capacities for subli mation but by th e hope of securing t hemselves as quick ly as may be from anxiety and unpleasure. In order to avoid suff ering, it [the ego] checks the development of anxiety and inflicts deformities upon itself.
CHAPTER 9 – IDENTIFICATION WITH THE AGGRESSOR By impersonating the aggressor, assuming his attributes or imitating his aggression, the child transforms himself from the person threatening into the person making t he threat. In “ identifi cation with t he aggressor” we recogni ze a by no means uncomm on stage in the normal development of t he superego. The moment the criti cism is i nternalized, the offense is externalized. This means that the mechanism of id entification o f the aggressor is suppl emented by anoth er defensive measure, namely, the projectio n of guilt. Vehement indignation at someone else’s wron gdoin g is th e precursor of and substitute for guilty feelings on its own account. When analysis b ring s into the patient’s consci ousness genuine, uncons cious , aggressive impu lses, the damned-up affect wil l seek relief throu gh abreaction in the transference. But, if his aggression is due to his identifying himself with what supposed to be our criticis m, it will not be in the least affected by his “ giving it practical expression” and “ abreacting” it.
CHAPTER 10 – A FORM OF ALTRUISM In repression the objectionable idea is thr ust back int o the id, while in projection it is displaced into the outside world. Another poin t in w hich proj ectio n resembles repression is t hat it is not associated with any particu lar anxiety sit uation but m ay be moti vated equally by ob jective anxiety, superego anxiety, and inst inct ual anxiety. They [chil dren] employ it [m echanism of projectio n] as a means of repudiating th eir own activi ties and wishes wh en these become dangerous and laying the responsibil ity fo r them at the door of so me external agent.
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The mechanism of proj ection dist urbs our h uman relations w hen we project our won jealousy and attribute to ot her people our own aggressive acts. The surrender of on e’s own wi shes to another person and th e attempt to secure their fulfil lment thus vicarious ly are, indeed, comparable to the int erest and pleasure with whi ch one watches a game in whic h one has no st ake itself. Various factors determine the selection of the object in f avor of whom in stinc tual impul ses are surrendered. The surrender of in stinc tual wishes to an object better qualified to fulfi ll them oft en determines the relation o f a girl to s ome man whom she chooses to represent her – to the detriment of any true object relation. We know that parents sometimes delegate to their ch ildren their projects fo r their own l ives, in a manner at once altruist ic and egoistic . It remains an open question whether there is such a thing as a genuinely altruistic relation to one’s fellowmen, in which the gratification of one’s own in stinc t plays no part at all, even in some displ aced and sublimated form.
CHAPTER 11 – THE EGO AND THE ID AT PUBERTY … not only the physical but also the psychic p henomena of puberty are of the utmo st imp ortance in the development of the indivi dual and that here are the beginning and the root of the sexual life, of the capacity for love, and of character as a whole. It is in t he early infantil e sexual period and no t at puberty th at the cruci al steps in development are taken, the most impo rtant pregenital phases of sexual organization are passed through , the different component insti ncts are developed and broug ht int o action and the normalit y or abnormality of the indivi dual, his capacity o r incapacity fo r love, are determined. In each c ase – in the early infantil e period, at puberty, and at t he clim acteric – a relatively st rong id con front s a relatively weak ego. A man’s id remains much th e same throughout li fe. The immu tability o f the id is matched by th e mutability of the ego.
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… in its confli cts wit h the instinct s it [the ego] makes use of different defense mechanisms in the different periods. Objective anxiety is t he antici pation of su ffering wh ich may be inflicted on the child as punishment by outside agents, a kind of “ forepain” which governs th e ego’s b ehavior, no m atter whether the expected punis hment always takes place or not . It is certain that in the minds of little children urgent instinctual demands conflic t with acute objective anxiety, and the symptoms of infantile neurosis are attempts at solving this conflict. But in little children the ego is the product of the conflict itself, and that side of the ego which, throug hout l ife, will have to deal with the task of mastering the instinc ts only co mes to birth at this early period under the combi ned pressure of the id’s i nstin ctual demands and that objective anxiety which is external in origin . More and mor e the princ iples held up to th e child by hi s parents and teachers – t heir wi shes, requirements, and ideals – are intr ojected. In this str uggle to preserve its own existence unchanged the ego is motiv ated equally by ob jective anxiety and anxiety of consc ience and employs ind iscri minately all the methods of d efense to which it has ever had recourse in infancy and durin g the latency period.
CHAPTER 12 – INSTINCTUAL ANXIETY DURING PUBERTY As we have seen, the indir ect effect of th e intensifi catio n of instinctual impulses is the redoubling of the subject’s efforts to m aster the instincts. In neurosis we fin d that there is always a connection between the repression of an instin ct and the nature or the quality of the instin ct repressed. Thus hysterics repress the genital impulses associated with the object wish es of the oedipus comp lex but are more or less indiff erent or tolerant in th eir attitude toward ot her insti nctual wi shes, e.g., anal or aggressive impul ses. Obsession al neuroti cs repress the anal-sadisti c wishes whi ch, in con sequence of regression, have become the vehicles of their sexuality, but t hey tolerate oral gratific ation and have no particular mistrust of any exhibitionistic impulses which they may have, so long as they are not directly connected with the nucleus of their neurosis. Again, in melancholi a it is th e oral tendencies in parti cular whic h are repudiat3ed, while phobic p atients repress the impuls es associ ated with the castration compl ex. In none of these cases is there an indiscrim inate repudiation of
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insti nct, and we always find in analyzing t hem that there is a defini te relation between the quality of t he instinct repressed and the subject’s reasons for expelling it from consciousness. A dif ferent pi ctur e meets our eyes when, in analyzing adolescents, we investigate their repudiation of i nstin ct. Young people who pass through t he kind of ascetic phase which I have in mind s eem to fear the quantit y rather than the quality of their instincts. This adolescent mis trust o f insti nct has a dangerous tendency to spread; it may begin with inst inctu al wishes proper and extend to the most ordinary physi cal needs. Where … the ego is str ong enough to carry thr ough it s repudiation of insti nct wit hout any deviation, the result is a paralysis of t he subject’s vital activiti es – a kind of catatonic con ditio n, which can no lon ger be regarded as a normal phenomenon of p uberty but m ust be recognized as a psychoti c affection. … we stil l have the impr ession that amore primiti ve and less compl ex process is at work in t he asceticism of adolescence than in repression p roper…. To describe the dual attit ude of mankind t oward the sexual life – consti tutio nal aversion cou pled with passio nate desire – Bleuler coined the term ambivalence. With the accession of i nstin ctual energy he becomes mor e a creature of insti nct; that is natural and needs no furth er explanation. He also becomes more moral and ascetic, the explanation being t hat a conflict is taking place between the ego and the id. But he becomes, besides, more intellig ent and all his intellectual int erests are keener. Adolescent intellectu ality seems merely to min is ter to daydr eams. As we have seen, asc etici sm , with it s flat prohib it ion of i nsti nct, does not generally accompli sh what the adolescent hopes. Since the danger is omnipr esent, he has to devise many means of su rmoun ting i t. The think ing over of the insti nctual confl ict – its intellectualization – would seem to be a suitable means.
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The philo sophy of l ife which they constr uct – it may be their demand for revolut ion in th e outsi de world – is really their respons e to the perception of th e new inst inctu al demands of their ow n id, which th reaten to revolut ioni ze their whole liv es. This intellectualization of i nstin ctual life, the attempt to lay hold on the instinc tual process by conn ecting them with ideas which can be dealt with i n consc iousn ess, is one of the most general, earliest, and most necessary acquirements of the human ego. We regard it not as an activ ity of the ego but as one of its indi spensable components. The intellectual work ed performed by the ego durin g the latency period and in adult life is i ncomp arably mo re solid , more reliable, and, above all, much m ore closely conn ected with action. The danger which th reatens the ego is that it may be submerged by the instinct s; what it dreads above all is the quantit y of inst inct. The task which asceticism s ets itself is to keep the id with in lim its by simply impos ing prohibition s; the aim of intellectualization is to link up insti nctual proc esses closely wi th ideational content, and so render them accessibl e to conscio usness and amenable to control . Insofar as the superego is at this period st ill cathected with libi do derived from the relation to the parents, it is itself tr eated as a suspi cious incestuou s object and falls a victi m to the consequences of asceticism. … asceticis m, itself due to an inc rease in inst inctu al danger, actually leads to the ruptur e of the relation w ith t he superego and so r enders inoperative the defensive measures pro mpted by superego anxiety, with the result that the ego is still more violently t hrown b ack to the level of pur e insti nctual anxiety and the primiti ve protective mechanisms characteristic of t hat level. But, if the ascetic attitude is rigo rousl y maintained, if the process of intellectualization o verruns the whol e field of mental life, and its relations to other people are based exclus ively on changin g identifi cations, it wil l be diffi cult for a teacher or analyst to decide from observations how much may still be regarded as a transiti onal phase in normal development and how muc h is already pathologi cal.
CONCLUSION There is still considerable obscurity about the historical connection between typic al experiences in indivi dual development and the produc tion of partic ular modes of defense.
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In the present state of our knowledge we can already speak wi th greater certainty about t he parallels between t he ego’s defensive measures against external and against int ernal danger. Repression g ets rid of insti nctual derivatives, just as external stim uli are aboli shed by denial. Reaction fo rmation secures the ego against the return of repressed impul ses from with in, while by fantasies in which t he real situation is reversed denial is sustained against overthrow from wit hout. Inhibiti on of instinctual impulses corresponds to the restrictions imposed on the ego to avoid unpleasure form external sources. Intellectualization of the insti nctual proc esses as a precaution against danger form within i s analogou s to the const ant alertness of the ego to dangers from wit hout. The existence of neurotic sym ptom s in its elf indicates that the ego has been overpow ered, and every return of r epressed imp ulses, with its sequel in compro mise formation , shows that some plan for defense has miscarri ed and the go has suffered a defeat. But the ego is victori ous when its defensive measures effect t heir pur pose, i.e., when th ey enable it to restric t the development of anxiety and unp leasure and so to transfo rm the instinc ts that, even in diffic ult ci rcums tances, some measure of gratification is secured, thereby establishing the most harmonious relations pos sible between the id, the superego, and th e forces of the outside world.
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