What is the theory behind this Psychodynamic therapy worksheet?

Psychodynamic therapy is an integrated form of therapy that focuses on internal emotional processes and their interpretation. Psychodynamic therapist tries to help the client to have insight into themselves by focusing on their emotions, thoughts and beliefs. One of the internal processes includes defense mechanisms. Defense mechanisms are psychological tactics an individual uses unconsciously to protect oneself from unacceptable thoughts and feelings.

How will the worksheet help?

The purpose of this worksheet is to help the therapist in figuring out the defense mechanisms their clients are using. Figuring this out is crucial in the therapeutic process as it will aid in getting to know the resistance and conflicting behaviors. 

How to use this worksheet?

Read the following checklist while assessing your client during therapy. It contains the description of five most common defense mechanisms. Mark (✓) whenever the client displays the behavior matching the description of a specific defense mechanism.

Psychodynamic therapy worksheet

References 

Summers, R. F., & Barber, J. P. (2010). Psychodynamic therapy: A guide to evidence-based practice. Guilford Press. 

Vishnu, N. S., Singh Batth, R., & Singh, G. (2019). Denial of service: Types, techniques, defence mechanisms and safe guards. 2019 International Conference on Computational Intelligence and Knowledge Economy (ICCIKE). https://doi.org/10.1109/iccike47802.2019.9004388 

You can download this worksheet here.