vast desire for knowledge and knew well how theorising can become a compulsive activity. He might not have disagreed too strongly with Didier Anzieu's assessment of the extent to which "his elaboration of psychoanalytic theory...corresponded to a setting up of obsessional defenses against depressive anxiety" – of Freud's need "to defend himself against [anxiety] through such a degree of intellectualisation". Further examples Suppose John has been brought up by a strict father, feels hurt, and is angry as a result. Although John may have deep feelings of hatred towards his father, when he talks about his childhood, John may say: "Yes, my father was a rather firm person, I suppose I do feel some antipathy towards him even now". John intellectualizes; he chooses rational and emotionally cool words to describe experiences which are usually emotional and very painful. A woman in therapy continues to theorise her experience to her therapist – 'It seems to me that being psycho-analysed is essentially a process where one is forced back into infantilism... intellectual primitivism' – despite knowing that she 'would get no answer to it, or at least, not on the level I wanted, since I knew that what I was saying was the "intellectualising" to which she attributed my emotional troubles'. References Psychoanalytic terminology Defence mechanisms Intellectualism sv:Intellektualisering