Denial psychology

Anorectic patients are usually brought to professional attention by family members after the patients have lost a large amount of weight. If they seek help on their own it is usually because of their subjective distress over the somatic and psychological consequences of starvation. These include weakness, fatigue, difficulty concentrating, sleep disturbances, and depression. Because individuals with AN have considerable denial of the seriousness of their problem, they are often unreliable historians. Thus it is necessary to ob-... 

This denial and refusal runs deep in the psycho-spiritual make up of mankind and is in fact the basis for much of the work of therapy that modern psychology deals with everyday. The denial of reality is well known in psychological circles, but true to form, it seems that many or most psychologists are not aware of their own denial of their own ignorance. Thus denial takes us into spiritual issues, into the dark side of the force or the death principle, as Sigmund Freud would put it. 

Terms like motivation have been around as long as human behavior has been observed and interpreted. Motivation to change has been considered essential if there is any hope that treatment of a behavioral or psychological problem will be effective. In the context of substance-use disorders, motivation to change is discussed often and sometimes heatedly. For example, it frequently is asserted that the major barrier to change is the person s denial that he or she has any problem at all with alcohol or drugs. 

Fear may be at the root of your condition, too—fear of change, of losing a person you care about, of being a bad person, of your own buried anger. But your response to this fear is your favorite psychological defense—denial. 

Humans who have experienced some severe psychological traumatic event may even develop an altered psychological state to deal with the event. The sudden death of a loved one, involvement in a serious car accident, or combat experience can produce a traumatic reaction that may include a denial state characterized by sleep disturbances, amnesia, fatigue, and headaches (Smith, 1998). Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), also called shell shock or battle fatigue is common to those who have had to face extreme distress in military or civilian Ufe. PTSD is characterized by negative emotional reactions beyond coping. 

Many of the issues relating to CW are not open to conclusive solutions there are too many contradictions and uncertainties. Chemical weapons have some military utility as weapons of attrition and denial, and because of their psychological effect, but they are not unreservedly advantageous to the user. Chemical warfare can be indiscriminate and inhumane, but it is not automatically more so than... 

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