Reaction formation
In psychoanalytic theory, reaction formation (German: Reaktionsbildung) is a defense mechanism in which emotions, desires and impulses that are anxiety-producing or unacceptable to the ego are mastered by exaggeration of the directly opposing tendency. == Theory == Reaction formation depends on the hypothesis that: [t]he instincts and their derivatives may be arranged as pairs of opposites: life versus death, construction versus destruction, action versus passivity, dominance versus submission, and so forth.