FREUD STUDY GUIDE
Freud’s Psychoanalytic Perspective:
Psychodynamic Theories
➔ A view on the human behavior as a relationship between the conscious and the
unconscious
◆ focus mainly on inner motives, conflicts, and childhood experiences
➔ Came from Freud’s Psychoanalytic perspective
Psychoanalysis
➔ Freud’s idea that a human’s thoughts and actions reflected their internal unconscious
motives or conflicts.
◆ For example, if a person were to have many inner conflicts, in return their actions
and behavior would mirror those negative feelings
➔ Freud discovered that the best way to deal with psychological disorders, was to release
and relieve the patient of their unconscious problems
Free Association
➔ A treatment discovered by Freud that allows the psychologist access to someone’s
unconscious
➔ In this method, the patient would relax and talk about whatever comes to their mind,
freely
➔ Can help the psychologist trace back to the root of the patient’s conflicts
Unconscious
➔ Hidden under the conscious
➔ Internal thoughts that are kept deep within us, which we are unaware of
◆ according to freud, the unconscious mainly contained unacceptable feelings or
desires
➔ Some thoughts move into the preconscious area, where we can actually reach them
➔ Dreams are a window into the unconscious and it’s inner conflicts
➔ Unconscious conflicts can be a result of traumatic childhood experiences
◆ Freud believed every action and every behavior linked back to a repressed idea
(often of sexual or aggressive thoughts)
Structure of personality:
· Id
o This unconscious energy based on survival, reproduction, and aggression.
o The pleasure principle is what makes the id seek immediate gratification, only craving
what will bring you pleasure, no matter the costs.
o Inappropriate and unacceptable thoughts are repressed in the id.
o Neuroses, according to Freud, happened to an individual when unconscious thoughts
from the id try to enter one’s conscious. Anxiety arises from these traumatic, oppressed
thoughts trying to enter conscious.
· Ego
o Reality principle: satisfying the id’s desires based on what is realistic to bring longterm pleasure.
·
o Partly conscious perceptions, thoughts, judgements and memories.
o Constantly trying to appease the id and superego’s impulses
Superego
o Forces the ego to look at what is ideal for ourselves.
o Portrays the best image of ourselves, how we ought to behave. This is known as the
ego-ideal
Psychosexual Stages of Development:
Theory
● Psychosexual energy also known as libido is the driving force behind behavior.
● Freud believed that personality developed through a series of childhood stages in which
the pleasure-seeking energies of the Id become focused on certain erogenous areas.
● Early experiences play a large role in personality development and continue to influence
behavior later in life.
● If these psychosexual stages are completed successfully, a healthy personality is the
result. If certain issues are not resolved at the appropriate stage, fixations can occur.
● A fixation is a persistent focus on an earlier psychosexual stage. Until the conflict is
resolved, the person will stay ‘stuck’ in this stage.
Oral Stage
● Age: Birth-1 Year
● Erogenous Area: Mouth
● The mouth is vital for eating and the infant derives pleasure from oral stimulation through
gratifying activities such as tasting and sucking. Because the infant is entirely dependent
upon caretakers (who are responsible for feeding the child), the infant also develops a
sense of trust and comfort through this oral stimulation.
● The primary conflict at this stage is the weaning process--the child must become less
dependent upon caretakers.
● If fixation occurs at this stage, Freud believed the individual would have issues with
dependency or aggression.
Anal Stage
● Age: 1-3 Years
● Erogenous Area: Bowel and bladder control
● Freud believed that the primary focus of the libido was on controlling the bladder and
bowel movements.
● The major conflict in this stage is toilet training; the child has to learn to control their
bodily needs. Developing this control leads to a sense of accomplishment and
independence.
● Freud believed that success at this stage was dependent upon the way parents
approached toilet training. Parents who utilize rewards and praise for toilet training at the
appropriate time encourage positive outcomes that help children feel capable and
productive.
● Freud believed that inappropriate parental responses (like shaming your child when they
have an accident) can result in negative outcomes.
●
If parents take an approach that is too lenient, Freud suggested that an anal-expulsive
personality could develop in which the individual has a messy, wasteful, or destructive
personality. If parents are too strict or begin toilet training too early, Freud believed that
ananal-retentive personality develops in which the individual is stringent, orderly, rigid,
and obsessive.
Phallic Stage
● Age: 4-6 Years
● Erogenous Area: Genitals
● The primary focus of the libido is on the genitals. At this age, children also begin to
discover the differences between males and females.
● Freud believed that boys began to view their fathers as a rival for their mother’s
affection; this is known as ‘The Oedipus Complex’ . Boys want to possess their mother
and have the desire to replace their father. However the child also fears that he will be
punished by his father for those feelings.
● ‘The Electra Complex’ is used to describe a similar feeling that girls experience however
Freud believed that girls instead experience ‘penis envy’
Latent Period
● Age: 6-Puberty
● Erogenous Area: Sexual feelings are inactive
● During the latent period the libido interests are suppressed. The ego and superego
contribute to this period of calm.
● According to Freud, the latent period is a time of exploration in which sexual energy is
still there but is directed towards other important areas like intellectual pursuits and
social interactions.
● Freud believed that this stage is important in development of social and communication
skills and self-confidence.
Genital Stage
● Age: Puberty to Death
● Erogenous Area: Maturing sexual interests
● Freud believed that in this final stage that the individual begins to develop strong sexual
attraction in the opposite sex. This stage begins in puberty and lasts for the rest of a
person’s life.
● Where in earlier stages the focus was solely on individual needs, interest in the welfare
of others grows during this stage. If the other stages have been completed successfully,
the individual should now be well-balanced, warm, and caring.
● The goal of this stage is to establish a balance between the various life areas.
Neo-Freudians and Theories:
Neo-Freudians: Psychoanalysts who accepted Freud’s basic ideas: personality structures of id,
ego, and superego; importance of the unconscious; the shaping of personality during childhood;
and the dynamics of anxiety and the defense mechanisms. But they differed in that they placed
more emphasis on the conscious mind’s role in interpreting experience and coping with the
environment.
Projective Tests: test-takers would describe an ambiguous stimulus or tell a story about it. The
clinician may presume that any hopes, desires or fears that people see in the ambiguous image
are projections of their own inner feelings or conflicts.
Theorists:
Karen Horney:
a) Believed childhood social tensions were crucial for personality formation, not childhood
sexual tensions.
b) Childhood anxiety triggers desires for love and security
c) Tried to balance the bias that Freud had in his masculine view of psychology, with him
saying that women have weak superegos and “penis envy”
Alfred Adler:
a) Believed childhood social tensions were crucial for personality formation, not childhood
sexual tensions.
b) Proposed the inferiority complex theory, explaining that our behaviour is driven by efforts
to conquer childhood feelings of inferiority.
Carl Jung:
a) Less emphasis on social factors and more on the unconscious
b) Proposed the collective unconscious theory, a concept that we inherit a reservoir of
memory traces from our species history.
Rorschach:
a) Created a widely-used Inkblot test, that was supposed to identify details of a test-takers
unconscious, by having them stare at a symmetrical inkblot.
Defense Mechanisms
Defense mechanisms, according to Freud, are used by people when they are battling unwanted
thoughts from their unconscious.
Defense mechanism
Definition
Repression
Preventing thoughts from
entering conscious
Displacement
Taking out feelings on another
person or object
Reaction Formation
Containing anxious feelings by
behaving in an opposite way
Denial
Adopting a reassuring, contrary
belief
Projection
Seeing your own thoughts or
motives in others
Rationalization
Finding reasons to justify our
behavior
Regression
Going backward to an earlier
stage of development
Compensation
Trying to make up for lacking in
one thing by doing well in other
areas
Procrastination
Putting off making a decision
Undoing
A repetitive, ritualistic action to
get rid of unwanted thoughts or
feelings
Sublimation
Channeling prohibited impulses
into socially acceptable
activities
Fantasy
Substituting
Suppression
Consciously not thinking of
something
Withdrawal
Removing yourself from a
situation
Identification
Unconscious attempt to mimic
the behavior of another person