Cosnier suggests that humor involves an intersystemic and intrasystemic interplay and is a function of the ego. It is a phenomenon related to Winnicott's transitional object. Humor permits the resolution of contradictions, but not by replacing reality with illusion. Instead, humor more nearly resembles the denial of reality such as one finds in a game, a denial which expresses a confidence in the ego and in its functioning. Cosnier seeks to illustrate her thesis by reference to a study of Edith Jacobson's on the genesis and precursors of humor. Humor in Jacobson's patients was used to repair narcissistic wounds concerning the differences between the sexes and between the generations.