ways of dealing with difficult feelings

1. Defense mechanism
Presented by-
Sakuntala Giri
SUM Nursing College

2. Ego defense mechanism
Motive cause conflicts & in turn conflicts cause anxiety, stress and
frustration in the individual.
In our life we want many things and have different goals, but we
can not achieve everything we aspire for, then we become
frustrated when we fail in our attempt.
These failure and frustration hurt our ego and cause a lot of anxiety
and feeling of guilt.
Under such circumstances, we do not want to accept failure easily.
Instead we resort to certain mechanisms by which we can
safeguard our self respect.

3. Cont…
The mechanisms used for maintaining harmony
with environment can be grouped into 2
categories:
(i)Direct method
(ii)Indirect method

4. Cont..
• Direct method: It employed by the individual
intentionally at the conscious level, which
includes,
Increasing trials or improving efforts.
Adopting compromising .
Indirect method: Indirect methods are those
method by which a person tries to seek
temporary adjustment to protect him for the
time being against a psychological danger.

5. Cont..
The ego usually copes with anxiety through
rational means. When anxiety is too painfu,the
individual copes by using defense mechanism
to protect the ego and diminish anxiety, such
mechanism are called mental mechanism or
ego defense mechanism.

6. Definition
Ego defense mechanism are methods of
attempting to protect self and cope with
basic drives or emotionally painful
thoughts, feelings or events.
Ego defense mechanism are also called
defense mechanism are considered as
protective barrier to manage instinct and
affect in stressful situation.(Frued,1946)

7. Purpose
To reduce anxiety or fear.
To resolve a mental conflict.
To protect one’s self esteem.
To protect one’s sense of security.

9. Defense Mechanisms
• Projection — In this mechanism, an individual puts the
blame of his own failure upon others and some
unfavourable factors of his environment. Blaming others
for his mistake .e.g. a student comes late to the class
excuses by saying that the bus or train was late or
traffic jam.
• Sublimation — It is a defence mechanism in which
unacceptable desire are redirected into socially accepted
channels. e.g. Anger –Kick boxing -- some people, poem
writing, engage in social services etc.
• Repression — Pushes threatening thoughts back into the
unconscious - Posttraumatic Stress Disorder- PTSD –
Common with veterans and victims of sexual abuse
• Rationalisation — An individual tries to justify his failure
by giving some excuses e.g. A student makes use of
rationalisation, when he tries to blame teachers for
hard question paper.
• Compensation — It is an attempt to cover ones deficiency
in one field by exhibiting his strength in another field e.g.
If a student is not good in his studies, may show his
ability in sports.

10. Defense Mechanisms
• Identification — It is a process which may
operate outside and beyond conscious
awareness. Hero worshipping by an individual is
a sort of identification where an individual
identifies himself with a popular hero or an
actor.
• Displacement — An individual does something
as a substitute for something else e.g. If a
wife gets angry with Husband and cannot say
anything to him, she beats her child.
• Withdrawal —- Some persons withdraw
themselves from the circumstances that cause
tension, frustration or pain e.g. If a person is
being humiliated or laughed at, he may shut
himself in a room and may not need any one.
• Day-dreaming —- It is a defence mechanism
which sometimes helps in making adjustment.
e.g. A young man who has been jilted in love,
dreams of becoming a bride groom and feels
satisfaction in the imaginary world.

11. Regression:Reverting to an older less mature way of handling stress
and feeling. Eg, An adult throws a temper tantrum when he does not
get his own way.
Supression: Voluntary rejection of unacceptable thoughts or feelings
from conscious awareness. Eg; Student who failed in an
examination,states he is not ready to talk about his marks.
Substitution: Unconscious replacement of unacceptable
impulses,attitude,need or emotion with those that are more
acceptable
Eg:A student nurse decides to work in teaching side,because she is
unable to master in clinical competencies.
Undoing: Trying to reverse or “undo” a thought or feeling by
performing an action that signifies an opposite feeling than original
thought or feeling.
Eg: You have feelings of dislikes for someone,so you buy them a gift.

12. Defense Mechanisms
• Denial – Simplest form of self
defence.Unconscious refusal to admit an
unacceptable idea or behaviour. eg. If a person
is diagnosed as having cancer, they will first
get shock, then start denying reality saying
perhaps that the diagnosis was not proper
• Reaction Formation –Replacing unacceptable
feeling with their exact opposites. eg. A person
who hates another cannot accept the painful
fact of hating and so shows extraordinary love
towards that person
• Introjection – taking in and accepting uncritically
the values and standards of others eg. If a child
is constantly called stupid, the child thinks
that it is really stupid
There is a popular saying, excess of anything is bad.
Similar is the case of Defence Mechanisms. They should
be used with in limits. They are temporary. Therefore we
have to keep a watch on our children so that should not
use defence mechanism frequently

14. Types of defense mechanism
• Adaptive
• Repression
• Rationalization
• Intellectualization
• Compensation
• Sublimation
• Substitution
• Maladaptive
• Displacement
• Denial
• Isolation
• Supression
• Regression
• Reaction formation
• Projection
• Undoing

15. Implication
 Defense mechanism enable a person to resolve a conflicts.They are
essential to maintainance of normal equillibrium.
 Difficulty only occur if the defense mechanism are inadequate to
deal with anxiety or inappropriate to the situation in which they are
used.
 Many mental mechanisms are a means of compromising with
forbidden desires,feelings of guilt etc.
 When mental mechanisms are used moderately they are harmless
and helps to face conflict and frustration easily and protect ego and
helps to relieve tension and feel comfortable.
 Excessive and persistant use of these defense mechanisms is
harmful.They do not solve the problem,but only relieve the related
anxiety.Too much dependent makes us unable to face problem
 Many times more than one mechanism may operate in the process
of adjusting to the situation.

16. PERSONAL & SOCIAL ADJUSTMENT
• Many individual have a desire to attain great wealth
or become extremely popular or famous,but hardly a
few of them attain these.
• Those of them who take their failures
realistically,become satisfied with what they have
attained and face the world squarly.
• They can be called well adjusted individuals.But
those who are always brooding over their failure or
adopt abnormal means to satisfy their desire for
power or wealth by becoming too arrogant or day
dreamer, are the person who have a maladjusted
personality.

17. DEFINITION
Adjustment means the modification to compensate for or meet
special condition.(webster-1951)
Adjustment is the interaction between a person and his
environment.How one adjust in a particular situation depends
upon ones personal characteristics as also the circumstances of
the situation.In other word both personal & environmental
factors work side by side in adjustment.An individual is
adjusted,if he is adjusted to himself and to his environment.
(Arkooff-1968)

18. Areas of adjustment
Health adjustment
Emotional adjustment
Social adjustment
Home adjustment
School and professional adjustment

19. Personal adjustment
Personal adjustment is a process of harmony between
the individual & his environment.
The individual purposefully applies efforts and energy
not only to accommodate perfectly within the society and
the environment, but also to fulfill his neeeds and lead a
happy social life.
The adjustment is highly selective and a specialized
process.
The adjustment of an individual is more dynamic and
capable of readjustment with new environment and there
is remarkable mobility in the process of adjustment.

20. Characteristics of a well adjusted person
 Basic needs are satisfied
 Leads balanced life
 Respects self and others
 Has realistic goals
 Aware of one’s own strengths & weakness
 Flexible mind set
 Ability to deal with adverse circumstances
 Realistic perception of the world
 Comfortable with the surrounding environment
 Absence of fault – finding attitude.

21. Social adjustment
 As social being we live in a society. We forms opinions about
others & others form opinion about us.
 Everybody wants acceptance & recognition from and within
the society. We try to behave according to the norms of the
society, so hat we can adjust with others.
 Social adjustment can be defined as a psychological process.
It frequently involves coping with new standards and values in
the society.
Perception and social adjustment
Impartial perception is needed for social adjustment
The way we interact with people depends to a great extent
upon how we perceive them & how we interpret their
behaviour.
The perception about people- what we think, what they are
likes- influence the we respond to them.

22. Thank you