What does projection mean?

The attribution of one’s own attitudes, feelings, or desires to someone or something as a naive or unconscious defense against anxiety or guilt.

Psychologically, “projection” takes place when a person (observer, viewer, hearer) (I’ll refer to this person as “the viewer”) perceives another person — or even an object — to have attributes, traits, or characteristics of the viewer which are, in fact, those of the viewer. This is a subconscious or unconscious process which can gives the viewer a distorted or inaccurate perception of the person or object observe. That distortion can be either negative or positive. This is frequently seen when liars perceive others as lying to them even though they are not. A graduate of a prestigious university, who considers herself to be academically superior, may view someone who also graduated from that school as also being of superior intellect. In each instance, there are these elements (1) the viewer perceives themselves as having a certain quality, (2) that person encounters another person who shares some characteristic(s) which is objectively similar to a characteristic(s) of the viewer and (3) the viewer attributes his or her own quality to the other person. For example, a person with red hair and blue eyes who perceives themselves as being very intelligent, upon meeting someone else with red hair and blues eyes and perceives that person to also be intelligent. I’ve repeatedly used the word “perceives” in this answer because that’s what projection is all about.

EMO Anxiety