Persecutory anxiety

In Melanie Klein's theory, the fear that the self will be attacked, invaded or destroyed by bad objects, outside or within. Klein traced it to the death instinct, which the infant feels as a threat of annihilation. That threat is turned outward and projected into the object, which then seems to be a persecutor bent on revenge. Frustration and the infant's own aggressive phantasies feed it, and so do the bad objects taken in by introjection. It is the leading anxiety of the paranoid-schizoid position, and is met by splitting, projection, idealisation, denial and omnipotent control. In "A Contribution to the Theory of Anxiety and Guilt" (1948) Klein set it apart from depressive anxiety, which is a fear for the loved object rather than for the self. It never vanishes, but returns under stress and in psychotic and paranoid states.