Boomerang Effect (Psychology)

In social psychology, the boomerang effect, also known as reactance or the theory of psychological reactance, is the unintended consequence of an attempt to persuade someone that instead results in that person adopting the opposing position. The effect holds that attempts to restrict a person's freedom often produce an anticonformity boomerang response, so that people tend to move toward the opposite of what a message urges precisely because of how forcefully that message is presented to them; the more aggressively a position is pushed on someone, the more likely they are to adopt the contrary view instead.