Introjection
Encyclopedia
Introjection is a psychoanalytical term with a variety of meanings.
Generally, it is regarded as the process where the subject replicates in itself behaviors, attributes or other fragments of the surrounding world, especially of other subjects. Cognate concepts are identification
, incorporation, and internalization
.
To use a simple example, a person who picks up traits from their friends (e.g., if someone exclaims "Ridiculous!" all the time and their friends start saying it too) is participating in introjection.
Projection
has been described as an early phase of introjection.
as she favours using the term as it is employed by Sándor Ferenczi
in his essay "The Meaning of Introjection" (1912). In this context introjection is an extension of autoerotic interests that broadens the ego by a lifting of repression so that it includes external objects in its make-up. Maria Torok
defends this meaning in her 1968 essay The Illness of Mourning and the Fantasy of the Exquisite Corpse where she argues that Sigmund Freud
and Melanie Klein
confuse introjection with incorporation and that Ferenczi's definition remains crucial to analysis. She emphasized that in failed mourning
'the impotence of the process of introjection (gradual, slow, laborious, mediated, effective)' means that 'incorporation is the only choice: fantasmatic, unmediated, instantaneous, magical, sometimes hallucinatory...crypt effects (of incorporation)'.
According to Freud, the ego and the superego are constructed by introjecting external behavioral patterns into the subject's own person. Of course, Freud had a habit of looking at relational mechanisms in negative terms.
"One example often used is when a child envelops representational images of his absent parents into himself, simultaneously fusing them with his own personality."
"Individuals with weak ego boundaries
are more prone to use introjection as a defense mechanism.
According to Donald Woods Winnicott "projection and introjection mechanisms... let the other person be the manager sometimes, and to hand over omnipotence
."
Generally, it is regarded as the process where the subject replicates in itself behaviors, attributes or other fragments of the surrounding world, especially of other subjects. Cognate concepts are identification
The psychoanalytic view on Identification
Identification is a psychological process whereby the subject assimilates an aspect, property, or attribute of the other and is transformed, wholly or partially, after the model the other provides. It is by means of a series of identifications that the personality is constituted and specified. The...
, incorporation, and internalization
Internalization
Internalization has different definitions depending on the field that the term is used in. Internalization is the opposite of externalization.- General :...
.
To use a simple example, a person who picks up traits from their friends (e.g., if someone exclaims "Ridiculous!" all the time and their friends start saying it too) is participating in introjection.
Projection
Psychological projection
Psychological projection or projection bias is a psychological defense mechanism where a person subconsciously denies his or her own attributes, thoughts, and emotions, which are then ascribed to the outside world, usually to other people...
has been described as an early phase of introjection.
Torok/Ferenczi
However, this meaning has been challenged by Maria TorokMaria Torok
Maria Torok was a Hungarian-French psychoanalyst, a student of Sandor Ferenczi.Torok is best known for her idiosyncratic contributions to psychoanalytic theory, developed in the wake of first Freud, then Ferenczi, and also the critical study of Husserl, and often coauthored with Nicolas Abraham...
as she favours using the term as it is employed by Sándor Ferenczi
Sándor Ferenczi
Sándor Ferenczi was a Hungarian psychoanalyst, a key theorist of the psychoanalytic school and a close associate of Sigmund Freud.-Biography:...
in his essay "The Meaning of Introjection" (1912). In this context introjection is an extension of autoerotic interests that broadens the ego by a lifting of repression so that it includes external objects in its make-up. Maria Torok
Maria Torok
Maria Torok was a Hungarian-French psychoanalyst, a student of Sandor Ferenczi.Torok is best known for her idiosyncratic contributions to psychoanalytic theory, developed in the wake of first Freud, then Ferenczi, and also the critical study of Husserl, and often coauthored with Nicolas Abraham...
defends this meaning in her 1968 essay The Illness of Mourning and the Fantasy of the Exquisite Corpse where she argues that Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud , born Sigismund Schlomo Freud , was an Austrian neurologist who founded the discipline of psychoanalysis...
and Melanie Klein
Melanie Klein
Melanie Reizes Klein was an Austrian-born British psychoanalyst who devised novel therapeutic techniques for children that had an impact on child psychology and contemporary psychoanalysis...
confuse introjection with incorporation and that Ferenczi's definition remains crucial to analysis. She emphasized that in failed mourning
Mourning
Mourning is, in the simplest sense, synonymous with grief over the death of someone. The word is also used to describe a cultural complex of behaviours in which the bereaved participate or are expected to participate...
'the impotence of the process of introjection (gradual, slow, laborious, mediated, effective)' means that 'incorporation is the only choice: fantasmatic, unmediated, instantaneous, magical, sometimes hallucinatory...crypt effects (of incorporation)'.
According to Freud, the ego and the superego are constructed by introjecting external behavioral patterns into the subject's own person. Of course, Freud had a habit of looking at relational mechanisms in negative terms.
Relational mechanisms
In Freudian terms, introjection is the aspect of the ego's system of relational mechanisms which handles checks and balances from a perspective external to what one normally considers 'oneself', infolding these inputs into the internal world of the self-definitions, where they can be weighed and balanced against one's various senses of externality. For example:"One example often used is when a child envelops representational images of his absent parents into himself, simultaneously fusing them with his own personality."
"Individuals with weak ego boundaries
Personal boundaries
Personal boundaries are guidelines, rules or limits that a person creates to identify for him- or herself what are reasonable, safe and permissible ways for other people to behave around him or her and how he or she will respond when someone steps outside those limits.'Personal boundaries define...
are more prone to use introjection as a defense mechanism.
According to Donald Woods Winnicott "projection and introjection mechanisms... let the other person be the manager sometimes, and to hand over omnipotence
Omnipotence
Omnipotence is unlimited power. Monotheistic religions generally attribute omnipotence to only the deity of whichever faith is being addressed...
."