There are people openly betrayed by their partner who do not believe that their partner is unfaithful; already worn out love stories in which people continue; worrying signs of illness that we ignore by mistakenly attributing disorders to tiredness from work; addictions to toxic substances that we believe are the result of autonomously chosen behavior…
In situations like these, we tell ourselves a story that does not correspond to the truth and an attentive interpreter does not escape the fact that, if we were impartial or were not emotionally and cognitively involved in the situation in which we find ourselves, if we did not have a motivation or an interest in believing something more pleasant, it would not be difficult to see and say how things are. In this Psychology-Online article, we are going to find out then What is self-deception in psychology, its types, consequences and examples.
Meaning of self-deception
The origin of the word “deception” is late Latin (gannare), with both Greek and Slavic contaminations, and the meaning is to mock, deceive, fraud, of course, deliberate, that is, not involuntary, and which has been done with the purpose of obtaining advantages of any kind, from economic to relational, at the expense of those who are deceived.
Self-deception, on the other hand, comes from ourselves, and is difficult to detect and therefore combat, precisely because we have not been able (or willing) to recognize it: we all have the tendency to want to see in reality what confirms our sensations and ideas. It is the basic principle of self-deception. The victim hides the state of real things from himself, or believes in something that he hopes is not false, he has illusions that an object, a situation, a relationship is better (or worse) than it seems, and due to naivety or Erroneous or superficial information falls into the trap that has been created.
Self-deception is precisely classified as a psychological phenomenon that belongs to the broadest family of cases of so-called “motivated irrationality”, where “motivated” is defined as any form of irrationality in which we would not find ourselves if we were not conditioned by a state. motivational (for example, a desire). Self-deception, therefore, consists of the formation (or maintenance) of a false belief in the drive of a strong state of motivation to believe that proposition.
Function of self-deception
Self-deception is a process of cognitive distortion, which has psychological and existential motivations that can be very different from each other, but all aimed at guaranteeing the achievement of a state considered preferable to what would otherwise be determined with the acceptance of impulses, which They come from deep areas of the psyche.
considered the refusal procedure as one of the defense mechanisms, with which the Self prevents itself from recognizing a desire that produces conflicts and disturbances that place it in a psychologically unsustainable situation. The truth, or the acceptance of real or alleged factual data, can represent or be experienced as a threat. In this case, the Self tries to protect the image of itself, convincing itself to feel, think or act according to motivations, ideas or values that reinforce the feeling of personal security and help calm guilt and internal conflictswhich they otherwise could not control.
But self-deception also has a social value, in the sense that it is an important factor of social cohesion: in effect, it is impossible to belong to a community without sharing the collective deceptions that characterize it. We can say, then, that self-deception, that is, the gaps and logical leaps in conscious thought, serve to avoid being excluded or marginalized from the community of belonging. The absence of self-deception would have two serious consequences.
- The first would be a denunciation of the falsehood of the majority of the members of the community itself, an accusation that would not be tolerated by those concerned and would lead to the punishment and marginalization of the accuser.
- The second consequence would be a self-use of one’s own falsehood, which would have disastrous effects on self-esteem, both from an intellectual and moral point of view. In fact, then the subject would feel unworthy of belonging to a community of sincere people.
Consequences of self-deception
As we see, on certain occasions, self-deception may be necessary, however, it can also affect us negatively. Self-deception can be two faces and it can also have unfavorable consequences. Among the main consequences of self-deception, we can find:
- Not facing reality. We fool ourselves into thinking that our partner will change or that our family will one day understand us.
- Blame others and circumstances. Self-deception causes us not to take responsibility for what is our responsibility and we blame the context and other people for everything.
- Take no action. If we don’t accept the problem, that this person is like this or that this job is like that, we won’t do anything about it, like ending the relationship or changing jobs.
- The situation does not change. We stay in a situation that we don’t like or that causes us discomfort.
- We are not moving forward. Self-deception causes us to not accept reality, take responsibility or take any action to promote change. Therefore, it leaves us stagnant.
- we don’t learn. If we do not take action or make changes, we do not live new experiences and we do not learn.
Types and examples of self-deception
Let’s look at some common situations in which self-deception is present:
- A man believes that his wife is not having an extramarital affairwhich he actually has, and he believes it despite the fact that the evidence at his disposal should at least alert him and favor the conviction, or at least the suspicion, that his wife is unfaithful.
- An experienced oncologist believes she does not have canceralthough it has symptoms that you can usually identify in your patients as diagnostic of a serious tumor.
- A mother believes her son is innocent and that he did not commit a crime for which he was convicted after a full confession.
- A person methodically proceeded to hasten the death of his alcoholic partner letting him drink excessively, but now believes he had nothing to do with his spouse’s death.
Examples of self-deception phrases
Typical phrases that indicate self-deception:
- “I can stop smoking whenever I want.”
- “I can decide to end the relationship at any time.”
- “I can start working whenever I want.”
- “I know what I do.”
- “I’m all over you because you can’t take care of yourself.”
This article is merely informative, at Psychology-Online we do not have the power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.
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Bibliography
- Conti, I. (2012). Autoinganni. Per non essere più vittime dei tranelli che ci struiamo da sol. Milan: Franco Angeli.
- Pedrini, P. (2013). L’autoinganno. It works and works. Bari: GLS.
- Bisogni Psychology (2021). Autoinganno. Retrieved from: https://psicologiadeibisogni.it/autoinganno/
- Saladini, V. (2012). Le vie della mystificazione. Rome: Armando Editore.