Psychological projection

Part of a series of articles on
Psychoanalysis
Outside the Sigmund Freud Museum (Vienna).
Concepts Psychosexual development Psychosocial development (Erikson) Unconscious Preconscious Consciousness Psychic apparatus Id, ego and super-ego Libido Drive Transference Countertransference Ego defenses Resistance Projection Denial
Important figures Alfred Adler Michael Balint Wilfred Bion Josef Breuer Nancy Chodorow Max Eitingon Erik Erikson Ronald Fairbairn Paul Federn Otto Fenichel Sándor Ferenczi Anna Freud Sigmund Freud Erich Fromm Harry Guntrip Karen Horney Ernest Jones Carl Jung Melanie Klein Heinz Kohut Jacques Lacan Ronald Laing Margaret Mahler Jacques-Alain Miller Otto Rank Sandor Rado Wilhelm Reich Joan Riviere Isidor Sadger James Strachey Ernst Simmel Harry Stack Sullivan Susan Sutherland Isaacs Donald Winnicott
Important works The Interpretation of Dreams (1899) The Psychopathology of Everyday Life (1901) Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality (1905) Beyond the Pleasure Principle (1920) The Ego and the Id (1923)
Schools of thought Self psychology Lacanian Jungian Object relations Interpersonal Relational Ego psychology
Training Boston Graduate School of Psychoanalysis British Psychoanalytic Council British Psychoanalytical Society Columbia University Center for Psychoanalytic Training and Research International Psychoanalytical Association World Association of Psychoanalysis

Psychological projection was first conceptualized by Sigmund Freud as a defence mechanism in which a person unconsciously rejects his or her own unacceptable attributes by ascribing them to objects or persons in the outside world instead. Thus, projection involves psychically expelling one's negative qualities onto others, and is a common psychological process.^[1][2] Theoretically, projection and the related projective identification reduces anxiety by allowing the unconscious expression of the unwanted unconscious impulses or desires through displacement.^{[3][not in citation given]}

The theory was originally developed by Freud in his letters to Wilhelm Fliess - ""Draft H" deals with projection as a mechanism of defence"^[4] — and further refined by his daughter Anna Freud; it is sometimes referred to as Freudian projection.^{[5][unreliable source?]}

Overview

According to Sigmund Freud, "projection" is a psychological defence mechanism whereby one "projects" undesirable or unacceptable thoughts, motivations, desires, and feelings onto someone else. "Emotions or excitations which the ego tries to ward off are 'split out' and then felt as being outside the ego... perceived in another person", wrote Otto Fenichel.^[6] It is a common process, something normal people do.^[1] The related defence of projective identification differs from projection in that the impulse or desire projected onto an external object does not appear alien and distant from the ego because the self maintains the connection with that which is projected.^[7]

In one example of the process, a person might have thoughts of infidelity with respect to a spouse or other partner. Instead of dealing with these undesirable thoughts consciously, the subject unconsciously sees these feelings as belonging to the other person, and begins to think that "the other" has thoughts of infidelity and may be having an affair. In this way, the subject may obtain "acquittal by his conscience - if he projects his own impulses to faithlessness on to the partner to whom he owes faith", wrote Freud.^[8] In this sense, projection is related to denial, a more primitive defence mechanism than projection, allowing a person to protect the conscious mind from a feeling that is otherwise threatening.

Projection can also be established as an attempt to obtain or justifying certain actions that would normally be found unacceptable.^{[citation needed]} This often means projecting false accusations, information, etc., onto an individual for the sole purpose of maintaining a self-created illusion.^{[citation needed]} One of the many problems with this process comes from the object relations theory which suggests that people relate to others and situations in their adult lives as shaped by family experiences during infancy. In this view, "something dangerous that is felt inside can be moved outside - a process of 'projection' " - and the result is "the projector may become somewhat depleted and rendered limp in character, as he loses part of his personality", according to Melanie Klein.^[9]

Compartmentalization, splitting, and projection are seen as ways that a fragile ego attempts to maintain the illusion that it is completely in control at all times, something normal people also do. While engaged in projection, individuals can be unable to access alternative memories, intentions, and experiences, even about their own nature in dissociation, as in Dissociative identity disorder.^[10]

Historical uses

The historian and librarian Peter Gay describes projection as "the operation of expelling feelings or wishes the individual finds wholly unacceptable—too shameful, too obscene, too dangerous—by attributing them to another."^[11]

The philosopher Ludwig Feuerbach based his theory of religion in large part upon the idea of projection, that is the idea that an anthropomorphic deity is the outward projection of man's anxieties and desires.^[3]

The "Shadow"—a term used in Jungian psychology to describe one kind of psychological projection—refers to the projected material from the individual's personal unconscious.^{[12][unreliable source?]} Jungians consider that "Political agitation in all countries is full of such projections, just as much as the backyard gossip of little groups and individuals".^[13] Marie-Louise Von Franz extended the view of projection, stating that: "... wherever known reality stops, where we touch the unknown, there we project an archetypal image".^[14]

Psychological projection is one of the medical explanations of bewitchment that attempts to diagnose the behavior of the afflicted children at Salem in 1692. The historian John Demos asserts that the symptoms of bewitchment experienced by the afflicted girls in Salem witch trials during the witchcraft persecutions were due to the girls undergoing psychological projection.^[15] Demos argues the girls had convulsive fits caused by repressed aggression and were able to project this aggression without blame because of the speculation of witchcraft and bewitchment.^{[dubious – discuss]}

Counter-projection

When addressing psychological trauma, the defence mechanism is sometimes counter-projection, including an obsession to continue and remain in a recurring trauma-causing situation and the compulsive obsession with the perceived perpetrator of the trauma or its projection.^{[citation needed]}

Jung writes that "All projections provoke counter-projection when the object is unconscious of the quality projected upon it by the subject."^[16]

Psychopathology

In psychopathology, projection is an especially commonly used defence mechanism in people diagnosed with Borderline personality disorder, and paranoia, a thought process that typically includes persecutory delusions born of fear. Paranoia is a common symptom of psychosis as well, such as schizophrenia. "Patients with Paranoid personality disorder, for example, use projection as a defence mechanism because it allows them to disavow unpleasant feelings and attribute them to others", according to Glen O. Gabbard.^[17]

In the DSM-IV-TR, paranoia is diagnosed in the form of:^[18]

• paranoid personality disorder^[19]
• paranoid schizophrenia (a subtype of schizophrenia)
• the persecutory type of delusional disorder, which is also called "querulous paranoia" when the focus is to remedy some injustice by legal action.^[20]

According to the psychoanalyst Otto Kernberg, all "the primitive defences, such as splitting, projection and projective identification, are commonly connected with primitively organized personalities", such as borderline personality disorder.^[17]

Projective techniques

Drawing on the theory that "the individual projects something of himself or herself into everything he or she does, in line with Gordon Allport's concept of expressive behaviour",^[21] projective techniques have been devised to aid personality assessment. "The two best-known projective techniques are the Rorschach ink-blots and the Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)".^[22]

Criticism

Later studies were critical of Freud's theory. Research supports the existence of a false consensus effect whereby humans have a broad tendency to believe that others are similar to themselves, and thus "project" their personal traits onto others. This applies to good traits as well as bad traits and is not a defence mechanism for denying the existence of the trait within the self.^[23]

Instead, Newman, Duff, and Baumeister (1997) proposed a new model of defensive projection. In this view, people try to suppress thoughts of their undesirable traits, and these efforts make those trait categories highly accessible — so that they are then used all the more often when forming impressions of others. The projection is then only a by-product of the real defensive mechanism.^{[citation needed]}

See also

References

External links

• Projection (outofthefog.net)