Now that the abused child has split off memories of abuse, they have a second equally significant problem, which is to create an illusion for themselves that they are living in a safe environment. Splitting is the perfect defense for the abused child because not only is it able to isolate the unacceptable aspects of the parents in the unconscious, but, equally importantly, it is able to create a fantasy-based view of the parent out of their neglectful, indifferent or abusive parent(s). This psychological mechanism begins when the child selectively takes those few moments of attention or tenderness that has been shown to them by their parent and magnifying them and creating a “better parent” . The process is the same, in that the few positive incidents from the real parent are split off from the actual parent, and are forced into their unconscious as well. This view of the parent (which is unrealistic) is "enhanced by the child’s unmet needs and [their] use of fantasy." The child holds a view that somewhere in their parents heart there is a hidden storehouse of love, if they only knew how to reach it. This fantasy-based view of the parent is called "the Exciting Object" in Fairbairns model, as the child feels excitement when they fantasize that they have a loving parent. The childs part-ego (or self) that relates to the Exciting Object is called "the Libidinal Ego". In Fairbairns model, Libidinal means loving.
Abuse and subsequent submission and appeasement by the victim have been observed among chimpanzees, leading to the theory that the Stockholm syndrome may have its roots in evolutionary needs.Life in the "environment of evolutionary adaptedness" (EEA) is thought by researchers such as Israeli military historian Azar Gat to be similar to that of the few remaining hunter-gatherer societies. Gat asserts that war and abductions were typical of human pre-history. Being captured by neighbouring tribes was a relatively common event for women. In some of those tribes (the Yanomamo, for instance), practically everyone in the tribe is descended from a captive within the last three generations. As high as one in ten of females were abducted and incorporated into the tribe that captured them. Being captured and having their children killed may have been common; women who resisted capture risked being killed. When selection is intense and persistent, adaptive traits (such as capture-bonding) become universal to the population or species. Loving to survive
First published in 1994, author Dee Graham uses the Stockholm syndrome label to describe group or collective responses to trauma, rather than individual reactions. Graham focuses specifically on the impact of Stockholm syndrome on battered and abused women as a community. She claimed that in both the psychological and societal senses, these women are defined by their sense of fear surrounding the threat of male violence.