Is There A Term For The Psychological Defense Mechanism Of Replacement?

[Tomino]

I'm not sure if I can explain this clearly, but is there a scientific term/label for a specific kind of psychological coping mechanisms? This involves things such as replacement of someone or something that you've lost and can not let go of, resulting in attempting to substitute said person or item to trick the mind into feeling that it originally felt. Best examples I can find of this are from two video games, Fallout 4 and Bioshock 2. (SPOILERS FOR BOTH GAMES)

Bioshock 2 - A computer scientist named Charles Milton Porter has suffered from losing his wife during the development of a supercomputer A.I called "The Thinker". As he worked on it, Porter has trained the A.I to replicate his dead wife's memories, along with her personality and voice. I feel like he did this, to cope with someone he has lost, although they're really not that person. During a voice/personality test, The Thinker mimicked Porter, which he shortly after said that what he was doing was "wrong", and disabled the A.I's mimicry of his wife.

http://bioshock.wikia.com/wiki/Pearl_(Audio_Diary)

Fallout 4 - The Sole Survivor discovers that their son, Shaun, has grown extremely old and lead The Institute while they were in cryosleep prior to the main events of Fallout 4. While leading The Institute, Shaun created a synthetic version of himself as a child. The player is given a choice to either abandon the synth Shaun or "adopt" him, and attempting to cope.
The Sole Survivor didn't have a chance to experience Shaun grow up, so the synth that the actual Shaun created would give the Sole Survivor a chance to experience it and cope. Although he's obviously fake, I'm sure the synth Shaun was adopted to induce a sort of mechanism (The synth not really being Shaun but attempts to trick the brain into thinking it really is, as if nothing happened, but subconsciously know that they're fake.)


If anyone can tell me the term or name of this specific coping mechanism, I would really appreciate it!

[fiction-factory]

self-deception?

[rowanwitch]

Substitution is a better term than replacement.

[Peter Pedant]

displacement ?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Displacement_(psychology)

this also occurs in anthropology - Mushroom 2 5 knows a lot about this: changing goals and changing ways to achieve the goals.....

[Peter Pedant]

substitution....
you have to distinguish ( cos I remember being told I had to ) substituting the goal - sour grapes I never wanted it anyway so I will do without X

and substituting the means to achieve the same goal - like stealing it rather than buying it

[Tilly2]

Coping?