(repression) A psychological mechanism utilized by humans to shield themselves from painful memories or traumatic events. This protection entails the exclusion of memories or thoughts from consciousness.

(repression) Active mental process of keeping out and ejecting, banishing from consciousness, ideas or impulses that are unacceptable to it.

(repression) Freud�s term for an unconscious defense mechanism in which unacceptable mental contents are banished or kept out of important in normal psychological development and in neurotic and psychotic symptom formation. Freud recognized two kinds of repression: (1) repression proper, in which the repressed material was once in the conscious domain and (2) primal repression, in which the repressed material was never in the conscious realm. Compare with suppression.

The active mental process of keeping out and ejecting, banishing from consciousness, ideas or impulses that are unacceptable to it.

Repression, in psychoanalytic theory, the exclusion of distressing memories, thoughts, or feelings from the conscious mind. Often involving sexual or aggressive urges or painful childhood memories, these unwanted mental contents are pushed into the unconscious mind. Repression is thought to give...