“The repression of the memory is dependent upon and related to the suppression of feeling, for as long as the feeling persists, the memory remains vivid”.
— Alexander Lowen
When you study about repression you might often come across the term “suppression” and the confusion that surrounds these two defence mechanisms. People often end up using them indistinguishably and synonymously, but from a psychological perspective, their concepts differ drastically.
Repression and suppression both deal with painful memories, unsavoury thoughts, feelings or impulses that an individual does not want to feel and wishes to get rid of them.But one key characteristic feature that separates the two is, that,
Repression is an unconscious process, &
Suppression is a conscious process.
To begin, lets understand what conscious and unconscious is ?
In simple terms; the conscious mind is which contains all the thoughts, memories, feelings of which an individual, is aware of, at any given moment.
The unconscious mind is a reservoir of thoughts, feelings, memories that are inaccessible to the consciousness but that, which influence feelings, judgements or behaviours.
Now , lets understand what Repression and Suppression are …
Repression deals with very painful and distressing thoughts or memories that an individual unconsciously decides to hide in order to completely forget about them and become unaware that they ever existed.
Example- A person who has suffered abuse as a child might repress the memories while growing up and have no idea about it. This is done to protect themselves of it as the memories might be harmful for the well-being of the person. Though this would influence the behaviour of the individual and hinder in forming good relationships in future.
Whereas, in suppression an individual finds a thought to be troublesome or maladaptive, he/she consciously attempts to subdue it, this thought will still be in their conscious, but its intensity would be reduced.
Example- A person who’s been bit by a dog would suppress that thought in order to not get scared or overreact whenever he/she sees a dog again.
To Conclude. . .
Suppression is a phenomenon wherein a person is aware of the thoughts and feelings and they can be recalled; whereas, repression is a phenomenon wherein if a person has repressed an incident then it cannot be brought back to the conscious through recollection as its simply not available.
-By Pradeepti Devgun