Exploring Projective Identification in Relationships

Our lives are not alone. Everything we do affects others, causing small changes in them. We often simplify science, breaking down behaviors to their simplest form to understand associated consequences. I have spent a lot of time researching defense mechanisms. One of the core topics of Psychology Fanatic. We define most defenses individually. However, projective identification is unique. It is a process involving two or more people—the one projecting and the one identifying.

Melanie Klein introduced projective identification in 1946. She defined it as “the projection of an unwanted part of the self onto an important other, together with identification of that part with the other” (Schore, 2003). In the defense mechanism of projection, a person relieves “uncomfortable emotions by projecting personal behaviors, thoughts, and character traits on a person or object outside of ourselves” (Murphy, 2022). However, in projective identification, there is another step in the process. The receiver of the projection absorbs the trait projected, identifying with it, and adopting the projected trait.

What is Projective Identification? Beyond Simple Projection

Projective identification is a complex process that integrates a basic defense mechanism (projection) with a interpersonal systemic process. Arthur C. Nielsen explains that projective identification is “an interpersonal defense mechanism by which individuals (inducers) recruit others (recipients) to help them tolerate painful intrapsychic states of mind” (Nielsen, 2019).

This defensive process is “a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy, whereby one individual relates to another in such a way that that other person alters his or her behavior to make the projector’s belief true” (Mendelsohn, 2009). Basically, projective identification has the effect of making projections come true.

For example, a person adopts a victim mentality in their marriage, deductively they see their partner as an abuser. While the relationship might not be good, leaving one or both of the partners emotionally empty, one would not label the relationship at this point as abusive. The “victim” then pushes, picks, and annoys until the partner aggressively reacts. The projector then righteously claims victimhood, pointing to the behavior in the partner as proof. “See, look at what he did.” In psychotherapy, this process contains elements of transference and countertransference.

Object Relations Theory

In the framework of object relations theory, projective identification functions as the vital bridge connecting the individual’s internal world of mental representations (internal objects) with the external world of actual interpersonal relationships (Grotstein & Rinsley, 1994).

While Melanie Klein originally conceptualized the process as an intrapsychic defense mechanism where the infant splits off and expels unwanted or “bad” parts of the self into an object to manage anxiety (Rizzolo, 2012; Grotstein, 1985), later theorists like Bion and Ogden expanded the concept to describe a profound interpersonal communication where the subject induces feelings in another to create a shared psychological space or “container” for processing experience (Rizzolo, 2012; Hamilton, 1990).

Consequently, projective identification is viewed not merely as a method of ridding oneself of unwanted feelings, but as the fundamental mechanism by which internal object relations—comprising a self-image, an object-image, and the affect linking them—are externalized and reenacted in social reality, allowing the subject to maintain a connection with the object while attempting to control or communicate with split-off aspects of the self (Hamilton, 1990).

“Intrapsychically, projective identification refers to attributing aspects of the self and associated feelings to the object and then attempting to control those feelings in the object.“

~N. Gregory Hamilton (1990)

How It Works: Steps in the Process

To understand projective identification, it helps to distinguish it from simple projection.

• Projection is seeing something inside yourself (like anger) as belonging to someone else. You might think, “I’m not angry, you are,” but you maintain a distance from that person (Luepnitz, 2008)..

• Projective Identification goes a step further. You not only attribute the feeling to the other person, but you also maintain a link to them and attempt to control that feeling within them (Hamilton, 1990).

The Drama of Projective Identity

The process generally involves a specific sequence of events, often described as a “drama” enacted between two people:

1. Projecting: A person (the subject) splits off a part of their self—often a painful or threatening feeling like helplessness or rage—and projects it into another person (the object) (Rizzolo, 2012).

2. Pressuring: The subject unconsciously exerts pressure on the recipient to feel and behave in a way that matches the projection. This is often called “interpersonal pressure” (Rizzolo, 2012; Grotstein & Rinsley, 1994).

3. Processing (or Reinjection): The recipient takes in these feelings. If things go well, the recipient (often a therapist or parent) “contains” these feelings, processes them (makes them less terrifying), and gives them back to the subject in a manageable form. This allows the subject to re-internalize (re-introject) the experience and learn from it (Hamilton, 1990).

Projection Identification Often Part of a Larger Pattern

We often explain and provide examples of singular instances of a defense mechanisms. However, these processes belong to much larger systems of behaviors, full of action, reactions, and feedback loops. A person doesn’t just use projective identification in relationships but they instinctively seek relationships where a partner will absorb the projections.

Lawrence Heller describes a survival strategy where the person actively is “attracted to needy partners, whose dependency they encourage.” He continues they “use projective identification masterfully: they maintain their larger-than-life image by making others feel small, their need to be in control by making others feel out of control, their need to feel smart by making others feel dumb, and their need to feel powerful by making others feel powerless” (Heller, 2012).

Key Perspectives and Theorists

The concept has evolved significantly over time, moving from a defense mechanism to a way of understanding deep human connection.

1. Melanie Klein: The Internal Drama

Melanie Klein introduced the term in 1946. She viewed it primarily as a defense mechanism used by the infant to manage anxiety. By projecting “bad” parts of the self (like aggression) into the mother, the infant could protect their “good” parts (Rizzolo, 2012). However, Klein also noted that projecting good parts of the self is essential for developing good object relations. For Klein, this was largely a fantasy happening within the infant’s mind (Grotstein, 1985).

2. Wilfred Bion: The Container and the Contained

Bion expanded the concept from a solitary fantasy to a two-person interaction. He introduced the famous metaphor of the Container and the Contained. He suggested that an infant projects overwhelming distress into the mother (the container). If the mother is capable of “reverie,” she absorbs this distress, detoxifies it, and returns it to the infant as a meaningful experience (Bion, 1962; Hamilton, 1990). This interaction becomes the foundation for the ability to think and process emotions (Grotstein, 1985).

3. Thomas Ogden: The Intersubjective Dance

Ogden reframed projective identification as a mutual enactment where two people enter a shared psychological space. He argues that the recipient’s personality is not “obliterated” by the projection but rather that specific aspects of their personality are “elicited” or recruited to fit the projector’s script (Rizzolo, 2012). This creates a “subjugating analytic third”—a merged experience where individual boundaries are temporarily blurred to transform the self (Ogden, 1982).

4. James Grotstein: Communication and Empathy

Grotstein viewed projective identification as a fundamental instrument of perception and communication. He argued that we cannot truly know or empathize with another person without projecting part of ourselves into them to see what it feels like to be them. He stated, “All projection is projective identification,” suggesting that we never project into a vacuum; there is always a target we identify with (Grotstein, 1985).

The Defensive Benefit of Projective Identification

Ayala Malach Pines wrote that once the projection of unwanted parts is made and the “the partner expresses, or is perceived as expressing, that repressed part in the self, there is no need to admit its existence in the self.” We free ourselves from dealing with aspects of ourselves we do not want to address. Accordingly, a woman who feels “unlovable,” because she “felt unlovable as a child”, is likely to choose a man who does not show love. This way she can “blame him for her bad feelings about herself” (Pines, 2005). We externalize cause and the object of our externalization obliges by acting in ways to confirm our projection.

These relationships are amazingly resilient. Pines explains:

“It is far easier to be with a partner who provides an external justification for your bad feelings about yourself than to confront those feelings directly in yourself” (Pines, 2005).

Perhaps, we unconsciously know that the relationship is providing a service, allowing for avoidance of addressing our own flaws. We project, our partner reacts, we complain, and we love it.

The 3 Stages of Projective Identification (Thomas Ogden’s Model)

An important part of defense mechanisms is that they work without us being aware of it. We don’t consciously decide to make someone behave in a certain way to meet our expectations. The intention to do so would counter the idea of getting rid of parts of ourselves that we don’t want. Some writers have divided projective identification into three stages:

1. The phantasy of placing one’s mental contents into the mind of another
2. Interpersonal pressure on the other to think, feel and behave in accordance with the projection
3. And return of the mental contents in an altered form (Ogden, 1979; 1982)

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A man I met at a service project was very condescending. His words and behaviors elicited feelings in me that pushed for an aggressive defensive response. Perhaps, he was projecting some unwanted internal feelings of his own. Fortunately, I was in the midst of researching this article and was able to sense the transference, and refrained from my impulse to return his mental contents with a little added energy of my own.

Is Projective Identification Maladaptive?

When Klein originally introduced projective identification, it was primarily, if not exclusively, seen as a malignant process of avoidance. Just like all defense mechanisms, sometimes the world overwhelms and defenses processes provide a slight break from the pressure so we an recalibrate.

Deborah Anna Luepnitz, Ph.D., a member of the Clinical Faculty of the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, wrote:

“Projective identification is not always a bad thing. On the contrary, at times we all need to banish overwhelming emotion, or to blame external sources, just to survive psychically” (Luepnitz, 2008, p. 130).

However, she later warns “if it becomes our way of being in the world, however, both feelings and judgments are compromised” (p. 138).

Researchers and psychologists have identified similar healthy interactional processes to those involved in projective identification. Perhaps, projective identification is an outgrowth from normal communication that through environmental stresses and negative experience mutated into the malignant, maladaptive defense mechanisms originally identified by Klein.

How to Respond to Projective Identification: Maintaining Your Boundaries

Thomas H. Ogden, M.D., a psychoanalyst and writer, theorized that projective identification “helps one to elicit another’s aid in processing difficult or important experiences” (Mendelsohn, 2009). Other researchers propose that in intimate moments of interpersonal interactions the boundary between self and object is lost. Anne-Marie Sandler and Joseph Sandler suggest that this process is “the essential basis of the process of projective identification, and that it occurs in a ‘reciprocal love relationship’ and is a significant basis for empathy” (Sandler & Sandler, 2018).

Empathy is commonly misunderstood to mean warm, accepting, and sympathetic reactions to others. However, the formal definition is slightly different, referring to “feel with” another person. Mendelsohn explains that this means to “feel emotionally what the other person is feeling, whether these feelings are warm and loving, moody, hateful, and angry” (Mendelsohn, 2009).

Basically, empathy describes a process of one person’s emotional state is projected onto another person. The empathetic person can receive the emotion and return it in a more manageable form. The child cries in discomfort, the empathetic mother absorbs the emotion, and helps sooth the child. IN psychology we refer to this as dyadic regulation.

Dyadic Regulation

Healthy relationships help each other soothe unruly emotions, bringing both partners back to a homeostatic balance. In these processes, the projection of internal states is a bid for help. We can view projective identification as “a dyadic, intersubjective communicative process.” Schore explains that projective identification is not “a unidirectional but instead is a bidirectional process in which both members of an emotionally communicating dyad act in a context of mutual reciprocal influence” (Schore, 2003).

Containment

These bidirectional processes were first identified in interactions between therapist and patient. Psychoanalyst were trained to receive the patient’s projections “contain the projection, process it, and then feed it back to the inducing patient in a more manageable form.” In the same way, people who remain “empathetic and emotionally capable can assist when their partners become overwhelmed inner states of distress” (Nielsen, 2019).

We receive, contain and return detoxified. This is the healthy process compared to receive, react, and return magnified with an intent to hurt. Joseph Sadler explains that it is “the capacity of the caretaking mother to be attentive to and tolerant of the needs, distress, and anger as well as the love of the infant, and to convey, increasingly, a reassurance that she can ‘contain’ these feelings and at an appropriate time, respond in a considered and relevant way” (Sadler & Sadler, 2018, p. 23).

Or as Neville Symington puts it the mother is able to contain these projections and “she does not herself become so depressed that she is unable to respond to her baby, or that she fears her baby, or that she is disgusted by her baby or envious of the baby” (Symington, 1992).

Containment is difficult. It requires an inner source of regulation. A child’s unresolvable fussiness frustrates. Unfortunately, disconnection and abuse sometimes follows. In secure attachment, “the caregiver contingently responds to the child’s projective identifications.” However, when the caregiver is unable to receive or contain these projective identifications, the failed communication “prevents the establishment of a dyadic system in which the infant can safely project ‘valued’ parts of the self into the mother (i.e., aspects of adaptive projective identification)” (Schore, 2003).

Associated Concepts

• Defense Mechanism: Projective identification is considered a defense mechanism where an individual unconsciously projects unwanted emotions or traits onto another person.
• Interpersonal Communication: It serves as a form of communication, often occurring within close relationships, where parts of the self are projected onto another person, influencing their behavior or emotions.
• Interpersonal Communication Theories: A basic element of close relationships is the quality of interpersonal communication. Several theories in social psychology examine elements of healthy communication.
• Ego Splitting: It involves the fantasy that parts of one’s ego are split off and projected into another person, which can be a means of protecting the disavowed parts of the self.
• Self-fulfilling Prophecy: Projective identification can become a self-fulfilling prophecy, where the person receiving the projection starts to believe and act in accordance with the projected traits or emotions.
• Altercasting: This manipulating mechanism is used in the context of communication where an individual manipulates personal identity and situational cues so the Alter (other) adopts a particular identity or role type that serves the first individual’s personal goal.

A Few Words by Psychology Fanatic

In closing, projective identity is not just a psychological concept; it’s a mirror reflecting the intricate dance of human emotions and relationships. It reveals how we, as social beings, navigate the complexities of our inner worlds by intertwining them with the lives of others. This phenomenon underscores the profound impact we have on each other’s psychological landscapes, often without conscious awareness.

As we journey through the corridors of self-discovery and interpersonal dynamics, let us embrace the power of introspection and empathy. By doing so, we can transform the shadows cast by projective identification into pathways of understanding and growth, fostering deeper connections with ourselves and those around us. May this exploration of projective identity inspire a more compassionate and self-aware society, where the projection of our innermost parts becomes a bridge to mutual understanding rather than a barrier.

When our partner feels sad, or reflective, do we absorb the state, and contain it? Or does it spike our own insecurities? Do we receive the projection, and detoxify, and dyadically work through the emotion, or do we compound it? The concepts and research on projective identification provide a profound and insightful framework for looking at human interaction, integrating Freudian mechanisms, attachment theory, and complex system theory.

Last Update: February 2, 2026

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