Abstract

This study examined what changes have occurred in the use of the defense mechanisms of female emerging adulthood group in the last 15 years. The subjects of the research were 132 women who were between the ages 18 and 24 of the emerging adulthood group in 1990 and 265 women in 2005. According to the study results, the modern female emerging adulthood group presented a significantly lower score than the past emerging adulthood group in factor 1 such as acting out, displacement, somatization, dissociation, projection, passive-aggressive behavior which are related with a sensitive and insecure behavior pattern. There was no difference in the score between the modern and the past emerging adulthood group for factor 2 which are a part of positive and productive defense mechanism such as controlling, distortion, altruism, humor, sublimation. In factor 3, which are related to self denial or self devaluation, only the reaction formation showed a significant difference in the score between the two groups. The modern female emerging adulthood group scored significantly lower than the past group in factor 4 such as denial, rationalization, suppression, evasion which are related with evasion of reality. These results show that the modern emerging female adulthood group is moving towards reduced insecure and sensivite ego defense mechanism and evasive defense mechanism in comparison to the past emerging female adulthood group, which in turn highlights the fact that there are also changes in the adaptive behavior between the two groups. (Korean J Str Res 2005;13:301∼308)

• Keywords: Emerging adulthood, Female, Defense mechasnism, Adaptation, Ego