In this video, we're going to be going over Freud's defense mechanisms. So Freud came up with quite a few different defense mechanisms. We're going to go over the 6 most commonly talked about ones here. And it might seem like a lot, but don't be intimidated because I would bet that you've actually heard most of these terms before. His defense mechanisms have kind of worked their way into pop culture over the last few decades, and most of us actually use these terms quite casually now.

So you'll probably be familiar with most of these terms already. Now according to Freud, defense mechanisms are essentially cognitive distortions that are designed to alleviate conflict, between the id and superego. So these are going to be essentially deployed by the ego in particularly stressful situations when it's really, really hard for whatever reason to kind of mediate or alleviate that conflict between the id and superego. The ego will kind of, you know, dish out one of these defense mechanisms to kind of distort our cognitions, change our way of thinking, in what is logically or technically like a flawed or inaccurate way in order to alleviate that tension and, you know, make us feel a bit better. And these are typically going to be unconscious, so they are deployed unconsciously.

We don't know that this is happening. So we're going to go over again the 6 most common ones. So we're going to start with repression. So the idea behind repression is that essentially our ego is going to be prohibiting specific memories or emotions from ever becoming conscious. So before those things can even enter consciousness, they are kind of getting cut off, and we basically cannot access them.

So, for example, not remembering a traumatic car accident. Now, to be clear, this is not exactly how memory works, so, you know, memorize this definition as a definition of repression according to Freud. Don't take this as an actual fact or how memory and forgetting works. Just keep that in mind. Alright.

Next up, we have denial, and denial is essentially a refusal or an inability to accept a fact or situation. And, again, this is happening unconsciously, so it's kind of like getting cut off from the source before it could ever become conscious. So, for example, just like an inability to accept that you have been given a terminal health diagnosis, that would be denial. Next up, we have displacement. So displacement is essentially when we are directing emotions or actions toward unrelated people or objects.

So, for example, a child breaking a toy when they are mad at their parents or if you ever get angry at somebody and, like, slam a door. So you're feeling the emotion toward, you know, this person and then you displace that emotion onto a different person or a different object. That is displacement. Next up, we have projection. And projection is when you basically attribute your own negative thoughts or feelings onto somebody else.

So if you have ever had the experience of, like, being in a really bad mood and, like, weirdly every other person that you seem to encounter also seems to be in a bad mood, that may have been projection. No judgment. It happens to everybody. So for example, you know, asking your partner, why are you so annoyed? When, like, you are the annoyed one.

That would be projection. Next up, we have regression. So the idea of regression is essentially a person reverting to a previous stage of psychological development. So for example, a 4-year-old begins acting like a baby when their parents bring home a newborn. Now to be clear, developmentally speaking, we don't see regression in typically developing healthy children.

What you might see are behaviors that we would expect in a younger child. So this does happen sometimes. You know, this 4-year-old might start asking to be fed with a bottle or asking to sleep in a crib, behaviors that we associate with younger children. But this child has not literally reverted to a previous stage of development. They're still cognitively a 4-year-old.

They're just developing or showing some behaviors that we associate with younger kids. So again, in typically developing children, we do not see actual regression. And then our final defense mechanism is reaction formation. So the idea of reaction formation is that we unconsciously replace threatening inner desires with the complete opposite feeling. So, for example, this is kind of a famous example, but a man who feels threatened by his own homosexual thoughts would act homophobic in response.

So he has these, you know, threatening inner feelings, or maybe he's attracted to another man. He finds that threatening for whatever reason, and so he decides to kind of respond with the opposite behavior, in this case acting homophobic. So that would be an example of reaction formation. Alright, so those are some of Freud's famous defense mechanisms, and I will see you guys in our next video. Bye bye.