conflict /kon″flikt/ [L, conflictere, to strike together] , 1. a mental struggle, either conscious or unconscious, resulting from the simultaneous presence of opposing or incompatible thoughts, ideas, goals, or emotional forces, such as impulses, desires, or drives. 2. a painful state of consciousness caused by the arousal of such opposing forces and the inability to resolve them; a kind of stress found to a certain degree in every person. 3. (in psychoanalysis) the unconscious emotional struggle between the demands of the id and those of the ego and superego or between the demands of the ego and the restrictions imposed by society. Kinds include approach-approach conflict, approach-avoidance conflict, avoidance-avoidance conflict, extrapsychic conflict, intrapsychic conflict.
