Justifying one's behaviors and motivations by substituting "good", acceptable reasons for these real motivations
Rationalization
You can't remember your father's funeral.
Repression
Burying a painful feeling or thought from your awareness though it may resurface in symbolic form. Sometimes considered a basis of other defense mechanisms.
Repression
Watching an old television show that reminds you of a happier time
Regression
Definition: Trying to reverse or "undo" a thought or feeling by performing an action that signifies an opposite feeling than your original thought or feeling
Undoing
Reverting to an older, less mature way of handling stresses and feelings
Regression
You have feelings of dislike for someone so you buy them a gift
Undoing
Not accepting reality because it is too painful.
Denial
Being mad at your mom and tearing your room apart
Displacement
Prompt: Someone on your team name a time you used a defense mechanism instead of facing the problem directly. What would you do now?
Good job!
Channeling a feeling or thought from its actual source to something or someone else.
Displacement
BONUS: your team gets 30 points!!!
YAY!
Adopting beliefs, attitudes, and feelings contrary to what you really believe
Reaction Formation
Intense rage redirected in the form of participation in sports such as boxing or football
Sublimation
Definition- Redirecting unacceptable, instinctual drives into personally and socially acceptable channels
sublimation
Handling your own pain by helping others.
Altruism
You are arrested for drunk driving several times but don't believe you have a problem with alcohol.
Denial
Attempting to avoid a painful thought or feeling by objectifying and emotionally detaching oneself from the feeling
Believing someone has a crush on you just because you have a crush on them
Projection
Prompt: What is a defense mechanism you've seen others use, and what happened?
Good job!
Attributing your own unacceptable thoughts or feelings to someone or something else
Projection
You think your best friend is absolutely worthless because he forgot a lunch date with you
Splitting
Everything in the world is seen as all good or all bad with nothing in between.
Splitting
Acting aloof and indifferent toward someone when you really dislike that person
Isolation of affect
Scenario: A person's treatment for cancer makes him lose his hair so he makes jokes about being bald.
humor