Adjustment (psychology)  

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In psychology, adjustment refers to the behavioral process of balancing conflicting needs, or needs challenged by obstacles in the environment. Humans and animals regularly adjust to their environment. For example, when they are stimulated by their physiological state to seek food, they eat (if possible) to reduce their hunger and thus adjust to the hunger stimulus. Adjustment disorder occurs when there is an inability to make a normal adjustment to some need or stress in the environment.

Successful adjustment is crucial to having a high quality of life. Those who are unable to adjust well are more likely to have clinical anxiety or depression, as well as experience feelings of hopelessness, Anhedonia, difficulty concentrating, sleeping problems and reckless behavior.

When evaluating adjustment it can be considered in two ways: adjustment as an achievement and adjustment as a process.

Additional Examples

  • Compensation: emphasizing a strength to diminish the appearance of a real or imagined weakness
    • Adaptive example: developing strong interpersonal skills to compensate for difficulty with academics
  • Intellectualization: focusing on the abstract side of something as opposed to the practical or emotional sides
    • Adaptive example: researching a disease after being diagnosed rather than contemplating the life changing impact
  • Rationalization: understanding the reasoning behind actions; often touted as "making excuses" but can be adaptive
    • Adaptive example: knowing that you need to be stern and harsh to a friend in order to tell them the truth and help them improve
  • Identification: associating oneself with another individual (often a friend or relative) that is extremely accomplished
    • Adaptive example: associating with the success of sibling when you have helped them achieve a goal
  • Projection: displacing personal feelings/opinions as those of another person (consciously or unconsciously)
    • Adaptive example: mitigating personal guilt by saying a friend has anger issues rather than acknowledging your internal anger

See also





Unless indicated otherwise, the text in this article is either based on Wikipedia article "Adjustment (psychology)" or another language Wikipedia page thereof used under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License; or on research by Jahsonic and friends. See Art and Popular Culture's copyright notice.

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