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The author, admitting to a very tentative approach to this obscure subject, thinks that the strength of the ego does not depend upon a high degree of narcissism, since that may lead to over-sensitivity; nor upon an ability to tolerate unpleasure, since that does not exclude masochism; nor upon an absence of anxiety, since the production of anxiety as a danger-signal is a healthy activity of the ego. he takes as his criterion of ego-strength the efficacity of its synthesizing function, by means of which it harmonizes the different forces which impinge upon it from the id, the super-ego and the external world. In his opinion, when the ego is completely governed by its super-ego or by its internalized objects or by a powerful instinctual urge, it may appear to be very strong, but is in fact weak; for it is then either at the mercy of its sense of guilt, or is laid open to the great quantities of aggressiveness which have been liberated in the process of identification and which cannot all be turned outwards, or is liable to come into conflict with the external world.
The main causes of weakness of the ego are, in Nunberg's view, inhibitions in its development which lead to infantile fixations and rigid reactions, so that on the one hand it is no longer an integral unit and on the other is unable to compromise with, and mediate between, the conflicting demands made upon it. In conclusion, pursuing a more speculative line, he suggests that the strength or weakness of the ego may ultimately depend upon the proportions in which the life instinct and the death instinct are mixed in it.