Identification in healthy and pathological character formation.

The character of the ego is built up via a series of identifications carried out in the course of development. As infants are forced by experience to give up the 'internal illusion' of primal identification with the powerful mother, the sense of helplessness that ensues leads to secondary identification to create an 'external illusion' of oneness with the mother during heightened stress or tension. Adequate experiences, leading to increasing trust and tolerance of frustration and tension, promote ego structuralization, self-object differentiation, and oedipal, triadic object relations. Inadequate experiences lead to pathological identifications that interfere with ego development. Oedipal conflicts produce new problems, which are dealt with in part by complex identifications that contribute extensively to the child's personality structure. Superego crystallization derives largely from these later identifications. In optimal circumstances, the identifications out of which the child's character is built become reworked and modified so that it becomes increasingly unique and independent of its sources in others. Stability is never absolute, however. Under stress, reversion is possible to dependence on powerful, charismatic leaders that offers return to the illusion of identificatory union with a powerful, protective, parental 'other'. This can be exploited by potentially dangerous, destructive leaders.