"...Defense mechanisms are tools for adaptation to the environment by either
alloplastic means (changing the environment) or
autoplastic ones (changing the self). Alloplastic solutions require the cooperation or subservience of elements outside the self and are thus often thwarted. The mature, confident ego is more apt to attempt autoplastic solutions, which are more likely to be successful. The child who persists in demanding attention from an unresponsive parent is certain to be frustrated. If he or she learns to entertain himself or herself and to find pleasure in friends, gratification is at hand.
"In the earliest stages of ego development, the role of the defenses is to minimize pain and distress and to gratify id wishes. Later, they serve to contain and master id’s conflicts with reality and with superego. Eventually, though, many applications of the defense mechanisms lose their purely defensive function. The mechanisms that began as reflexes can come to change personality..."
MATURATION OF DEFENSESErikson’s model popularized the notion that psychological development is a lifelong process. His scheme drew on the existing principles of ego psychology, augmented with observations ofchildren and adults in different cultures. A complementary model was developed by George Vaillant (1934–), who examined the patterns of defense mechanisms employed over the lifespan. His methodology was notable. He followed a sizable cohort of healthy young adult men over decades from their 20s into late adulthood and interviewed them in depth to determine what defense mech-anisms they employed most commonly and what the consequences were of different patterns of defense. From his observations, he clustered the defense mechanisms according to the stages of life at which they were most appropriately or most adaptively employed.
■ Immature defenses include projection, passive aggression, acting out, hypochondriasis, and retreat into fantasy. These defenses are normative in early life. In adulthood, they are characteristic of many personality disorders.
■ Intermediate (or neurotic) defenses include dissociation, displacement, isolation of affect, intellectualization, repression, and reaction formation. They are common to middle childhood and adolescence. In adulthood, they are most commonly employed in moderately disabling conditions such as generalized anxiety disorder, simple phobias, and dysthymic disorder.
■ Mature defenses, characteristic of healthy adults, include altruism, sublimation, anticipation, and humor.
Vaillant’s contributions were twofold. First, he undertook an empirical investigation of the evolution of ego function that returned results consistent with the predictions of the prevailing theory. Second, he integrated the cross-sectional descriptions of the defenses that had been used since Freud’s time with the longitudinal perspective of Erikson and others..."
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