Characteristics on Ego Defense Mechanism of Believers in Religion:Focused on Comparison with Persons without Religion or Unbelievers

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this study was to examine characteristics on ego defense mechanism of believers in religion compared with unbelievers. Korea－Defense Style Questionnaires (K-DSQ) have been administered to a sample of 456 Buddhists, Christians, Catholics, Won-Buddhists and persons without religion living in Seoul and Gyeonggi-do. It was reviewed the difference of ego defense mechanism according to the religions and the kinds of religions based on t-test and One-way ANOVA. The results indicated that: 1) The group that hold religious beliefs had higher scores at the adaptive defense style compared with the group that didn’t. 2) The score of defensive mechanism such as sublimation and reaction formation was higher too. 3) The Won-Buddhists got lower scores at the immature defense style and had higher scores at the adaptive defense style compared with the Christians and the Catholics. The outcome of this study and the direction for future research were discussed.