The Conceptual Tragedy in Studying Defense Mechanisms.

The concept of defense mechanism is interwoven with psychoanalytic theories of anxiety and psychic conflict. From its first formulation in 1894, its usefulness resides in the degree to which it helps to explain otherwise mysterious phenomena. Statistical approaches to the study of defense mechanisms, which have significantly increased in popularity in the past three decades, test isolated assumptions without reflection on how these are integrated into psychoanalytic theory, nor on what should be regarded as psychoanalytic data. Consequently, their results and their models have not provided useful insights into psychoanalytic theory. This paper aims to show how these issues in statistical approaches largely stem from disregarding discussions on the ontological status of defense mechanisms and the epistemological consequences linked to them. Studying defense mechanisms as they are manifested in external lifestyles, clouds the distinction between constructs (explanatory terms) and phenomena (empirical referents), which is furthermore necessary for a theoretical model to have explanatory value. Concrete examples are given regarding problems in statistical conceptualizations of defense mechanisms as well as the cursory explanations these tend to describe. Implications for future research are discussed.

"Well Now we Have Entered University and So On, but". Autodialogue and Circumvention Strategies in Reflections about Being a University Student.

In higher education, there is nowadays a production of discourses about the negative effects of academic life on the well-being of the students. In the specific Danish context, we wondered how to understand the process involved in coping with problems and decisions of everyday life. To investigate this question, we present an empirical study on the microgenetic processes unfolding when students discuss their experiences with peers. We develop Josephs and Valsiner's (Social Psychology Quarterly, 61,(1), 68-82, 1998) concepts of circumvention strategies and autodialogue. The study covers 2 focus-group discussions among 2nd semester psychology students aged 20-25, attending the same psychology course at a Danish university. The students were presented with a dilemmatic situation, that they are required make sense of, based on minimal information, by integrating it in their own representations, expectations and life experiences. Our analysis suggests that the students' investment of meaning in themselves and others often occurred through autodialogical negotiation. In such negotiations, circumvention strategies offer the students a solution, enabling them not to get stuck in a dilemma between two oppositional ways of relating to a certain issue, or offers them a new and less upsetting perspective. These findings suggest that reaching a conclusion about themselves and their experience is not just a clear-cut process of making a statement, but a dynamic and complex process in which multiple perspectives and meanings are in play.

Authority Relationship From a Societal Perspective: Social Representations of Obedience and Disobedience in Austrian Young Adults.

Obedience and disobedience have always been salient issues for both civil society and social psychologists. Since Milgram's first studies on destructive obedience there has not been a bottom-up definition of what obedience and disobedience mean. The current study aimed at investigating the social representations young adults use to define and to co-construct knowledge about obedience and disobedience in Austria. One hundred fifty four (106 females, 68.8%) Austrian young adults (Mean age = 22.9; SD = 3.5) completed a mixed-method questionnaire comprising open-ended questions and free word associations. Overall obedience and disobedience are respectively defined as conformity and non-conformity to regulations, ranging from implicit social norms to explicit formal laws. Authority is multi-faceted and has a central role in orienting obedience and disobedience. Further fundamental determinants of the authority relationship and relevant application of the results are discussed in this paper.