Defensiveness and Projection: How Individual Differences Affect Person Perception.

Abstract

Classical projection involves the projection of unwanted traits or drives onto disliked others, whereas attributive projection consists of the projection of unwanted traits or drives onto liked others. It was hypothesized that defensive people would tend to use classical projection, in an effort to deny their own possession of the trait. Open people were expected to employ attributive projection. They admit to possessing the unwanted trait or drive but are able to minimize the consequences of such possession by finding other good people who also possess the trait. These patterns of projection, moreover, should be intensified or exaggerated under conditions of arousal. Two drives were used, lustfulness and aggression. One hundred and fifty-nine University of Michigan students were first given a defensiveness questionnaire and then asked to rank photos of college students according to likability. One third of the sample was then exposed to explicit sexual material, one third was given insulting reading material (designed to elicit an aggressive mood), and the other third was asked to read a boring, ordinary passage. Subjects then rated the photos they liked and disliked the most on a number of traits, including lust and aggression. The main hypothesis of the study was partially confirmed. Open subjects rated liked targets as more lustful than did defensive subjects, though open and defensive subjects' lust ratings of disliked targets did not differ significantly. Disliked targets were rated as more aggressive by defensive subjects, though defensive and open subjects did not differ in the amount of aggression "projected" onto liked targets. Arousal had no effect on projection. The two groups which projected the most, sexually open subjects and aggressive defensive subjects, could be seen as the most motivated to project since their attitudes toward the traits are most different from the norms as represented by the trait evaluations of the sample.