Related Experiment Video
Updated: Aug 13, 2026

Use of a Psychophysiological Script-driven Imagery Experiment to Study Trauma-related Dissociation in Borderline Personality Disorder
Published on: March 8, 2018
Hope and dysphoria: the moderating role of defense mechanisms
1Department of Psychology, Washington State University, Pullman 99164-4820, USA. kwonp@wsu.edu
Abstract:
It was hypothesized that the adaptive value of hope cognitions would be dependent upon the quality of an individual's defense style. Undergraduate students completed measures of hope, defense mechanisms, and dysphoria in two studies. As predicted, defense mechanisms significantly moderated the relation between hope and dysphoria. In addition, both hope and defense mechanisms predicted dysphoria as main effects. Individuals who had low hope and an immature defense style had particularly high levels of dysphoria. Low hope was not maladaptive for individuals with a mature defense style, suggesting that a subtype of low hope ("defensive hopelessness") may exist that is analogous to defensive pessimism. Individuals with high hope had low levels of dysphoria regardless of defense style. Overall, the present study suggests that an integration of psychodynamic and cognitive perspectives on hope may be productive.
More Related Videos
05:22Dissociation of the Confounding Influences of Expectancy and Integrative Difficulty Residing in Anomalous Sentences in Event-related Potential Studies
Published on: May 9, 2019
06:04Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy Hyperscanning Study in Psychological Counseling
Published on: January 17, 2025
Related Concept Videos
Self-Discrepancy Theory
Cognitive Dissonance
Horney's Sociocultural Approach
Unrealistic Optimism Bias
Self-Discrepancy and Its Effects
The Influence of Cognition on Affect