Psychoanalytic approaches to personality: Classical |  |
Chapter OutlinePsychoanalytic Approaches to Personality
Introduction
- Ross Cheit: A case of recovered memories
- Brief biography of Sigmund Freud
Fundamental Assumptions of Psychoanalytic Theory
- Human mind is like a "hydraulic" system, operating by internal pressure
- Personality change occurs with redirection of a person's psychic energy
Basic Instincts: Sex and Aggression
- Instincts: Strong innate forces that provide all the energy in the psychic system
- Freud's original theory of instincts was influenced by Darwin's theory of evolution
- In initial formulation, two instinct classes: Self-preservation instincts, sexual instincts
- In later formulations, Freud collapsed self-preservation and sexual instincts into one, called life instinct (libido); added death instinct (thanatos)
- Although Freud initially argued life and death instincts oppose each other, later he argued they could combine (e.g., in eating)
Unconscious Motivation: Sometimes We Don't Know Why We Do What We Do
- Unconscious: Part of the mind holding thoughts and memories about which person is unaware; includes unacceptable sexual and aggressive urges, thoughts, and feelings
- Human mind consists of three parts
- Conscious: Contains thoughts, feelings, and images about which you are presently aware
- Preconscious: Contains information you are not presently thinking about, but can be easily retrieved and made conscious
- Unconscious: Largest part of the human mind
- Iceberg metaphor
- Freud argued that unconscious material can take on a life of its own—Freud called this the "motivated unconscious"—material can "leak" into thoughts, feelings, and behaviors
Psychic Determinism: Nothing Happens by Chance
- Freud argued that nothing happens by accident—instead, there is a reason behind every act, thought, and feeling
- Everything we do, think, say, feel is an expression of our mind—either conscious, preconscious, or unconscious
- Reasons could be discovered if contents of the unconscious could be examined
- Most symptoms of mental illness are caused by unconscious motivations
- To cure psychological symptoms, the unconscious cause must be discovered
- A Closer Look: Subliminal Psychodynamic Activation
Structure of Personality
- Psychoanalytic personality theory concerns how people cope with their sexual and aggressive instincts within the constraints of civilized society
- One part of the mind creates these urges, another part has a sense of what society expects, and another part tries to satisfy urges within the bounds of reality and society
- Mind as a plumbing system, which contains water under pressure
- Pressure is a metaphor for energy from instincts, which builds up and demands release
- Regarding this internal pressure, three different schools of plumbing:
- One plumber (Id) suggests we open up all valves at the slightest pressure
- Another (Ego) offers ways to redirect pressure so that the strain is relieved without making a mess
- Another (Superego) wants to keep all the valves closed
Id: Reservoir of Psychic Energy
- Most primitive part of the mind, source of all drives and urges
- Operates according to the pleasure principle, which is the desire for immediate gratification
- Functions according to primary process thinking, thinking without logical rules of conscious thought or anchor in reality
- Wish fulfillment: Something unavailable is conjured up and the image of it is temporarily satisfying
Ego: Executive of Personality
- Constrains id to reality
- Develops within first two or three years of life
- Operates according to reality principle: Ego understands that urges of id are often in conflict with social and physical reality
- Operates according to secondary process thinking, development and devising of strategies for problem solving and obtaining satisfaction
Superego: Upholder of Societal Values and Ideals
- Internalizes ideals, values, and moral of society
- What some refer to as the "conscience"
- Main tool of the superego in enforcing right and wrong is the emotion of guilt
- Like id, superego is not bound by reality
Anxiety and the Mechanisms of Defense
Types of Anxiety
- Anxiety is an unpleasant state that signals that things are not right and something must be done
- Signals that control of ego is being threatened by reality, by impulses from id, or by harsh controls exerted by superego
- Objective anxiety occurs in response to real, external threat to a person
- Neurotic anxiety occurs when there is direct conflict between id and ego
- Moral anxiety is caused by conflict between ego and superego
- In all three types of anxiety, the function of ego is to cope with threats and to defend against dangers in order to reduce anxiety
- Ego accomplishes this through the use of defense mechanisms
- Repression
- Denial
- Displacement
- Rationalization
- Reaction formation
- Projection
- Sublimation
Psychosexual Stages of Personality Development
- Freud argued that all people pass through a series of stages in personality development
- At each of the first three stages, young children must face and resolve specific conflicts
- Conflicts revolve around ways of obtaining sexual gratification
- Children see sexual gratification at each stage by investing libidinal energy in a specific body part
- If a child fails to resolve a conflict at a particular stage, he or she may get stuck in that stage or become fixated
- Each successive stage represents a more mature mode of obtaining sexual gratification
- Oral stage (birth to 18 months)
- Main sources of pleasure and tension reduction are the mouth, lips, and tongue
- Key conflict is weaning—withdrawing from the breast or bottle
- Anal stage (18 months to three years)
- Child obtains pleasure from first expelling feces and then, during toilet training, from retaining feces
- Many conflicts arise around the child's ability to achieve self-control
- Phallic stage (three to five years)
- Child discovers he has (or that she doesn't have) a penis
- Sexual desire directed toward the parent of opposite sex
- Produces Oedipal and Electra conflicts—unconscious wish to have opposite-sex parent all to self by eliminating the same-sex parent
- Latency stage (six year to puberty)
- Little psychological development occurs
- Focus of child is on learning skills and abilities necessary to succeed as adult
- Genital stage (puberty through adult life)
- Libido is focused on the genitals, but not in manner of self-manipulation associated with the phallic stage
- This stage is not accompanied by specific conflict
- People reach this stage only if conflicts are resolved at previous stages
Personality and Psychoanalysis
- Psychoanalysis also a method of psychotherapy—a method of deliberately restructuring personality
Making the Unconscious Conscious - Goal of psychoanalysis is to make the unconscious conscious
- First aim of psychoanalysis is to identify unconscious thoughts and feelings
- Once a patient is aware of this material, the second aim is to enable the person to deal with it realistically and maturely
Techniques for Revealing the Unconscious - Free association
- Dream analysis
- Projective techniques
The Process of Psychoanalysis - Psychoanalyst offers interpretations of psychodynamic causes of problems
- Through many interpretations, the patient gains "insight"—an understanding of the unconscious source of problems
- But process is difficult and wrought with roadblocks and challenges
- Patient resistance
- Patient transference
- Repetition compulsion
Evaluating Freud's Contributions
- Psychoanalysis has had major impact on psychology, psychiatry, and Western thought generally
- But many criticisms
- Freud's theory is primarily of historical value and does not directly inform much current personality research
- Freud did not believe in the value of experimentation or hypothesis testing in establishing the validity of psychoanalysis
- Freud relied on case studies of a select group of wealthy women to generate his theory of human nature
Some personality psychologists take issue with Freud's negative view of human nature
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2002 McGraw-Hill Higher Education