APA Dictionary of Psychology

the psychoanalytic concepts of British psychoanalyst W. Ronald D. Fairbairn (1889–1964), which form a part of object relations theory. Fairbairn saw personality structure developing in terms of object relationships rather than in terms of Sigmund Freud’s id, ego, and superego. Fairbairn proposed the existence of an ego at birth, which then splits apart during the paranoid-schizoid position to form the structures of personality. In response to frustrations and excitement experienced in the relationship with the mother, the infant’s ego is split into (a) the central ego, which corresponds to Freud’s concept of the ego; (b) the libidinal ego, which corresponds to the id; and (c) the antilibidinal ego, which corresponds to the superego.