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This paper extends previous observations concerning the various mechanisms encountered in what I have called “the struggle of the ego against the introjects” (Bychowski, 1954, 1956, 1958, 1961, 1966). Most recently, I have discussed alienation as a pattern of the ego dealing with archaic objects. The latter term—an equivalent of introject—is defined as “a distorted archaic image of the original love-hate objects” (Bychowski, 1967).
A well-structured ego is capable of assimilating introjects which subsequently, instead of becoming a source of conflicts, enrich the ego; they provide the cornerstones for the ego ideal and, thus, sources for inspiration rather than the restricting limitations of a punitive superego. Moreover, they provide for identifications sufficiently strong to serve as a scaffolding of personality and yet sufficiently flexible to be modified when this is required by changes in environmental reality or intrapsychic homeostasis.
In the structurally defective ego, we can discern several patterns of dealing with introjects as internal representations of the original love-hate objects. Two basic forms of patterning are outlined below.
The introjects are maintained within the ego without modification, fixated mostly in the form of archaic images, with all the ambivalent cathexis preserved. This situation is tantamount to the conservation of the original love-hate objects split into bad and good introjects.
The ego tries to abolish the boundaries between the introjects and to maintain them in a state of flux and oscillation.
It appears that the degree of concreteness of the introjects, preserved in all their original bipolarity, is a good indicator of the defectiveness of ego structure. In keeping with this double version of the introjects is the fragmentation of the total personality and of its entire line of existence. As an end result, the ego is filled with introjects representing original love-hate objects distorted in the sense of archaic imagos and sp