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Anna Freud showed previously that denial is used in situations in which the child cannot otherwise escape some unpleasant external impressions. When the child is older he finds ways of avoiding such impressions, and there is then no need for denial. The ego can ‘refuse to encounter the dangerous external situations at all’ (100, 93)1. This is the ‘restriction of the ego’ discussed below.
In Chapter 8 Anna Freud describes a child patient who dealt with situations in which he saw himself as competing with the analyst by abandoning the activity concerned. He could not tolerate comparing his performance with another person's, and avoided this by giving up the activity, losing pleasure and interest in what he was doing. But at the same time he would become preoccupied with activities in which he felt himself to be superior, and spent much time on them. ‘He restricted the functioning of his ego and drew back, greatly to the detriment of his development, from any external situation which might possibly give rise to the types of un-pleasure which he feared most’ (102, 95). There seem to be many intelligent children who do not have the usual inhibitions in relation to learning, but who avoid entering into activities in regard to which their achievements can be