As Sigmund Freud described ego defense mechanisms, the processes were primarily unconscious. This new focus on the ego as a coping, self-directing part of our personality came after Freud. Freud would say, if he were here today, that most of psychology has repressed and denied his disturbing insights into the powerful sexual, selfish, hostile, and irrational nature of man, just as he predicted we would. It is likely that each of us can sometimes recognize when we use defense mechanisms. We can't detect every time, but by being very familiar with the common defense mechanisms and by being vigilant, we can investigate our possible use of defense mechanisms and keep ourselves honest.
Awareness is the mark of a healthy, adjusted person.
Work on it. More recent experimental investigations of defenses Almost all of the information about defense mechanisms mentioned above comes from pre-W.W.II psychoanalysts. Clinical psychologists, however, in contrast to experimentalists, continued using the idea of defenses. Then in the late 1980's, cognitive researchers began to repeatedly find ample evidence for unconscious mental processes. Many benefits will come from the new experimental interests in defensive cognitive processes.