Reaction Formation: An Amazing Defense Mechanism

  Reaction formation is a defense mechanism. It occurs when someone experiences an instinctive or unconscious desire that they consciously reject. This leads them to develop the opposite impulse to the one they reject. Let’s give an example. Say a woman doesn’t agree with her mother’s way of being, because she’s too controlling. This rejection leads her to incubate hatred for the way her mother tries to intervene and restrict her life. However, this hatred is actually repulsive to her and, deep down, she feels that she’s a bad person for hating her mother. She consequently develops the behavior of reaction…