neurotic anxiety

in psychoanalytic theory, anxiety that originates in unconscious conflict and is maladaptive in nature: It has a disturbing effect on emotion and behavior and also intensifies resistance to treatment. Neurotic anxiety contrasts with realistic anxiety about an external danger or threat and with moral anxiety, which is guilt posited to originate in the superego.

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Psychology term of the day

February 22nd 2025

conditioning of attitudes

the formation or change of an attitude as a result of the association of an attitude object with a pleasant or unpleasant stimulus in the environment. Attitudes may be conditioned via classical conditioning or operant conditioning processes.