Synonyms
Definition
Identification is an ego defense or mental mechanism through which an individual, in varying degree, makes himself or herself like someone else; he identifies with another person. This results in the unconscious taking over of various elements of another (Laughlin 1979).
Introduction
There is a noteworthy confusion and lack of clarity in the definition of identification in the literature (see Cramer 2006). Identification most often has been described as a defense mechanism and is a mostly an unconscious process, but may also have preconscious and conscious features (Schafer 1968). When using identification as a defense, the individual takes experiences with the outside world and places them inside to create new ego schemes (Laughlin 1979) or ego structures (Cramer 2006). Identification, when done consciously, is often accompanied by a simple form of imitation and a modeling of oneself after some aspects or...
References
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Békés, V., Perry, J. (2016). Identification. 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_1386-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-28099-8_1386-1
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