34: Projection
Projection involves attributing one's own unacceptable thoughts and feelings to others. Repression or denial is a necessary first step to projection - a person must first reject the thoughts as being his own, then find another person on whom they can be blamed.
The most common example among teenaged boys is to experience sexual attraction to another boy, and then berate him for being homosexual. A plethora of other examples exist: the covetous person who believes everyone envies him, the dishonest person who believes others are lying to him, the cheating spouse who accuses her partner of infidelity, etc.
(EN: I recall an observation that when people gratuitously insult others, their choice of subject matter often involves a projection of the qualities they despise in themselves. This may be the case even if the individual acknowledges their shortcomings, so it is not merely projection.)
The self-deceptive nature of projection is clear: the individual denies having the qualities he despises and his projection of them onto others enables him to express his revulsion without feeling that he is being critical of himself.
Projection is theorized to be the basis for paranoid personality disorder, as a person who feels no loyalty to others projects disloyalty onto them and suspects them of scheming to undermine him. In this instance, the projection not only avoids confronting his own disloyalty but also justifies it.
The author mentions transference, which is somewhat different in that the subject transfers emotions from one person to another - accusing his wife of behaviors that he was unable to criticize his mother for - rather than projecting qualities of the self onto them. The mechanism has a similar function (moving the source of their anxiety from a person they fear to one that they do not fear and can thus handle).
Projection or transference are slightly more difficult to detect when the person onto whom qualities are projected often happen to have them. A boy may project his own homosexual attraction onto someone who happens to be homosexual, or a man may transfer his hatred of his philandering father onto a friend who has been promiscuous. The way to tell is that their reaction to the other person is far more extreme and aggressive than it would be if it were merely revulsion of their actual qualities.
The author mentions that this is a particular concern for psychologists, whose patients may project or transfer emotions onto their therapist - who must be conscious of this to avoid antagonizing the patient further.