2.5 Resistance: Classification of Resistances

During the course of his many writings on problems of defense and resistance, Freud at various times attempted to distinguish between different types of resistance. In Inhibitions, Symptoms and Anxiety he distinguished five kinds of resistance and classified them according to their source (1926a, p. 160). (1) The resistance of repression, by which he meant the resistance of the ego's defenses. (2) Resistance of the transference. Since transference is a substitute for memory and is based on a displacement from past objects onto present objects, Freud classified this resistance too as derived from the ego. (3) The gain from illness, or secondary gain, he also placed under the ego resistances. (4) The fourth variety he considered those which required working through, namely, the repetition compulsion and the adhesiveness of the libido, which he considered to be resistances from the id. (5) The last resistances Freud designated were those which arose from unconscious guilt and the need for punishment. He believed that these resistances originated in the superego.

Glover (1955), in the two chapters devoted to defense resistance in his book on technique, classifies resistances in many different

ways, but goes along with Freud's classification according to sources of resistance. Fenichel (1941) considered this method of differentiation unsystematic, and pointed out that Freud himself had the same impression (pp. 33-34).

Before pursuing our discussion of the sources of resistance, I believe it would be wise to state the truism that all psychic structures participate in all psychic events, although to varying degrees. If this is kept in mind, we will be less prone to oversimplify or overgeneralize our formulations. In accordance with our discussion of resistance and defense, I believe that the function of defense, the activity of avoiding pain, no matter what the evocative stimulus is, is initiated by the ego. The ego is that psychi