displacement activity 
noun Psychology
An animal or human activity that seems inappropriate, such as head-scratching when confused, considered to arise unconsciously when a conflict between antagonistic urges cannot be resolved.When it happened, it was almost a displacement activity....
- Yet the whole affair was a displacement activity: an exercise in self-deception.
- What choice did I have but to find some displacement activity?
- Schoenberg, Arnold
- scholar
- scholarliness
- scholarly
- scholarship
- scholar's mate
- scholastic
- scholastically
- scholasticism
- scholiast
- scholiastic
- scholium
- school
- schoolable
- school age
- school attendance
- school bass
- school bell
- school board
- school board visitor
- schoolbook
- schoolboy
- schoolboy code
- schoolboy code of honor
- schoolboy code of honour