Primary (Primitive) Defensive Processes: 'those that involve the boundary between the self and the outer

world'; characterized by two qualities of preverbal phase of development: lack of attainment of the
reality principle; lack of appreciation of the separateness & constancy of those outside the self; operate 'in a global, undifferentiated way in a person's total sensorium, fusing cognitive, affective, & behavioral
dimensions' mw98; we all have them, they provide the basic foundations of everyon'es psychology; 'they pose a problem only if one lacks more mature psychological skills of if these defenses are persistently
used to the exclusion of possible others' mw99; 'it is the absence of mature defenses, not the presence of primitive ones, that defines borderline or psychotic structure' mw100

Defense

Definition

Dimensions

adaptive origin: baby's self-protective response when overstimulated or distressed, e.g.

Primitive Withdrawal psychological withdrawal into a different
may fall asleep; resistance to engage on feeling level; serious level: resistance to mental
(mw100-101; cf. DSM
state of consciousness, incl. substituting
health workers; healthier level: though not able to express their own feeling, may be highly
p.809: 'autistic
internal fantasy for the stresses of relating to sensitive and perceptive of others' feelings, found in people of remarkable creativity: 'artists,
fantasy')
others
writers, theoretical scientiests, philosophers, religious mystics, & other highly talented onlookers' gifted with

Related Character Structure &

Psychopathology (when habitual, fails to do
job, & to the exclusion of other ways of
responding to anxiety & coping mw119)

Advantage & Disadvantage

schizoid character; may also play role in

addictive propensity 'to use chemicals to
alter one's consciousness'

Advantage: while it involves a psychological

escape from reality, it requires little
distortion of it; disadvantage: removes
person from active participation in
interpersonal problem solving.

standing back and provide original commentary.

Denial (mw101-103;
also at work in most of
mature defenses, e.g.,
together with
rationalization or
reaction-formation
when one experiences
rejection

Omnipotent Control
(mw103-104)

Refusal to accept that unpleasant

experiences are happening, e.g., 'this is not
happening' mw99

Fantasy that one is in control of the world

manic character (hypomanic [hypo=little] or

cyclothymic ['alternating emotion' as
adaptive origin: 'archaic process rooted in the child's egocentrism', prelogical conviction: 'If
oscillating between manic denial &
I don't acknowledge it, it isn't happening', 'magic'; may be useful, e.g., denying hurt feelings
in situation in which it would be unwise to cry; serious level: bipolar illness; healthier level: depressive collapse, short of bipolar illness]:
denial of limitations, whether physical (e.g.
can be delightful, found in many comedians & entertainers who show quick wit, elevated energy,
sleep, nutrition), finances, weaknesses, 'even
playfulness with words, & infectious high spirits characteristic of those 'who successfully screen out and
transform painful affects for long periods of time', but may have depressive underside kept private.
their mortality'; mania makes 'the painful
facts of life' 'psychologicically insignificant'
adaptive origin: newborn's 'primary narcissism' [Freud] or 'primary egocentrism' [Piaget], in
which baby experiences self as source of all events internally, magically elicited by baby;
this is first experience of sense of control & agency; then transferred to caregivers as
Psychopathic (or later terms 'sociopathic',
'secondary or derived omnipotence'; this development of illusion of one's & caregiver's
'antisocial'), if personality is structured
omnipotence is precondition for mature adult's coming to terms with fact that neither
around this defense
one's own or any other person's potency is boundless mw103-104; delight in 'getting over
on' other people; serious: may become criminal; on healthier level: found in businesses that

Effect of onesided use on interpersonal

relationships & society

Example

retreat from social or interpersonal

situations; disadvantage: removes person
from active participation in interpersonal "He just fiddles with the TV remote control
and refuses to answer me"
problem solving; those who love them find it
hard to get an emotional response from
them

Pollyana-like individual who insist that

Advantage: may be lifesaving in crises or

everything is always fine & for the best;
emergencies, as 'keeping one's head';
may deny abuse by partner; parents may
Use of spirituality ['it was the will of God']
disadventage: depressive underside exacts ignore evidence of sexual molestation of their to refuse mourning losses or to flee into
'experiences of rapture & overwhelming
psychological price often hard to see by
children
exhilaration' in the face of negative
others
experiences

Advantage: in adulthood, feel a natural kind

If feeling of impending luck is followed by
of 'high' when we exert our will; conscious have as central objective to make their influence
winning some gamble, sense of
felt; may be manipulative; coercive
omnipotent control may be felt; 'getting
manipulation as way of avoiding anxiety and
over on' someone; manipulation
maintaining self-esteem;

require risk taking, politics, military, CIA, sales professions, cult leaders, evangelists, ad & entertainment
industries, where potential to wield raw power is high mw104

Primitive Idealization
(& Devaluation)
(mw105-106)

Primitive fantasy of the omnipotence of

caregivers and later substitutes

adaptive origin: trust in parents in face of realities out of one's control, e.g., hostility,
vulnerability to illness & misfortune, mortality, & other terrors; healthier level: 'normal
idealization is an essential component of mature love'; deidealization also normal part of
separation-individuation process; by idealizing other, one gets narcissistic satisfaction of
being associated with and recognized by that 'perfect' other.

projection & introjection as two sides of the

same psychological coin: 'projection is the
process whereby what is inside is
misunderstood as coming from outside';
Projection,
projection: when benign, ego observes it, is ego alien; when serious: ego syntonic & person
'introjection is the process whereby what is
Introjection, &
experiences what is projected as an accurate depiction of another person's state of
outside is misunderstood as coming from
Projective
mindintrojection: benign form: a primitive identification with important others; projective
inside'; projective identification: fusion of
Identification (mw107identification can lead to 'very primitive ways of perceiving reality, short of psychosis',
projective & introjective mechanisms 112)
induced countertransference
project internal objects on another person
and get that person 'to behave like those
objects, as if the target person had those
same introjects' mw110

Splitting of the Ego

(mw112-114)

To be either in an all-good or all-bad ego

state toward an object in one's world, which
is then seen as either all good or bad;

To split off "partial selves, each of which

Dissociation (mw114performs certain functions" mw334; "a
115)
single person with the subjective experience
of different selves" mw324

narcissistic character: search for perfection

being put on a pedestal is only the precursor to
both thru merger with idealized objects &
Advantage: sense of protection by
e.g., when 900 followers of Jim Jones
being knocked off'; others feel as if this defense
with efforts to perfect the self; need for
omnipotent other; hope to be free of shame;
willingly drank cyanide in Gayana in 1978:
puts a straightjacket of perfection on them,
the greater once feeling of dependency,
constant reassurance of their 'attractiveness, disadvantage: imperfections in self & others
which they now have to live up to;
the greater the temptation to idealize
power, fame, & importance to others (i.e., are hard to bear; doomed to disappointment
megaexpectations can feel irritating.
perfection) results from this defense

Paranoid character uses projection as main

e.g., someone who is afraid of losing touch
way of understanding and coping with life;
with reality may feel more 'normal' if s/he
while introjection 'crosses all diagnostic
Advantage: normal reaction to trauma to
can induce in another person the feelings
boundaries', it is particularly evident in
protect self, to be 'outside' rather than inside
s/he thinks they already have. E.g.,
sadism, explosivity, and impulsivity; and in
usually history of abuse, usually but not limited
accusatory statement by a men in intake
in face of sense of impending obliteration;
to sexual abuse
depression related to experience of loss of
interview 'You shrinks all love to sit back
disadvantage: 'autohypnotic' reenactments
loved ones: 'shadow of the object fell upon
and judge people, and I don't give a shit
of past painful situations
the ego' (Freud); borderline personality
what you think!' --> may induce therapist
organization, esp. borderline levels of
to feel judgmental of this person
paranoid personality

based on developmental stage prior to object constancy, when one feels all good when the
object is there and all bad [because one cannot hold the 'object' in one's mind] when the
object is gone; need to organize perceptions by assigning good or bad valences to
everything in the world; no tolerance of ambivalence, as there is no object constancy
attained yet; functions to reduce anxiety and maintain self-esteem

borderline states; borderline patients of

various diagnosis

Advantage: functions to reduce anxiety and to

maintain self-esteem; disadvantage: may
alienate others; in mental health settings, staff
may get split into those who are sympathetic
and those who feel hostile

the internal split may recreated externally

with others, via projective identification,
where some are seen as all good and others
as all bad, all of whom in turn start behaving
like it; wear those who care for them out

seeing world dualistically in terms of

'good vs. evil, God vs the devil,
democracy vs communism' etc.; in
therapy: pt. may one week see
therapist as all good and next week as
all bad

an experience is totally cut off from conscious experience mw123; normal response to
trauma, under horrific abuse, conviction of imminent death, out-of-body-experience;
different from other primary defenses: not all have dissocation, even though we all are
capable, but most of us are fortunate not to run into conditions under which it emerges
mw114; only people capable of being hypnotized can use this defense

Dissociative Identity Disorder [formerly

'Multiple Personality Disorder']

Advantage: a coping mechanism to survive

severe psychic trauma by cutting off pain,
terror, horror, & the conviction of imminent
death; disadvantage: tendency of defense to
operate automatically under conditions when
one's survival is not realistically at risk

history of abuse, 'usually including but not

limited to sexual abuse' mw332; emotional
responses to abuse were punished with more
abuse: 'now I'll really give you something to
cry about' mw333; most dissociative people
are quite lovable

Movie Sybil (1973);

Based on Nancy McWilliams, Psychoanalytic Diagnosis (1994); prepared by Matthias Beier, PhD

Secondary (Higher-Order) Defensive Processes: 'deal with internal boundaries, such as those between the ego or superego and the id, or between the observing and experiencing parts of the ego' mw98; 'healthier people' who
typically use these defenses, tend to use varying defenses and hence 'no single personality types' 'reflect an overdependence on them' mw134 (NB: not a complete list, as virtually any psychological process can be used
defensively mw117)

Defense

Definition

Dimensions

only present when 'an idea or emotion or perception has become consciously inaccessible
because of its power to upset ' mw118; requires prior attainment of a sense of wholeness
motivated forgetting or egnoring, e.g., 'this and continuity of self before one is capable of handling disturbing impulses by repression (if
Repression (mw118happened, but I'll forget about it because it's
not attained, then more primitive defenses like denial, projection, & splitting) mw119;
120)
too painful' mw99
healthier level: momentarily forgetting name of a person one introduces if there was ucs
negative feeling to person; is 'most basic' higher orderdefense; element present in most
higher-order defenses, e.g., reaction formation, isolation

Regression (mw120122)

reverting unconsciously to old habits of

though, feeling, and behavior

e.g., use of regression to the sick role as a primary means of coping with upsetting aspects;
but unconscious! ; caution: people can get sick because they are unconsciously depressed,
but they can also get depressed because they are physically ill and in need of care!

Related Character Structure &

Psychopathology (when habitual, fails to do
job, & to the exclusion of other ways of
responding to anxiety & coping mw119)

Hysterical, Histrionic personality; also

present in PTSD

Somatization & Hypochondriasis, Infantile

Personality (not in DSM after 2nd ed)

Advantage & Disadvantage

Effect of onesided use on interpersonal

relationships & society

Example

Advantage: keeps unpleasant facts about self

When experiencing a passing fantasy of
or other or events from consciousness;
often experience in childhood of having one's
stealing jewlery laid out at a Tiffany's
disadvantage: because the repressed idea or
sexuality harshly controlled, or being
window: looking into window and
emotion continuous to have unconscious ridiculed for showing emotion, or exposed to
running into the opposite direction
power to upset, compromises internal
angry and overbearing outbursts, especially
(rather than tolerating fantasy while
freedom and contributes to 'uncontrollable'
from a father (figure) mw308-309
staying in front of window)
symptoms

Advantage: provides relief from stress of

growth and change that feels too much;
disadvantage: often resistant to change
because of the 'secondary' gain of being ill

e.g., lashing out at partner after attaining

some new level of intimacy --> go back to
earlier way of relating;

anyone, if tired enough, may begin to

whine, as in earlier age.

Isolation (mw122123)

affect connected with an idea may either be repressed or denied; idea of a feeling is
The affective aspect of an experience or idea theoretically not acceptable; "psychic numbing" in face of catastrophe (Lifton); 'isolation is
Advantage: able to stay calm and rational in
early experience of control of feelings and
is sequestered from its cognitive dimension = a degree more discriminative than dissociation: The experience is not totally obliterated
otherwise intensely emotional situations;
e.g., surgeons could not work unless
Obsessive character: primary defens of
the message that one should be able to
isolating feeling from knowing; (NOT same as from conscious experience, but its emotional meaning is cut off' mw123: is most primitive
disadvantage: inability to be aware of feeling
they isolate affect (their own distress,
isolation, life pattern ov overvaluing thinking
control them; often much moral disapproval
isolating in the sense of physical remove from of the "intellectual defenses" and 'the basic unit of psychological operation in mechanism
makes it difficult to work with feelings, e.g.,
empathy, revulsion, sadism etc.) when
& undervaluing feeling mw123
and control in interpersonal relationships;
interpersonal relationships!) mw120; will say
like intellectualization, rationalization, and moralization' which have in common the
unconscious anxiety, that evidently get in the
cutting flesh
may be experienced as stoic, Mr. Spock-like
"I have no feeling"
'relegation to unconsciousness of the personal, gut-level implications of any situation or
way of the person's life.
idea or occurance' mw123

Intellectualization

talking about feelings that strike listeners as the idea of a feeling, e.g., anger, is theoretically acceptable to a person, but the actual
emotionless; e.g, saying in a casual, detached expression of it, e.g., through tone of voice, body language, is inhibited; 'handles ordinary in many characters in neurotic & borderline
tone, maybe even with a smile "I do feel
emotional overload in the same way that isolation handles traumatic overstimulation'
range; various
naturally angry about that"
mw124

Advantage: can talk about feeling and gives

impression as if feeling. Disadvantage: may
have dull, hollow experience of life

perceived as insensitive, heady; have

difficulty in emotional intimacy

e.g., speak about trauma in matter of

fact way, e.g., rape (but not
rationalizing it)

Rationalization
(mw124-125)

Make up reasons for why some distress or

One unconsciously seeks cognitively acceptable grounds for one's direction; conversts what in many characters in neurotic & borderline
loss or not getting what one wanted is not as
the person already wants into reasonable language
range; various
bad as one thought

Advantage: reconciles us to fact that some

things are not attainable; disadvantage:
virtually anything can be rationalized, incl.
the most horrific things

may be used to justify doing abusive things 'for

other's good';

e.g., that abuse was for the better, 'made

me a stronger person'

Advantage: gives sense of justification for an

e.g., belief of colonialists that pain of
experienced as self-righteous; may put others in
impulse otherwise experienced as
exploitation was justified because
dilemma: if one does not live up to or join them
colonialization brough higher standards of
questionable; disadvantage: may be
in the moralization, one may be devalued as
civilization to the people; Inquisition;
maddeningly impervious to therapeutic
immoral
abusing child for their own good
influence

one seeks to feel it is one's duty to pursue

one seeks ways to feel one has moral reasons for pursuing a certain direction; jastifies and
make morally obligatory ; may be used 'as a developmentally advanced version of
splitting'; 'resolves, by recourse to principle, mixed feelings that the evolving self has
become able to suffer'mw126

Moral masochism; also in some obsessive

and compulsive people

permits two conflicting conditions to exist

Compartmentalizatio
whithout conscious confusion, guilt, shame,
n (mw127)
or anxiety

Whereas isolation involves a rift between cognition & emotion, in compartmentalization,

ther is a rift between incompatible cognitive sets. E.g., professed belief in the Golden Rule
and looking out for Number One

various, often on borderline level

Advantage: permits 'two conflicting

conditions to exist without conscious
confusion, guilt, shame, or anxiety';
disadvantage: may lead to shamefule
exposure of moral contradictions.

acting with some by highest standards, and with

some in abusive ways

deploring prejudice and savoring ethnic

jokes; e.g., saints in public sphere &
abusive in private sphere

the unconscious effort to counterbalance

some affect -- usually guilt or shame -- with
an attitude or behavior that will magically
erase it.

is more grown-up version of omnipotent control; person may be open to see it as

superstitious behavior. NB: does not refer to more abstract wish to reverse something that
happened, but instead refers to undoing something the person feels they did!

compulsive character, neutral as to moral

content: one can be compulsive drinker or
compulsive humanitarian

Advantage: temporarily relief from

undesirable affect; disadvantage: thought
may be equated with the deed, which
becomes further source of anxiety

Often originates out of guilt or shame

e.g., (religious) effort to atone for sins;

altruism due to inadvertant offense as a
child;

Moralization (mw125127)

Undoing (mw127129)

Based on Nancy McWilliams, Psychoanalytic Diagnosis (1994); prepared by Matthias Beier, PhD

Secondary (Higher-Order) Defensive Processes: 'deal with internal boundaries, such as those between the ego or superego and the id, or between the observing and experiencing parts of the ego' mw98; 'healthier
people' who typically use these defenses, tend to use varying defenses and hence 'no single personality types' 'reflect an overdependence on them' mw134 (NB: not a complete list, as virtually any psychological process
can be used defensively mw117)

Defense

Turning against the

Self (mw129-130)

Displacement
(mw130-131)

Definition

Dimensions

Related Character Structure &

Psychopathology (when habitual, fails to do
job, & to the exclusion of other ways of
responding to anxiety & coping mw119)

Advantage & Disadvantage

turning negative affect or attitude from an

external object toward the self

however unpleasant self-criticism may be, it is experienced as preferrable 'to

acknowledging a realistic threat to one's survival under conditions in which one has no
power to change things; negative affect usually turned inward from a person to whom one
feels dependent for security

depression; masochism; in healthier, neurotic

spectrum

Advantage: gives the self the illusion to be in

control by turning a difficult uncontrollable
outside situation into something managable:
one's self; disadvantage: continuous even in
situations that are not uncontrollable

redirection of a drive, emotion,

while turning against self may involve displacement, displacement is more broadly
preoccupation, or behavior from its initial or understood; one can displace due to anxiety onto almost anything: other person (e.g., that
natural object to another because its original home wrecker, in an affair); Bowen's 'triangulation' is displacement phenomenon; anxiety
direction is for some reasonanxiety ridden
itself may be displaced from one area of body etc. to another

an emotion is turned into its opposite; more

is 'more complex form of denial of feeling defended against than a simple refusal to feel
Reaction Formation accurately: functions to deny ambivalence:
that emotion' mw102; conversion of a negative into a positive affect or vice versa mw131;
(mw131-133)
convince self that all that is felt is one polarity
typical that some of the disowned affect 'leaks through'
of a complex emotional response

Phobia

Effect of onesided use on interpersonal

relationships & society

Example

fear of offending others; often person found e.g., if one feels critical of an authority but
themselves in childhood in situations where
fears one will lose the authority's goodwill
parents may not have had control, or that were if one challengas them, then it feels safter
simply not controllable; learned to take
to turn the critical ideas on oneself; e.g.,
responsibility as way of trying to make such
be critical of self for not being good
situation for self and parents better;
enough

Advantage: reduces the anxiety the drive,

emotion, preoccupation, or behavior caused
when it was associated with the original
target; disadvantage: the new target, e.g., a fearful preoccupation with many situations may
stifle person's interpersonal relationships;
spider in a phobia that displaced, for
instance, mfears of maternal engulfment,
may leave person in panic, not knowing why;
disruptive

e.g., sexual fetishes --> from person to

thing; scapegoating in forms of prejudice
such as racism, sexism, heterosexism;
transference: feeling from early objects
displaced to therapist

Prominent in character structures in which

'hostile feelings & aggressive strivings' are
paramount: paranoid & obsessive
compulsive character

Advantage: at age when finer discriminations

the proverbial 'loving someone to death':
between shades of feelings and feelings and
hugging too hard etc.; a way of handling
e.g., hatred into love, or idealization into
actions are not yet maturationally possible, jeaulousy: e.g., displaced siblings who turn their
contempt
rivalrous feelings into loving ones, but may do it
this may be adaptive to handle negative
in ostentatious or aggressive ways;
feelings;

used by various personality types

Advantage: allows one to 'shift the power

becoming nurturing when one does not
e.g., in therapy: a patient may make himself the
aspects of a transaction so that one is in the
get one's own needs to be nurtured met:
therapist and turn the therapist into the patient
the caring for someone else then meets
initiating rather than the responding role',
(cf. movie: 'What about Bob'!)
the need to be nurtured, but without it
e.g., passive into active;

e.g., turning from victim into victimizer; or:

Reversal (mw133134)

switch from position of subject to object or

vice versa; reversing desires into their
opposite

e.g., if desire to be loved not met, one decides to love and unconsciously identifies with the
loved person's gratification;

being evident to others

Identification
('oedipal level')
(mw135-138)

becoming (like) another person

expressing in action what one cannot express

Acting Out (mw138in words with the purpose of mastering fears
140)
that surround it

Sexualization
(Instinctualization)
(mw140-142)

Sublimation (mw142144)

Advantage: to feel less powerful when

e.g., toddler who deals with fear of
is the emotional basis of psychological growth & change in life; only problematic under
threatened by aggression; to feel one can
thought to emerge out of coping with hostile
punishment from mommy for his hostile
certain circumstances; [Beier: on psychotic level: not just become like other person, but used by various personality types; lack of role hold onto someone lost; disadvantage: when wishes to adults experienced as threatening by impulses bybecoming her: 'then I have her
wanting to become like them; therapeutic
power inside me rather than outside' ;
rather become or be the other person!]; typically involves 'taking in of what is loved and a models for identification in adolescence may
no longer adaptive, it may turn into
e.g., 'conversion experiences contain a
defensive becoming like what is feared'; oedipal scenario as basis for 'identification with the be one reason for increase in teen suicides opposite, e.g., if one once gain respect from relationship: major part is to rework old and
now problematic identifications
heavy component of defensive
aggressor': can't defeat him, so might as well be like him
being tough as child, now as adult may
identification
backfire

enacting a frightening scenario in order to get from a passive into an active role; originally
impulsive personalities (e.g., hysteria,
referred to a p not saying something to therapist but instead 'acting it out' outside the
addictions, compulsion, sociopathic);
Advantage: not feeling helpless or powerless,
therapy office; contrary to colloquial usage of term, it is not per se negative, but rather
certain classes of behaviors: 'exhibitionism,
not passive victim, but rather active;
characterized by 'the unconscious & fearsome nature of the impulses that propel the
voyeurism, sadism, masochism, perversion, & disadvantage: when done in self-destructive
person into action & the compulsive' way one acts; Freud: we act out what we do not
all the 'counter' terms: counterphobia,
way
remember
counterdependency, counterhostility' etc

considered by some as just one instance of acting out; however, it can be present without
to use sexual activity and fantasy defensively acting out as erotization : one can turn painful feelings into exciting ones in order to control
with the intention of converting a terrifying
the pain; attempt to master anxiety, restore self-esteem, offset shame, or distract from
or painful experience into excitement
inner deadness; gender difference tendency: 'women are apt to sexualize dependency &
men to sexualize aggression'

redirect desires from something

unacceptable or distressing to something
acceptable and gratifying

originally meant by Freud in drive model as 'expression of biologically based impulses' 'in a
socially valuable form'; considered the healthiest defense for two reasons: 1. beneficial to
species; 2. it discharges the relevant impulse instead of wasting a lot of emotional energy
either transforming it into something differnet (e.g., as reaction formation would do) or
counteracting it with an opposing force (e.g., denial, repression); redirect aim of impulse
from 'forbidden' object to acceptable and also fullfilling object

Based on Nancy McWilliams, Psychoanalytic Diagnosis (1994); prepared by Matthias Beier, PhD

like other defenses, is not in itself

problematic; may appear in abusive
dynamics

may have roots in childhood experience of

fearing authority's rejectiong of one's feelings
and needs

e.g., acting out unconscious sexual

scenarios,

e.g., hair yanking from childhood

Advantage: to cope with terrifying or painful e.g., 'tendency of people to erotize their reaction
to anyone with superior power'; susceptibility of defensively sexualized to cope with pain,
situation by using one's capacity for
those in a socially weak position to convert envy which later in life may charge the touch of
excitement and life to charge it with different
or fear of mistreatment into sexual scenario is
hair in a sexual way; harmful example: if
meaning; disadvantage: may make one
reason for importance of laws to protect
abuse was sexualized, it may lead to
susceptable to exploitation and abuse
employees, students etc.
compulsive recreation of it.

Psychoanalytic therapy: aims at helping

healthy: assumes that 'the infantile parts of
Advantage: allows one to stop vilifying self
patient develop understanding &
our natures remain alive throughout
Enables one to be compassionate also to others;
and others and instead seek creative ways of
compassion even for 'the most primitive &
to engage in constructive work and creative
adulthood. We do not have the choice to
disturbing' apsects of the self, in order to
using parts of self constructively without
production in the social sphere
divest ourselves of them; we can only handl
expand 'one's freedom to resolve old
denying them
them in better or worse ways
conflicts in new ways'