Defense Mechanisms
Patterns of feelings, thoughts, and behaviors that are
unconscious and arise in response to a perceived psychic
conflict or danger. Defense mechanisms serve to reduce
anxiety.
1. Projection: perceiving and reacting to your own unacceptable
impulses as though they were occurring in someone else.
2. Denial: avoiding awareness of some painful aspect of reality. Often
seen with substance abuse and in grief.
3. Blocking: patient blocks out bad thoughts or memories, having no
memory of them.
4. Regression: returning to an earlier stage of development to avoid
tension and conflict.
5. Somatization: feelings that manifest as physical symptoms.
6. Identification: unconscious behavior that is patterned after someone
the patient considers “better” than himself/herself.
7. Displacement: taking out emotions or feelings on a less threatening
or less powerful target.
8. Isolation of Affect: failing to show or display the feelings associated
with a significant event.
9. Reaction Formation: transforming a socially unacceptable behavior
or emotion into a socially acceptable form.
10. Passive-Aggressive Behavior: passive and unconscious expression
of hostility.
11. Rationalization: supplying a reason for an action that could appear
logical, as opposed to the real reason, in order to justify an action.
12. Humor: using humor to cover the feelings associated with a stressful
situation or anxiety.
13. Altruism: a person engages in service to others, to help him/her deal
with his/her painful feelings.
Identify the type of defense mechanism used by
each patient description below:
a) A student who fails to do his work, claims her poor grades are due to
the fact that the teacher does not like her. ______________
b) A patient who states: “the tests may show that I have cancer, but they
are wrong. _______________
c) A husband who never appears angry with his spouse, but is repeatedly
late to her important events and occasions. _______________
d) A boy accuses his girlfriend of cheating on him, when in fact he is
secretly attracted to his girlfriend’s best friend. _______________
e) A child raised by a domineering and strict father becomes a drill
sergeant in the marines. _______________
f) A woman who fails to remember any details of her being raped as a
teenager. _______________
g) An elderly man who was tortured as a POW in World War II, talks
about the event in an even, mono-tone voice, without emotion.
_______________
h) A patient tells the ER doctor to stitch a tic-tac-toe board design on his
abdomen, after being stabbed during a robbery. ________________
i) A woman going through a divorce develops daily headaches and
fatigue. ____________
j) A six year-old child begins talking like a baby, following the birth of
his baby brother. _______________
k) A man who was yelled at at work by his boss, comes home and yells
at his wife and children for no apparent reason. _______________
l) A man who enjoys setting fires, decides to become a fireman.
_______________
m) A woman who lost her leg in an accident, volunteers at a camp for
children with physical disabilities. _______________
Answers to Defense Mechanism questions:
a) Rationalization
b) Denial
c) Passive-Aggressive
d) Projection
e) Identification
f) Blocking
g) Isolation of Affect
h) Humor
i) Somatization
j) Regression
k) Displacement
l) Reaction Formation
m) Altruism