ample, the death of someone else may cause shock and disbelief.Repression
Freud conceived of the id, ego, and superego as being in continual conflict.
Since the id is totally hedonistic and demands immediate reduction of ten-
sion, a clash with the environment becomes inevitable. The superego, on the
other hand, wishes to deny gratification to the id's impulses. Thus, perpetual
war is waged between the id and the superego attempting to mediate. One view of the
mental life depicted by Freud is that it resembles a house in which an agressive,
sex-crazed gorilla (the id) lives in the basement, and a harsh, puritanical spinster
(superego) dominates in thea attic - the battle between them is being referred by a
nervous bank clerk (the ego) dwelling between them!
ANXIETY. Anxiety originates in the personality because of this
id-ego-superego conflict. Freud describes three basic types of anxiety: neurotic, moral, and
objective. Neurotic anxiety develops when people fear their instincts will get out of
control. Here a strong id dominates a weak ego. Moral Anxiety, sometimes called guilt,
occurs when people punish themselves for minor transgressions. Here a strong superego controls a weak ego.
In the objective anxiety, the ego perceives a genuine danger in the real world.
DEFENSE MECHANISMS. Anxiety is unpleasant and Freud believed people their
defense mechanisms for dealing with it. Part of the unconsious, these are entirely normal and
effective coping mechanisms when used appropriately even if they do serve to deny, falsify, or distort
reality. Among the most common of them are denial, repression, projection, reaction formation, rationali-
zation, displacement, and sublimation.
Denial constitutes a massive inhibitory reaction rather than a specific response. For ex-
ample, the death of someone else may cause shock and disbelief.Repression