THEORIES OF PERSONALITY NOTES Source: Feist & Feist, 7th Ed What Is Personality? - It originated from the word persona, referring to a theatrical mask worn by Roman actors in Greek dramas. - Personality is a pattern of relatively permanent traits and unique characteristics that give both consistency and individuality to a person’s behavior. - A theory of personality is an organized attempt to describe and explain how personalities develop and why personalities differ. (Plotnik, 2009) - Traits contribute to individual differences in behavior, consistency of behavior over time, and stability of behavior across situations. - Characteristics are unique qualities of an individual that include such attributes as temperature, physique, and intelligence. A useful theory: (1) generates research (2) is falsifiable (3) organizes data (4) guides action (5) is internally consistent (6) is parsimonious Dimensions for Concept of Humanity (1) determinism vs. free choice - Are people’s behaviors determined by forces over which they have no control, or can people choose to be what they wish to be? (2) pessimism vs. optimism - Are people doomed to live miserable, conflicted, and troubled lives, or can they change and grow into psychologically healthy, happy, fully functioning human beings? (3) causality vs. teleology - Briefly, causality holds that behavior is a function of past experiences, whereas teleology is an explanation of behavior in terms of future goals or purposes. (4) conscious vs. unconscious - Are people ordinarily aware of what they are doing and why they are doing it, or do unconscious forces impinge on them and drive them to act without awareness of these underlying forces? (5) biological vs. social – nature-nurture issue (6) uniqueness vs. similarities – Is the salient feature of people their individuality, or their common characteristics? SIGMUND FREUD: Psychoanalysis Hysteria - a disorder typically characterized by paralysis or improper functioning of certain parts of the body. (Jean Martin-Charcot) Catharsis – the process of removing hysterical symptoms through “talking them out” (Josef Breuer) Free Association Technique & Hypnosis – principal therapeutic techniques used by Freud Interpretation of Dreams – Freud’s greatest work Phylogenetic Endowment – a portion of our unconscious originates from the experiences of our early ancestors that have been passed on to us through hundreds generations of repetition Provinces of the Mind (1) Id – serves the “pleasure principle”. It has no contact with the reality, it strives constantly to reduce tension by satisfying basic desires. (2) Ego – governed by the “reality principle”. The only region in the mind in contact with reality. It reconciles the blind, irrational claims of the id. (3) Superego – guided by the “moralistic principle”. Basically unrealistic in its demands for perfection because it has no contact with reality. - It has two subsystems: (a) conscience – results from experiences with punishments for improper behavior and tells us what we ‘should not do’ (b) ego-ideal – develops from experiences with rewards for proper behavior and tells us what we ‘should do’ Guilt results when the ego acts contrary to the moral standards of the superego. A function of conscience. Feelings of inferiority arise when the ego is unable to meet the superego’s standards of perfection. A function of ego-ideal. Dynamics of Personality (1) Drive - an internal stimulus that operates as a constant motivational force Sex Drive or Eros - erogenous zones: genitals, mouth, and anus Forms/Manifestations: (a1) primary narcissism – libido exclusively invested on their own ego, a universal condition (a2) secondary narcissism – Not universal, but a moderate degree of self-love is common to nearly every one. Here narcissistic libido is transformed into object libido (b) love – develops when people invest their libido on an object or person other than themselves (c) sadism – is the need for sexual pleasure by inflicting pain or humiliation on another person. Considered sexual perversion extreme. (d) masochism – is the need for sexual pleasure by suffering pain and humiliation inflicted by themselves or by others. (2) Aggression - the aim of the destructive drive is to return the organism to an inorganic state, which is death (3) Anxiety - the center of the Freudian dynamic theory - a felt, affective, unpleasant state accompanied by a physical sensation - it is ego-preserving and self-regulating (a) neurotic anxiety – defined as an apprehension about an unknown danger. It results from the dependence of the ego to the id. (b) moral anxiety – stems from the conflict between the ego and superego o. (c) realistic anxiety – It is closely related to fear. It is defined as an unpleasant, nonspecific feeling involving a possible danger. Defense Mechanisms - It helps the ego to avoid dealing directly with sexual and aggressive impulses and to defend itself against the anxiety that accompanies them (1) Repression – It is the most basic of the defense mechanisms. When the ego is threatened by undesirable id impulses, it forces threatening feelings into the unconscious. (2) Reaction Formation – repressed impulse becomes conscious by adopting a disguise that is directly opposite to its original form (3) Displacement – unacceptable urges are redirected onto a variety of people or objects so that the original impulse is disguised or concealed (4) Fixation – when the prospect of taking the next psychological stage becomes too anxiety provoking, the ego may resort to the strategy of remaining at the present, more comfortable psychological stage. This is held universally and demands a more or less permanent expenditure of psychic energy. (5) Regression – a reversion in which during times of stress and anxiety of a developmental stage, the libido reverts back to an earlier stage. Infantile and rigid in nature just like fixation, but is usually temporary. (6) Projection – seeing in others unacceptable feelings or tendencies that actually resides in one’s own unconscious. The ego may reduce the anxiety by attributing the unwanted impulse to an external object, usually another person. A severe variety of it is called paranoia. (7) Introjection - a defense mechanism whereby people incorporate positive qualities of another person into their own ego. People introject characteristics that they see as valuable and that will permit them to feel better about themselves. (8) Sublimation – is the repression of the genital aim of Eros by substituting a cultural or social aim. (9) Rationalization – involves covering up the true reasons for actions, thoughts, or feelings by making up excuses and incorrect explanations (10) Denial – is refusing to recognize some anxiety-provoking event or piece of information that is clear to others Stages of Development For Freud, the first 4 or 5 years of life, or the infantile stage, are the most crucial for personality information. It is divided into three stages: 1 Oral Phase (early infancy, first 18 months of life) - Pleasure-seeking activities include sucking, chewing, and biting. - If fixated at this stage, because oral wishes were gratified too much or too little, oral gratification continues in adulthood. 2 Anal Phase (late adulthood, 1½ to 3 years) - Infant’s pleasure seeking is centered on the anus and its function of elimination. - Fixation at this stage results to retention or elimination. - Anal retentive – may take the form of being very neat, stingy, or behaviourally rigid - Anal expulsive – may take the form of being generous, messy, or very loose or carefree - Anal triad: orderliness, stinginess, and obstinacy 3 Phallic Stage (early childhood, 3-6 years) - Infant’s pleasure-seeking is centered on the genitals. - Oedipus complex occurs at this stage: a process in which a child competes with the parent of the same sex for the affections and pleasures of the parent of the opposite sex. (Electra complex for female) - Castration anxiety may arise, the fear of losing the penis, or penis envy for females 4 Latency Stage (6 to puberty) - A time when the child represses sexual thoughts and engages in nonsexual activities, such as developing social and intellectual skills. - dormant psychosexual development 5 Genital Stage - puberty signals the reawakening of sexual impulses Dream Analysis - to transform the manifest content of dreams to the more important latent content - the “royal road” to the knowledge of the unconscious - Manifest content of a dream refers to the surface meaning or the conscious description given by the dreamer - Latent content refers to the unconscious material - For Freud, all dreams are wish fulfilments - Dreams can work their way to consciousness in two ways: (1) Condensation refers to the fact that the manifest dream content is not as extensive as the latent level, indicating that the unconscious material has been abbreviated or condensed before appearing on the manifest level (2) Displacement means that the dream is replaced by some other idea remotely related to it Freudian slips (parapraxes) Critique of Freud’s Psychoanalysis - His theory of personality was strongly oriented towards men, he lacked a complete understanding of the feminine psyche. - an area of criticism on Freud centers around his status as a scientist ALFRED ADLER: Individual Psychology - Individual psychology rests heavily on the notion of social interest, that is, a feeling of oneness with all humankind. - People are motivated mostly by social influences and by their striving for superiority or success. - People are largely responsible for who they are - Present behavior is shaped by the people’s view of the future. - an opposing theory to psychoanalysis Striving for success or superiority - 1st tenet: The one dynamic force behind people’s behavior is the striving for success or superiority - He reduced all motivation to this single drive. - Everyone begins with a life of physical deficiencies that activate feelings of inferiority. - The striving force serves as a compensation for feelings of inferiority. - People, by their nature, possess an innate tendency toward completion or wholeness. Masculine protest – implied will to power or a domination of others. This term was used after Adler rejected aggression as the single motivational force. Striving for superiority – limited to those people who strive personal superiority over others Striving for success – describes actions of people who are motivated by highly developed social interest. - Each individual is guided by a final goal regardless of the motivation for striving. It is fictional and has no objective existence, a product of creative power. Creative Power – it refers to the people’s ability to freely shape their behavior and create their own personality. Inferiority Complex – exaggerated feelings of personal inferiority Subjective Perceptions - 2nd tenet: People’s subjective perceptions shape their behavior and personality. Fictionalism. Striving superiority is shaped by people’s perceptions of reality that is by their fictions, or expectations of the future. - Fictionalism is consistent with the teleology. Unity and Self-Consistency of Personality - 3rd tenet: Personality is unified and selfconsistent. - Each person is unique and indivisible. Organ Dialect - The whole person strives in a selfconsistent fashion toward a single goal, and all separate actions and functions can be understood only as parts of this goal. The disturbance of one part of the body cannot be viewed in isolation; it affects the entire person. - For Adler, conscious and unconscious are not considered as a dichotomy, but two cooperating parts of the same unified system. The conscious thoughts are helpful for striving superiority while unconscious is not helpful. Social Interest - 4th tenet: The value of all human activity must be seen from the viewpoint of social interest. - Social interest means a feeling of oneness with all humanity; it implies membership in the social community of all people. It can also be defined as an attitude of relatedness with humanity in general as well as the empathy for each member of the community. - Social interest was Adler’s yardstick for measuring psychological health and is thus “the sole criterion of human value”. Style of Life - 5th tenet: The self-consistent personality structure develops into a person’s style of life. Style of life is the term Adler used to refer to the flavor of a person’s life. It includes a person’s goal, self-concept, feelings for others, and attitude toward the world. It is the product of the interaction of heredity, environment, and a person’s creative power. - Although the final goal is singular, style of life need not be narrow or rigid. - Three major problems of life: neighborly love, sexual love, and occupation. Creative Power 6th Tenet: Style of life is molded by people’s creative power. - Each person is empowered with the freedom to create his or her own style of life. Ultimately, people are responsible for who they are and how they behave. It makes each person a free individual. - Each person uses heredity and environment as the bricks and mortar to build personality, but the architectural design reflects that person’s own style. The building materials of personality are secondary. We are our own architect and can build either a useful or useless style of life. Abnormal Development - For Adler, the one factor underlying all types of maladjustments is underdeveloped social interest. - Also neurotics tend to: (1) set their goals too high (2) live in their own private world (3) have a rigid and dogmatic style of life External Factors in Maladjustment (1) Exaggerated physical deficiencies (2) Pampered style of life - the heart of most neuroses (3) Neglected style of life Safeguarding Tendencies - People create patterns of behavior to protect their exaggerated sense of self-esteem against public disgrace. - This protective devices enable people to hide their inflated self-image and to maintain their current style of life. - These can be compared to Freud’s defense mechanisms, but are largely conscious to shield a person’s fragile self-esteem. Three forms: (1) Excuses – commonly expressed in “Yes, but or If only” format (2) Aggression – most common safeguarding tendency Depreciation. The tendency to undervalue other people’s achievements and to overvalue one’s own (e.g. criticism and gossip). Accusation. The tendency to blame others for one’s failures and to seek revenge. Self-accusation. Marked by self-torture and guilt (e.g. masochism, depression, suicide). (3) Withdrawal – Running away from difficulties or referred to as “safeguarding through distance” Four Modes: Moving Backwards. The tendency to safeguard one’s fictional goal of superiority by psychologically reverting to a more secure period of life. It is designed to elicit sympathy. Standing Still. They do not move in any direction, thus, they avoid all responsibility by ensuring themselves against any threats of failure. Hesitating. In face of difficult problems, some people hesitate or vacillate. (e.g. procrastination) Constructing Obstacles. The least severe of the withdrawal safeguarding tendencies. Masculine Protest - Psychic life of women is essentially the same as that of men and that a male-dominated society is not natural but rather an artificial product of historical development. - According to Adler, cultural and social practices— not anatomy—influence many men and women to overemphasize the importance of being manly. Applications of Individual Psychology (1) Family Constellation - Analytical psychology is essentially a psychology of opposites. (2) Early Recollections (3) Dreams Golden rule of dream work in individual psychology: “Everything can be different.” (4) Psychotherapy Adlerian theory postulates that psychopathology results from lack of courage, exaggerated feelings of inferiority, and underdeveloped social interest. Thus, the chief purpose of Adlerian psychotherapy is to enhance courage, lessen feelings of inferiority, and encourage social interest. Critique of Adler - Like that of Freud, produced many concepts that do not easily lend themselves to either verification or falsification. - It suffers from a lack of precise operational definitions. - Individual psychology is somewhat philosophical even moralistic. - The concept of creative power cannot be scientifically studied. - high on free choice and optimism, very low on causality, moderate on unconscious influences, and high on social factors and the uniqueness of individual ________________________________________ CARL JUNG: Analytical Psychology - It rests on the assumption that occult phenomena can and do influence the lives of everyone. - Jung believed that each of us is motivated not only by repressed experiences but also by certainly emotionally toned experiences inherited from our ancestors. These make up the collective unconscious. - Some elements of the collective unconscious become highly developed and are called archetypes. Levels of the Psyche - Jung strongly asserted that the most important part of the unconscious springs not from personal experiences of the individual but from distant past of human existence, the collective unconscious. Of lesser importance are conscious and personal unconscious. Conscious. Images that are sensed by the ego; the center of consciousness. Ego is not the whole personality, but must be completed by the self, the center of the personality that is largely unconscious. - The consciousness plays a minor role in analytical psychology, and an overemphasis on expanding one’s conscious psyche can lead to psychological imbalance. Personal Unconscious. It embraces all repressed, forgotten, or subliminally perceived experiences of one particular individual. It contains repressed infantile memories and impulses, forgotten events, and experiences originally perceived below the threshold of our consciousness. Our personal unconscious is formed by our individual experiences and is therefore unique to each of us. Complexes – are contents of the personal unconscious. It is an emotionally toned conglomeration of associated ideas. It is partly conscious and may stem from both the personal and collective unconscious. - an individualized component of the personal unconscious. Collective Unconscious – This has roots in the ancestral past of the entire species. The physical contents of the collective unconscious are inherited and pass from one generation to the next as a psychic potential. - This refers to human’s innate tendency to react in a particular way whenever their experiences stimulate a biologically inherited response tendency. - This does not lie dormant but are active and influence a person’s thoughts, emotions, and actions. - Countless repetition of these biologically based predispositions have them part of the human biological constitution which then begin to develop some content and to emerge as a relatively autonomous archetypes. Archetypes - are ancient or archaic images that derive from the collective unconscious. - These emotionally tones collection of associated images are generalized components of the collective unconscious. - Archetypes cannot be directly represented, but when activated it expresses itself through several modes (e.g. dreams, fantasies, and delusions). Persona - the side of personality that people show to the world - If we over identify with our persona, we lose touch with our inner self and remain dependent on society’s expectations of us. Shadow - the archetype of darkness and repression represents those qualities we do not wish to acknowledge but attempt to hide from ourselves and others Anima - the feminine side of men’s personality - represents irrational moods and feelings Animus - the masculine side of women’s personality - symbolic of thinking and reasoning Great Mother - derivative of anima archetype - represents both positive and negative feelings: fertility and nourishment and on the one hand, power and destruction - Fertility and power combine to form the concept of rebirth, which maybe a separate archetype. Wise Old Man - archetype of wisdom and meaning, symbolizes human’s pre-existing knowledge of the mysteries of life. Hero - the conquering hero archetype represents victory over the forces of darkness Self - the innate disposition possessed by each person to move toward growth, perfection, and completion - the most comprehensive of all archetypes - the self is the archetype of archetypes because it pulls together the other archetypes and unites them in the process of self-realization -its ultimate symbol is the mandala, representing the strivings of the collective unconscious for unity, balance and wholeness Dynamics of Personality Causality and Teleology - He insisted that both causal and teleological forces must be balanced. Progression – adaptation to the outside world involving the forward flow of psychic energy Regression - adaptation to the inner world involving the backward flow of psychic energy * Alone, neither progression nor regression leads to development. Either can bring about too much one-sidedness and failure in adaptation; but the two, working together, can activate the process of healthy personality development. Psychological Types Attitudes. Jung defined it as a predisposition to act or react in a characteristic direction. He insisted that each person has both an introverted and an extraverted attitude, although one may be conscious while the other is unconscious. Intoversion - is the turning inward of psychic energy with an orientation toward the subjective. Introverts are tuned in to their inner world with all its biases, fantasies, dreams, and individualized perceptions. Extraversion - is the turning outward of psychic energy with an orientation toward the objective. 4 Functions: Sensing – tells people that something exists Extraverted sensing- people perceive external stimuli objectively Introverted sensing – guided by their subjective interpretation of sense stimuli Thinking – enables them to recognize its meaning Extraverted thinking – relying heavily on concrete thoughts, objective Introverted thinking – interpretation of an event is colored more by the internal meaning, subjective Feeling – tells them its value or worth Extraverted feeling – people use objective data to make evaluations Introverted feeling - people base their value judgments primarily on subjective perceptions Intuiting – allows them to know without knowing how they know Extraverted intuitive people – are oriented towards facts in the external world Introverted intuitive people – are guided by unconscious perceptions of facts that are basically subjective and have no resemblance to external stimuli Development of Personality Stages of Development: childhood, youth, middle life, and old age Childhood Three Substages: (1) Anarchic phase – characterized by chaotic and sporadic consciousness. Experiences of the anarchic phase sometimes enter consciousness as primitive images, incapable of being accurately verbalized. - “Islands of consciousness” may exist but there is little or no connection among these islands. (2) Monarchic phase – characterized by the development of ego and by the beginning of logical and verbal thinking. During this time, children refer to themselves in the third person. - The islands of consciousness become larger, more numerous and inhabited by a primitive ego. - The ego is perceived as an object, not as a perceiver. (3) Dualistic phase – The ego as perceiver arises during this stage and divided into the subjective and objective. - Children now refer to themselves in the first person and aware of their existence as separate individuals. - The islands of consciousness become continuous land, inhabited by an ego-complex that recognizes itself as both object and subject. Youth - the period from puberty until middle life - Young people strive to gain psychic and physical independence from their parents, find a mate, raise a family, and make a place in the world. - A period of increased activity, maturing sexuality, and growing consciousness. Middle Life - approximately begins at age 35 or 40 - presents people with increasing anxiety, and a period of tremendous potential - If middle-aged people retain the social and moral values of their early life, they become rigid and fanatical in trying to hold on to their physical attractiveness and agility. Old Age - people certainly fear death during this stage Self-realization - also called as psychological rebirth - the process of becoming an individual or a whole person - the process of integrating the opposite poles into a single homogenous individual - this process of “coming to selfhood” means that a person has all psychological components functioning in unity, with no psychic process atrophying - The self-realized person must allow the unconscious to be the core of personality. Methods of Investigation (1) Word Association Test (2) Dream Analysis - Jung objected to Freud’s notion that nearly all dreams are wish fulfilments and that most dream symbols represent sexual urges; rather people used symbols to represent a variety of concepts to try to comprehend the “innumerable things beyond the range of human understanding”. - Dreams are our unconscious and spontaneous attempt to know the unknowable. - The purpose of Jungian dream interpretation is to uncover elements from the personal and collective unconscious and to integrate them into consciousness in order to facilitate the process of self-realization. - Jung felt that certain dreams offered proof for the existence of the collective unconscious. These dreams included big dreams, which have special meaning for all people; typical dreams, which are common to most people; and earliest dreams remembered. (3) Active Imagination - This method requires a person to begin with any impression—a dream image, vision, picture, or fantasy—and to concentrate until the impressions begins to “move”. The person must follow these images and courageously face these autonomous images and freely communicate with them. - The purpose of active imagination is to reveal archetypal images emerging from the unconscious. - Jung believed that active imagination has an advantage over dream analysis in that its images are produced during a conscious state of mind, thus making them more clear and reproducible. Variations: - nonverbal manner (drawing, painting) (4) Psychotherapy - The first stage is the confession of a pathogenic secret (adopted from Breuer’s cathartic method). - The second stage involves interpretation, explanation, and elucidation. This gives the patients insight into the causes of their neuroses but may still leave them incapable of solving social problems (adopted from Freud). - The third stage is the education of patients as social beings (adopted from Adler). - The fourth stage is transformation. By transformation, he meant that the therapist must first be transformed into a healthy human being, preferably by undergoing psychotherapy. Only after transformation and an established philosophy of life is the therapist able to help patients move toward individuation, wholeness, or self-realization. - He adopted an eclectic approach in psychotherapy. His treatment varied according to the age, stage of development, and particular problem of the patient. - The ultimate purpose of Jungian therapy is to help neurotic patients become healthy and to encourage healthy people to work independently toward self-realization. Critique of Jung - has a subjective and philosophical quality - the collective unconscious remains a difficult concept to test empirically - the acceptance of Jung’s archetype and collective unconscious rests more on faith than on empirical evidences - Analytical psychology is unique because it adds new dimension to personality theory dealing with the occult, the mysterious, and the parapsychological - usefulness of most analytical psychology is limited to those therapists who subscribe to basic Jungian tenets - his view of personality was neither pessimistic nor optimistic, neither deterministic nor purposive - people are motivated partly by conscious thoughts, partly by images from their personal unconscious. - the theory leans strongly in the direction of biology - can be rated high on similarities among people and low in individual differences ________________________________________ their psychic structure the external objects. MELANIE KLEIN: Object Relations Theory - Klein stressed the importance of the first 4 to 6 months after birth. - an offspring of Freud’s instinct theory but differs in three general ways: (1) It places less emphasis on biologically based drives and more importance on consistent patterns of interpersonal relationships. (2) It tends to be more maternal, stressing the intimacy and nurturing of the mother, as opposed to Freud’s rather paternalistic theory that emphasizes the power and control of the father. (3) Object relations theorists generally see human contact and relatedness – not sexual pleasure as the prime motive of human behavior. Psychic Life of the Infant - first 4-6 months of an infant is important - To her, infants do not begin life with a blank slate but with an inherited predisposition to reduce the anxiety they experience as a result of the conflict produced by the forces of the life instinct and the power of the death instinct. The infant’s innate readiness to act or react presupposes the existence of phylogenetic endowment, a concept that Freud also accepted. Phantasies - Infants, even at birth possesses an active phantasy life. - Phantasies are psychic representations of unconscious id instincts - It also springs from reality and universal predispositions. - Infants possess unconscious images of “good” and “bad” (e.g. bad breast and good breast) - As they mature, newer phantasies emerge Objects - Humans have innate drives or instincts, including death instinct - The earliest object relations are with the mother’s breast - In their active fantasy, they introject, or take into Positions - Infants attempt to deal with life instincts and death instincts, and they attempt to organize these experiences into positions, or ways of dealing with both internal and external objects. The term “position” was used to indicate that positions alternate back and forth. They are not stages of development through which a person passes. (1) Paranoid-Schizoid Position (3-4mos.) - a way of organizing experiences that includes both paranoid feelings of being persecuted and a splitting of internal and external objects into good and bad. - Paranoid-Schizoid position develops during which the ego’s perception of the external world is subjective and fantastic rather than objective and real. - The child alternately experiences feelings of gratification and frustration. In order to tolerate these feelings, the ego then splits itself, retaining parts of the life and death instincts while deflecting parts of both instincts onto the breast. Persecutory breast Ideal breast which provides love, comfort, and gratification. - Thus, the persecutory feelings are considered to be paranoid; that is, they are not based on any real or immediate danger from the outside world. - In the young child’s schizoid world, rage and destructive feelings are directed toward the bad breast, while feelings of love and comfort are associated with the good breast. - Language is not used to identify the good and bad breast, they use a biological disposition. (2) Depressive Position (5-6 mos.) - An infant begins to view external objects as whole and to see that good and bad exist in the same person. - The infant develops a more realistic picture of the mother and recognizes that she is an independent person who can be both good and bad. - The ego is beginning to mature to the point at which it can tolerate some of its own destructive feelings rather than projecting them outward. - The infant experiences feelings of guilt for its previous destructive urges toward the mother. - The feelings of anxiety over losing a loved object coupled with a sense of guilt for wanting to destroy the object constitute what Klein called the depressive position. - When the depressive position is resolved, children close the split between the good and the bad mother. They are able not only to experience love from their mother, but also to display their own love for her. However, an incomplete resolution of the depressive position can result in lack of trust, morbid mourning at the loss of a loved one, and a variety of other psychic disorders. Psychic Defense Mechanisms Infants adopt several psychic defense mechanisms to protect their ego against the anxiety aroused by their own destructive fantasies. (1) Introjection - Infants fantasize taking into their body those perceptions and experiences that have had with the external object, originally the mother’s breast. - Introjected objects are not accurate representations of the real objects but are colored by children’s fantasies. (2) Projection - Projection is the fantasy that one’s own feelings and impulses actually reside in another person and not within one’s body. - By projecting unmanageable destructive impulses onto external objects, infants alleviate the unbearable anxiety of being destroyed by dangerous internal forces (3) Splitting - keeping part incompatible impulses, the good and bad aspect of themselves and of external objects - In order to separate bad and good objects, the ego must itself be split. Thus, infants develop a picture of both the “good me” and the “bad me” that enables them to deal with both pleasurable and destructive impulses toward external objects. - If splitting is not extreme and rigid, it has a positive effect on the child. The child can see both positive and negative aspects of their self. If splitting is excessive an inflexible, it can lead to pathological repression. (4) Projective Identification - A psychic defense mechanism in which infants split off unacceptable part of themselves, project them into another object, and finally introject them back into themselves in a changed or distorted form. Then they identify with the object. - It exerts a powerful influence on adult interpersonal relations. Internalizations - When object relations theorists speak of internalizations, they mean that the person takes in (introjects) aspects of the external world and then organizes those introjections into a psychologically meaningful framework. (1) Ego - Klein largely ignored the id, and that the ego reaches maturity at a much earlier stage than Freud had assumed. - Ego’s has the early ability to sense both destructive and loving forces and to manage them through splitting, projection, and introjection. - before a unified ego emerges, it must first become split (2) Superego - Klein’s conception of superego differs with Freud in three important respects: (a) emerges much earlier in life (b) it is not an outgrowth of Oedipus complex (c) it is much more harsh and cruel - Early superego not produces guilt but terror (3) Oedipus Complex - merely an extension not a refutation to Freud’s ideas (a) begins at much earlier stage, overlaps with oral and anal stage and reaches its climax during the genital stage at around age 3-4 (b) A significant part of the Oedipus complex is children’s fear of retaliation from their parent for their fantasy of emptying the parent’s body. (c) stressed the importance of children retaining positive feelings toward both parents during the Oedipal years (d) Fourth, she hypothesized that during its early stages, the Oedipus complex serves the same need for both genders, that is, to establish a positive attitude with the good or gratifying object (breast or penis) and to avoid the bad or terrifying object (breast or penis). In this position, children of either gender can direct their love either alternately or simultaneously toward each parent. Female Oedipal Development 1st month – the little girl sees her mother’s breast as both good and bad. 6 months – she begins to the view the breast as more positive than negative - She sees her mother as full of good things (this leads to her imagining of how babies are made). - She y by fantasizes that the father’s penis feeds her mother with riches, including babies (she fantasizes that the father will her with babies). - If the Oedipal stage flows smoothly, the little girl adopts a “feminine” position and has a positive relationship with both parents. - Under less ideal circumstances, the little girl will see her mother as a rival and will fantasize robbing her mother of her father’s penis and stealing her mother’s babies. The little girl’s wish to rob her mother produces a paranoid fear that her mother will retaliate against her by injuring her or taking away her babies. - This anxiety will only be alleviated when she later gives birth to a healthy baby. - Penis envy stems from the little girl’s wish to internalize her father’s penis and to receive a baby from him. This precedes the desire to have an external penis. Male Oedipal Development - The little boy sees his mother’s breast as both good and bad - During the early months; the boy shifts some of his oral desires from his mother’s breast to his father’s penis. The little boy is in his feminine position, a positive homosexual attitude toward his father. - Next, he moves to a heterosexual relationship with the mother. - As the boy matures, the boy develops oralsadistic impulses toward his father and want to bite off his penis and to murder him. This feeling arouses penis castration, which resolves the boy’s Oedipus complex. * For both girls and boys, a healthy resolution of the Oedipus complex depends on their ability to allow their mother and father to come together and to have sexual intercourse with each other. No remnant of rivalry remains. Children’s positive feelings toward both parents later serve to enhance their adult sexual relations. Later Views on Object Relations MARGARET MAHLER - Psychological birth begins during the first weeks of postnatal life and continues for the next 3 years or so. It meant that the child becomes an individual separate from his or her primary caregiver, an accomplishment that leads ultimately to a sense of identity. - The child proceeds through a series of three major developmental stages and four substages to achieve psychological birth and individuation: First Stage: Normal Autism - spans from birth until about age 3 or 4 weeks - Newborn infant satisfies various needs within the all-powerful protective orbit of a mother’s care. - This stage is a period of absolute primary narcissism in which an infant is unaware of any other person unlike Klein who conceptualized a newborn infant as being terrified. - An “objectless” stage when an infant naturally searches for the mother’s breast. - She disagreed with Klein’s notion that the infants incorporate the good breast and other objects into their ego. Second Stage: Normal Symbiosis - This stage occurs as infants gradually realize they cannot satisfy their own needs, and they begin to recognize their primary caregiver and to seek a symbiotic relationship with her. - begins around 4th or 5th week of age but reaches its zenith during the 4th or 5th month - The symbiosis is characterized by a mutual cuing of infant and mother. - objects relations have not yet begun – mothers and others are still preobjects Third Stage: Separation-Individuation - spans the period from about the 4th or 5th month of age until about the 30th or 36th month. - Children become psychologically separated from their mothers, achieve a sense of individuation, and begin to develop feelings of personal identity. - they no longer experience a dual unity with their mother, they must surrender their delusion of omnipotence and face their vulnerability to external threats Overlapping Substages of SeparationIndividuation First Substage: Differentiation - lasts from about the 5th month until the 7th to 10th month of age - marked by a bodily breaking away from the mother-infant symbiotic orbit - Psychologically healthy infants who expand their world beyond the mother will be curious about strangers and will inspect them; unhealthy infants will fear strangers and recoil from them. Second Substage: Practicing - a period from about 7th to 10th month of age to about the 15th or 16th month - an autonomous ego begin to develop, a specific bond with the mother is established, and the children easily distinguish their body from their mother’s - during the early stages, they do not like to lose sight of their mother - later, they begin to walk and to take in the outside world. Third Substage: Rapprochement - about 16 to 25 months of age - they desire to bring back their mother and themselves back together, both physically and physiologically - their increased cognitive skills make them more aware of their separateness and make various ploys to regain the desired unity Fourth Substage: Libidinal Object Constancy -approximates the 3rd year of life - children will continue to depend on their mother’s physical presence for their own security if they do not develop a constant inner representation of their mother. - children must also learn to consolidate their individuality, that is they must learn to function without their mother and to develop other object relations *The strength of Mahler’s theory is its elegant description of psychological birth based on empirical observations of mother-child interactions. Although many of her tenets rely on inferences gleaned from reactions of preverbal infants, her ideas can easily be extended to adults. the infant takes in the selfobject’s responses as pride, guilt, shame, or envy—all attitudes that eventually form the building blocks of the self. - He believed that infants are naturally narcissistic and self-centered. The self is crystallized around two basic narcissistic needs: (1) the need to exhibit the grandiose of self - The grandiose exhibitionistic self is established when the infant relates to a “mirroring” selfobject who reflects approval of its behavior. The infant thus forms a rudimentary self-image from messages such as “If others see me as perfect, then I am perfect.” (2) the need to acquire an idealized image of one or both parents - The idealized parent image is opposed to the grandiose self because it implies that someone else is perfect. Nevertheless, it too satisfies a narcissistic need because the infant adopts the attitude “You are perfect, but I am part of you.” *Both narcissistic self-images are necessary for healthy personality development. Both, however, must change as the child grows older. If they remain unaltered, they result in a pathologically narcissistic adult personality. - Grandiosity must changed into a realistic view of self. The idealized parent image must grow into a realistic picture of the parents. HEINZ KOHUT - He emphasized the process by which the self evolves from a vague and undifferentiated image to a clear and precise sense of individual identity. - He defined the self as “the center of the individual’s psychological universe” and “the center of initiative and recipient of impressions”. - He also focused on early mother-child relationship as the key to later development just like other object relations theorists. - Infants require adult caregivers not only to gratify physical needs but also to satisfy psychological needs. The adults or selfobjects must treat infants as if they had a sense of self. - Through the process of empathic interaction, JOHN BOWLBY: Attachment Theory - He realized that object relations theory could be integrated with an evolutionary perspective. But this he believed that he can correct the empirical shortcomings of the theory end extend it into a new direction. - Attachment theory also departed from psychoanalytic thinking by taking childhood as starting point and then extrapolating toward adulthood. - Bowlby firmly believed that the attachments formed during childhood have an important impact on adulthood. Childhood attachments are crucial to later development. - Humans just like primate infants go through a clear sequence of reactions when separated from their primary caregivers. Three Stages of Separation Anxiety (1) protest – When the caregiver is first out of sight, infants will cry, resist soothing by other people, and search for their caregiver. (2) despair – As separation continues, infants become quiet, sad, passive, listless, and apathetic. (3) detachment – The last stage the only one unique to humans. During this stage, infants become emotionally detached from other people including their caregiver. If their caregiver returns, infants will disregard and avoid her. As they become older, their interpersonal relations are superficial and lack warmth. Bowlby’s theory rests on two fundamental assumptions: (a) A responsive and accessible caregiver must create a secure base for the child. If this dependability is present, the child is better able to develop confidence and security in exploring the world. (b) A bonding relationship (or lack thereof) becomes internalized and serves as a mental working model on which future friendships and love relationships are built. * Attachment style is a relationship between two people and not a trait given to the infant by the caregiver. It is a two-way street—the infant and the caregiver must be responsive to each other and each must influence the other’s behavior. MARY AINSWORTH: Strange Situation - influenced by Bowlby’s theory - Ainsworth and her associates developed a technique for measuring the type of attachment style that exists between caregiver and infant, known as the Strange Situation. Three attachment styles: (1) secure attachment – Infants are confident in the accessibility and responsiveness of their caregiver. (2) anxious-resistant attachment – Infants are ambivalent. They seek contact with their mother, while on the other hand, and reject attempts at being soothed. (3) anxious-avoidant attachment - With this style, infants stay calm when their mother leaves; they accept the stranger, and when their mother returns, they ignore and avoid her. Psychotherapy - Klein insisted that negative transference was an essential step toward successful treatment. - She substituted play therapy for Freudian dream analysis and free association. - The aim of Kleinian therapy is to reduce depressive anxieties and persecutory fears and to mitigate the harshness of internalized objects. Object Relations and Eating Disorders - As applied to eating disorders, when these individuals feel anxious, they look for comfort in external sources; and food is a primary means of soothing and regulating their anxiety. - Bulimia is associated with overseparation (detachment) from parents, whereas anorexia was associated with high levels of guilt and conflict over separation from parents. Attachment Theory and Adult Relationships - People who had early secure attachments with their caregivers would experience more trust, closeness, and positive emotions. - Avoidant adults would fear closeness and lack trust, whereas anxious-ambivalent adults would be preoccupied with and obsessed by their relationships. - Attachment is also related to the type of information people seek or avoid regarding their relationship and romantic partner. Avoidant individuals strive to maintain emotional independence, so they would not seek out additional information about their partner’s intimate feelings and dreams. While anxious individuals tend to be chronically worried about the state of relationship so they express a strong desire to gain more information about their romantic partner. Attachment Style and Leadership - Leaders with a secure attachment style (neither anxious nor avoidant) are more effective than insecurely attached (anxious or avoidant) leaders. Critique of Object Relations Theory - low on its ability to generate research - Since it grew out of the orthodox psychoanalytic theory, it suffers from some of the falsifications that confront Freud’s theory. - Klein used needlessly complex phrases and concepts to express her theory. - It has the ability to organize information about the behavior of infants. Objects relations theory has speculated on how humans gradually come to a sense of identity. - It is built on careful observations of the motherchild relationship. - Parents of young infants can learn the importance of a warm, accepting, and nurturing caregiver. - high on determinism, low on free choice - can either be pessimistic or optimistic - tends to be more causal, expectations of the future play a very minor role - high on unconscious determinants of behavior - biology as more important than environment in shaping personality in terms of the concept of phylogenetic endowment and death instinct - the biologically based infantile stages lean more toward social determinants of personality - it tends toward similarities ________________________________________ KAREN HORNEY: Psychoanalytic Social Theory Overview - Culture, especially childhood experiences, plays a leading role in shaping human personality, either neurotic or healthy. - Social rather than biological forces are paramount in personality development. - Horney criticized Freud on several accounts: (1) strict adherence to orthodox psychoanalysis would lead to stagnation in both theoretical and therapeutic practice. (2) She objected to Freud’s ideas on feminine psychology (3) psychoanalysis should move beyond instinct theory emphasize the importance of cultural influences in shaping personality The Impact of Culture - Modern culture is based on competition among individuals. - Competitiveness and the basic hostility it spawns result in feelings of isolation. These feelings of being alone in a potentially hostile world lead to intensified needs for affection, which in turn, causes people to overvalue love. - They see love and affection as solution to their problems. Desperate need for love can lead to the development of neuroses. The Importance of Childhood Experiences - Childhood is the age from which the vast majority of problems arise. - Horney hypothesized that a difficult childhood is primarily responsible for neurotic needs. These needs become powerful because they are the child’s only means of gaining feelings of safety. - But it should be the sum total of childhood experiences, no single early experience is responsible for later personality. Basic Hostility and Basic Anxiety - Each person begins life with the potential for healthy development, but favorable conditions for growth are needed conditions that provide feelings of safety and satisfaction and permit them to grow in accordance with their real self. - If parents do not satisfy the child’s need for safety and satisfaction, the child develops feelings of basic hostility toward the parents. - This hostility is often repressed and takes the form as a basic anxiety, the profound feelings of insecurity and vague sense of apprehension. It is further defined as a feeling of being isolated and helpless in a world conceived as potentially hostile. - Hostile impulses are the principal source of basic anxiety, but basic anxiety can also contribute to feelings of hostility. Protective mechanisms from feelings of isolation (1) affection (2) submissiveness (3) striving for power, prestige or possession (4) withdrawal - Everyone uses these various protective devices to guard against the rejection, hostility, and competitiveness of others. People become unhealthy when people feel compelled to rely on them. Compulsive Drives - Compulsion is the salient characteristic of all neurotic drives. Neurotic Needs (1) The neurotic need for affection and approval. In their quest for affection and approval, neurotics attempt indiscriminately to please others. They try to live up to the expectations of others, tend to dread selfassertion, and are quite uncomfortable with the hostility of others as well as the hostile feelings within themselves. (2) The neurotic need for a powerful partner. Lacking self-confidence, neurotics try to attach themselves to a powerful partner. This need includes an overvaluation of love and a dread of being alone or deserted. (3) The neurotic need to restrict one’s life within narrow borders. Neurotics frequently strive to remain inconspicuous, to take second place, and to be content with very little. They downgrade their own abilities and dread making demands on others. (4) The neurotic need for power. Power and affection are perhaps the two greatest neurotic needs. The need for power is usually combined with the needs for prestige and possession and manifests itself as the need to control others and to avoid feelings of weakness or stupidity. (5) The neurotic need to exploit others. Neurotics frequently evaluate others on the basis of how they can be used or exploited, but at the same time, they fear being exploited by others. (6) The neurotic need for social recognition or prestige. Some people combat basic anxiety by trying to be first, to be important, or to attract attention to themselves. (7) The neurotic need for personal admiration. Neurotics have a need to be admired for what they are rather than for what they possess. Their inflated self-esteem must be continually fed by the admiration and approval of others. (8) The neurotic need for ambition and personal achievement. Neurotics often have a strong drive to be the best. They must defeat other people in order to confirm their superiority. (9) The neurotic need for self-sufficiency and independence. Many neurotics have a strong need to move away from people, thereby proving that they can get along without others. (10) The neurotic need for perfection and unassailability. By striving relentlessly for perfection, neurotics receive “proof ” of their selfesteem and personal superiority. They dread making mistakes and having personal flaws, and they desperately attempt to hide their weaknesses from others. Neurotic Trends - The 10 neurotic needs can be grouped into three categories, each relating to a person’s basic attitude toward self and others (also referred as basic conflict). (1) moving toward people (2) moving against people (3) moving away from people Normal Defenses (Spontaneous Movement) Toward people (friendly, loving personality) Against people (a survivor in a competitive society) Away from people (autonomous, serene personality) Neurotic Defenses (Compulsive Movement) Toward people (1-3) (compliant personality) Against people (4-8) (aggressive personality) Away from people (9-10) (detached personality) - Neurotics are limited to the use of a single trend, whereas normals can choose a variety of strategies. - Neurotics are unaware of their basic attitude and they are forced to act. Moving Toward People - refers to the neurotic need to protect oneself against feelings of helplessness through compliance - complaint people comply either or both of the first two neurotic needs: (1) they desperately strive for affection and approval of others (2) they seek a powerful partner who will take responsibility of their lives - Horney referred to this need as “morbid dependency” Moving Against People - they move against others by appearing tough or ruthless to resolve feelings of hostility - they are motivated by the strong need to exploit others and to use them for their own benefit - compulsively driven to appear perfect, powerful, and superior - Neurotic needs incorporated include: (1) the need to be powerful, (2) to exploit others, (3) to receive recognition and prestige, (4) to be admired, and (5) to achieve. * Moving towards others and moving against people are “polar opposites”. The compliant person needs affection from others while the aggressive person sees everyone as a potential enemy. * For both types, “the center of gravity lies outside the person”. Moving Away From People - To resolve basic conflict of isolation, people behave in a detached manner and adopt a neurotic need. - an expression of needs for privacy, independence, and self-sufficiency - this needs become neurotic when people try to satisfy each of these needs by compulsively putting emotional distance between themselves and other people - they want to attain autonomy and separateness Intrapsychic Conflicts - Horney did not neglect the impact of intrapsychic factors in the development of personality. The two important intrapsychic conflicts are: the idealized self-image and self-hatred The Idealized Self-Image - If given an environment of discipline and warmth, people will develop feelings of security and selfconfidence and a tendency toward selfrealization. Yet, early negative influences often impede people’s natural toward self-realization, growing sense of alienation from themselves. - This dilemma can only be solved by acquiring a stable sense of identity, an extravagantly positive view of themselves that exists only in their personal belief system. - The idealized self-image is not a global construction. As it becomes solidified, they lose touch with their real self and use the idealized self as the standard for self-evaluation. Rather than growing toward self-realization, they move toward actualizing their idealized self. - Horney recognized three aspects of the idealized self. (1) The Neurotic Search for Glory - As neurotics come to believe in the reality of their idealized self, they begin to incorporate it into all aspects of their lives—their goals, their selfconcept, and their relations with others. - It includes three other elements: (a) the need for perfection – Refers to the drive to mold the whole personality in to the idealized self. They try to achieve perfection by erecting a complex set of ‘shoulds’ and ‘should nots’, referred as the “tyranny of the should”. (b) neurotic ambition – Refers to the compulsive drive toward superiority. (c) the drive toward a vindictive triumph – The most destructive element of all. It may be disguised as a drive for achievement or success but its chief aim is to put others to shame or defeat them through one’s very success, to attain power. . . to inflict suffering on them–mostly of a humiliating kind. (2) Neurotic Claims - In their search for glory, neurotics build a fantasy world – a world that is out of sync with the real world. - They proclaim that they are special and therefore entitled to be treated in accordance with their idealized view of themselves. - Neurotic claims grow out of normal needs and wishes, however when neurotic claims are not met, neurotics become indignant, bewildered, and unable to comprehend why others have not granted their claims. (3) Neurotic Pride - A false pride based not on a realistic view of the true self but on a spurious image of the idealized self. - It is qualitatively different from healthy pride or realistic self-esteem. - Genuine self-esteem is based on realistic attributes and accomplishments and is generally expressed with quiet dignity. Neurotic pride on the other hand, is based on an idealized image of self and is usually loudly proclaimed in order to protect and support a glorified view of one’s self. Self-Hatred People with a neurotic search for glory can never be happy with themselves because when they realize that their real self does not match the insatiable demands of their idealized self, they will begin to hate and despise themselves. - Horney recognized six ways in which people express self-hatred: (1) relentless demands on the self (2) merciless self-accusation (3) self-contempt (4) self-frustration (5) self-torment or self-torture (6) self-destructive actions and impulses Feminine Psychology * Psychic differences between men and women are not the result of anatomy but rather of cultural and social expectations - Oedipus complex is not universal, instead is found only in some people and is an expression for the neurotic need for love. - A child may passionately cling to one parent and express (neurotic need for love) and express jealousy toward the other, as means of alleviating basic anxiety and not manifestations of an anatomically based Oedipus complex. - The child’s main goal is security not sexual intercourse. - Horney agreed with Adler that women possess a masculine protest (men are superior than women) that leads to the neurotic desire to be a man, not an expression of penis envy. the ability to recognize threats in the environment and would be related to decreased negative mood. Psychotherapy -The general goal of Horneyian therapy is to help patients gradually grow in the direction of selfrealization. More specifically, the aim is to have patients give up their idealized self-image, relinquish their neurotic search for glory, and change selfhatred to an acceptance of the real self. - Self-understanding is the key to positive change. - Successful therapy is built on patient’s selfanalysis (idealized self-image vs. real self). - In terms of techniques, Freudian dream interpretation and free association are employed. Horney saw dreams as attempts to solve conflicts. - When therapy is successful, patients gradually develop confidence in their ability to assume responsibility for their psychological development, they move toward self-realization. Critique of Horney - The strength of Horney’s theory is her lucid portrayal of the neurotic personality. Her comprehensive descriptions of neurotic personalities provide an excellent framework for understanding unhealthy people. - A serious limitation to her theory is that her references to the normal or healthy people are general and not well-explicated. There was no clear picture of what self-realization would be. Related Research - The Neurotic Compulsion to Avoid the Negative. Neuroticism is associated with setting avoidance goals rather than approach goals. High levels of neuroticism is also associated with experiencing more negative emotion and being more likely to develop generalized anxiety disorder. - Neuroticism can also be seen in a positive light. For those people high in neuroticism, they have -deterministic for neurotic individuals, but a healthy person would have a large element of free choice - somewhat more optimistic than pessimistic, people possess inherent curative powers that lead toward self-realization. - a middle position on causality vs. teleology: childhood experiences can block the movement toward self-realization - most people have limited awareness of their motives - strongly emphasized social influences more than biological ones - it highlights similarities among people more than uniqueness
