projective
adj.adj. describing a way of thinking where you imagine that your own feelings or thoughts are in someone else. It is often used in psychology to talk about how people see themselves through others.
adj. relating to the psychological process of attributing one's own thoughts, feelings, or motives to another person. In mathematics, it refers to properties or structures that remain invariant under projection.
The patient showed projective tendencies by blaming others for his mistakes.
The therapist noted that the client's projective behavior was a defense mechanism against his own insecurities.
In clinical psychology, projective identification describes a complex defense mechanism where an individual projects their own unacceptable feelings onto another person and then acts as if those feelings are the other person's own.
Formed by the suffixation of prōiect- (the perfect passive participial stem of the Classical Latin prōiciō, whence the English verb project) with the English -ive, forming project + -ive; however, compare the post-Classical Latin prōiectīvus (“relating to purging”).