Projective identification

 Interpersonal conflict reflects the transposition of intrapsychic conflict within each partner on to the couple relationship. The mental mechanism that is responsible for this transformation is projective identification, the core concept of the object relations approach.

Melanie Klein (1946) defined projective identification as “a combination of splitting off parts of the self and projecting them onto another person,” later desci identification with other people because one has attributed qualities or attributes of one’s own to them”.

Klein saw this as a defensive mode evolving from an early infantile developmental stage in which anxiety is warded off by experiencing intolerable affects, especially aggression, as if they resided in a space external to the self.

This defensive “splitting” thereby creates the first “me-not me boundary.” As the infant matures, and a self-object boundary develops, the preobject “not me” realm fuses with the object world, and what is projected is now directed into the mental image of the other. However, what is projected, is not only the disavowed aspects of the self but also those aspects that are cherished. 

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