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Prejudiced subjects may experience antiprejudice propaganda as a threat to their position and instead of accepting or opposing it, may attempt to evade it. Evasion can be achieved in various ways: first, by disidentification from the special instance of prejudice depicted which leads to a 'derailing of understanding'. Second, by invalidation of the message, either by admitting its general validity but insisting on their own position as justified by special experience, or by admitting the validity of the message for special instances but insisting on the general attitude on which prejudice is based. Third, by changing the frame of reference and asserting that the message is directed not against prejudiced people but against some other group. And fourth, evasion can simply be achieved by not understanding.
Cooper and Jahoda claim that the mechanism of evasion is used with particular frequency in present society. That frequency they attribute to the inconsistency of dominant value systems which leads to a departmentalization of personality. Insight into this state of affairs might lead to isolation from an environment in which these inconsistencies prevail.
The authors are obviously aware of the fact that the mechanism of evasion is familiar in psychoanalytic practice where it is generally considered as a special instance of avoidance or denial and mostly studied in resistance to an interpretation.
From the psychoanalytic point of view the value of the present study is twofold. First, it illustrates how the concept of 'defense' can be utilized in a vital area of the social sciences, i.e., in the study of communication. Second, it introduces certain distinctions within the general area of one mechanism of defense, which could easily and profitably be transposed from the area of communication research to the psychoanalytic interview.