Ego Mechanisms of Defense - 9780880484046

Not since Anna Freud's 1937 book, The Ego and the Mechanisms of Defense, has anyone explored defense mechanisms as fully as Dr. George E. Vaillant has in this volume. "No mental status or clinical formulation is complete," writes Vaillant, "without an effort to identify a patient's dominant defense mechanisms."
Psychodynamic clinicians have long recognized the importance of exploring defense mechanisms in assessing normal and pathological personality functioning. In recent years the availability of prospective longitudinal studies of adult development and videotapes of clinical interactions, as well as cognitive psychology's role in linking neuroscience with psychoanalysis, has made possible the empirical study of defense mechanisms.
This volume, with contributions by interdisciplinary researchers, lays the groundwork for future research by summarizing empirical studies to date, proposing a universal language of defense mechanisms, and demonstrating how various assessment methods can be used in diagnosis, case formulation, and treatment. Dr. Vaillant and colleagues leave no stone unturned in their evaluation of such assessment methods as videotaped interviewing, written transcripts, autobiographical statements, self-reporting, psychological tests, the Q-sort methodology, and combinations thereof.
An opening section on clinical applications reaches back to Sigmund Freud's discovery of individual defenses, tracing the evolution of their use in psychotherapy over the years. Based on the need for a common language of defenses, Dr. Vaillant then puts forth clear descriptions of each defense, explaining how each may be recognized and used in psychotherapy. The second section reviews in depth the proliferation of empirical studies that have finally made the systematic study of defense mechanisms tangible to serious investigators. Appendixes include several glossaries of defense mechanisms and useful rating scales.
Do defense mechanisms reflect enduring facets of one's personality? Can defensive functioning be measured? And if so, with what degree of interrater reliability or validity? Are individuals aware of their own defenses? And what do these defenses foretell? These are just a few of the questions explored in this volume.