While taking a particularly hard exam for her psychology course, Becky was struggling until she realized she could see what the person next to her had written. The person next to her was one of the top students in the class. Becky quickly copied the answers. Instead of feeling guilty about it afterwards, she told her friends that she saw someone else attempting to copy her answers. This best illustrates which defense mechanism?
a. rationalization
b. projection
c. denial
d. reaction formation