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Denial (Defense Mechanism)

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Encyclopedia of Personality and Individual Differences

Definition

By denial individuals cope with stressors by not acknowledging their reality and/or their consequences. This can range from common resistance to accept consequences of certain events to psychotic denial, in which even denial of physical aspects of immediate surroundings can happen. In a broader sense, denial may include negation, constructing fantasies to replace the stressor, minimizing the stressor, and maximizing what could make one dismiss the stressor; this led some to propose that denial may be more a class of defenses than a single defense mechanism (Baumeister et al. 1998).

Introduction

Denial as a defense mechanism was originally conceptualized by Freud as the refusal to acknowledge disturbing aspects of external reality, as well as the existence of disturbing psychological (internal) events, such as thoughts, memories, or feelings (Freud 1924/1961, 1925/1961). In fact, it has been argued that denial and repression are sometimes difficult to distinguish, especially...

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. WJCR – William James Center for Research, ISPA – Instituto Universitário, Rua do Jardim do Tabaco, 32, 1149-041, Lisbon, Portugal

    Rui Miguel Costa

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  1. Rui Miguel Costa
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Correspondence to Rui Miguel Costa .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Oakland University, Rochester, USA

    Virgil Zeigler-Hill

  2. Oakland University, Rochester, USA

    Todd K. Shackelford

Section Editor information

  1. Macquarie University, North Ryde, NSW, Australia

    Simon Boag

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Costa, R.M. (2017). Denial (Defense Mechanism). In: Zeigler-Hill, V., Shackelford, T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Personality and Individual Differences. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-28099-8_1373-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-28099-8_1373-1

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