Visual imagery and defensive processes

The ideas and feelings that a patient usually avoids gain expression in therapy as words, images, or acts. The model presented of these representational systems conceptualizes defensive processes as information processing decisions at the boundaries of particular systems and describes in detail the cognitive maneuvers that regulate image formation. Specification of these operations allows for acute observation and selective wording of the interpretation and direction on the part of the therapist that may help a patient override unconscious defenses by conscious choice.