The Psychodynamic approach
Summary:
 All human behaviour is a result of unconscious
mental processes formed during early childhood
experiences.
The term psychodynamic refers to any explanation that emphasises
internal processes of change and development, i.e. the dynamics of
behaviour or the forces that drive an individual to behave as he/she
does. Dynamics are the things driving us or a machine to behave in
particular ways.
The best known example of such a theory is Freud’s account of the
development of personality. While his theories were considered
shocking at the time and continue to create debate and controversy,
his work had a profound influence on a number of disciplines,
including psychology, sociology, anthropology, literature, and art.
When you think of a typical psychologist/psychiatrist:
beard, glasses, getting a person to lay down a couch and asking them
about their childhood in a slightly Austrian accent; you’re picturing
Freud.
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You may well have heard the over-used, incorrect, and frankly
infuriating to any psychology teacher, statement that “we only use
10% of our brain”. We have Freud to blame for this. But mostly
because people misunderstood what he was actually saying! Freud
was not interested in the biological brain; he was interested in
the mind.
This leads us to our first assumption of the psychodynamic
approach. Freud believed that human behaviour is influenced by
different levels of consciousness, and most of what goes on in
the mind, we are not consciously aware of.
Freud proposed that the mind is like an iceberg – most of what goes
on inside our mind lies under the surface.
In other words, we are only consciously aware of about 10% of our
mind.
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Above the surface is our
conscious – the rational,
decision-making part of our
mind. The ideas, thoughts and
emotions we are aware of.
Just below the surface is our
pre-consciousness- all those
thoughts memories and
emotions of which we are not
presently aware, but can call
to the surface at any time.
(For example; remembering
what you did yesterday.)
And deep below the surface, is your unconscious, which is much
larger than the other two. This is the deep, dark feelings, emotions,
and memories that you cannot access because you have blocked them
from your own awareness because they would be too damaging to
bring to your consciousness. The biologically based urges we all
possess, like sex and aggression, but can’t always act upon.
Most of the contents of the unconscious are unacceptable or
unpleasant, such as feelings of pain, anxiety, or conflict.
According to Freud, the unconscious continues to influence our
behaviour and experience, even when we are not aware of it doing so.
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Sometimes small parts of our unconscious mind can
come to the surface, mostly in a symbolic form.
This could be in the form of dreams or random
thoughts, or even slips of the tongue, called
“Freudian slips”: A Freudian slip is a verbal or memory mistake that
is believed to be a reflection of the unconscious mind.
Can you think of any situations where you have said
something but meant something completely different?
Perhaps you called you partner by your exes name!
According to Freud this is because that person or thing
that you actually said was playing on your unconscious
mind. Maybe you still have feelings for them. The same
goes if you’ve been having dreams about them lately,
but we’ll get to that later…
In each case, imagine little pieces of the iceberg breaking off and
floating to the surface.
Task:
Try a free association exercise by making a list of 20 words and
getting your partner to say what they associate with these words.
They should answer as fast as they can to access unconscious
thoughts. If they hesitate for too long they are using their
conscious mind to filter a response.
Write their answers down but note that these answers are
confidential and should be destroyed at the end of the class.
Swap over and get your partner to read out a new list of words to
you.
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The second assumption of the psychodynamic approach is that
human personality is actually made of three separate parts
(called the tripartite). It was Freud’s belief that the adult
personality is structured into three parts, which are developed by a
person at different stages in their early childhood.
Task:
Design 3 characters with these characteristics:
A. Selfish, hedonistic, seeks pleasure no matter what the
cost
B. Uptight, follows rules rigidly, worries constantly, wants to
be in control
C. Considerate, rational, realistic
Choose a name, gender and general character overview for this
person – What job might they do? What are their friends like?
Would you want to be friends with them?
Would your characters be friends with each other?
Imagine they had to live together; who might argue the most?
According to Freud, all three of these characters are inside us all,
sometimes in conflict, but mostly living together as best they can.
Character A is your Id.
Character B is your Superego.
Character C is your Ego.
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 The Id is exclusively in your unconscious and includes our
primitive sex and aggression drives and desires. It is the unsocialised part of us, and is present from birth. As we grow, we
learn to ‘control’ our id (but it never goes away). The word ‘id’ is
shortened from the word ‘Libido’, which means our life-force.
 The Super-ego is partly conscious, partly unconscious; they are
our ideal self and morality, (“our conscience”). It is the part of
our personality that is (sometimes painfully) aware of the rules
and makes us feel guilty when we don’t follow them. The superego grows and develops as we learn the rules of right and
wrong.
 The Ego is our conscious, socialized self. It adjudicates
between the competing demands of the Id and Superego. It is
our own self-control (specifically of the id).
Example: A child’s id wants sweets. Throwing a tantrum won’t work.
It’s up to the ego to find an acceptable solution to get what it wants,
such as “Mum, if I behave will you buy me sweets?” The id gets what
it wants, but in an acceptable manner, based on the ego’s experience
of how other people get things.
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This brings us to our third assumption; all human behaviour is
influenced by our childhood experiences, long into adulthood.
Freud believed that everyone goes through stages of development in
their childhood. Freud called these stages the psychosexual stages.
Stage
Age in years
(approx)
Focus
Details
Oral
0-1½
Mouth
Anal
1½-2
Anus
Phallic
3-6
Genitals
Latency
6 - 12
N/A
Genital
12 - 16
Genitals
Pleasure is gained from eating and sucking.
(id only)
Pleasure is gained from expelling and/or
withholding faeces.
(development of ego)
Boys resolve Oedipus complex.
Girls resolve penis envy.
(development of super-ego)
Nothing happens in terms of psychosexual
development.
Adolescence, the start of puberty.
Progress is made towards adult sexual maturity.
Development of independence.
Freud believed that early experience drives us to behave in
predictable ways in later life. Childhood is a critical period of
development, which has far reaching repercussions into adulthood.
Infants are born with innate social drives, i.e. for oral satisfaction.
Such drives have a physical (sexual) basis. If these drives are not
satisfied this can lead to personality or behavioural problems later
in life, because our physical energies (libido) remain attached to
these earlier stages and therefore the individual will regress
(return) to that stage when experiencing anxiety.
Research task:
Find out what Freud believed would be the adult behaviour and personality traits that
could be associated with a child not resolving the various stages in their development.
Eg: Oral: Behaviour: Smoking, thumb sucking, pencil chewing…
Personality: Impatience, greediness, dependence…
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Freud extended on his idea of psychosexual development and the
tripartite, and theorised that your ego has a number of defence
mechanisms it uses to protect itself (you) from unpleasant feelings
of anxiety or guilt. These feelings could arise because we feel
threatened by ‘real’ danger, or our super-ego or id has become too
demanding. Ego defence mechanisms are not under your conscious
control and are purely involuntary. Here are some examples of ego
defence mechanisms:
Something so painful and traumatic happens; you
permanently forget that it ever happened.
You transfer ideas or feelings from one object to
Displacement
another.
You behave in manner more suitable for an earlier
Regression
stage in life.
You refuse to believe that something is actually
Denial
happening.
You explain away uncomfortable thoughts or
Rationalisation
feelings as positive or logical.
You project undesirable characteristics or feelings
Projection
you have for yourself, onto another person.
Repression
Task:
Can you think of any example behaviours that might result from each
defence mechanism?
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Strengths of the psychodynamic approach
 Freud’s theory was quite revolutionary for his time. As one of
the earliest psychological explanations for abnormal
behaviour, it paved the way for all other psychological
research into psychology
disorders. Prior to Freud there
was a very clear distinction
between what is considered
‘normal’ and ‘abnormal’ behaviour
(and for many years mentally ill
people were treated in a horrible
fashion).
Freud’s ideas rejected this distinction and created a much
more accepting attitude towards those with developed
abnormalities in their behaviour.
 Freud’s theories went on to
influence Psychology for many years.
And not just in psychology! They
appear in art and literature and
everyday life. Everyone has heard of
Freud, even if they are not aware of
who he is or why he is famous.
It has been suggested that the
durability of his theory is due to
Freud’s broad and deep conceptions
of human beings, one that combines
the world of reality with make
believe.
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 Freud is responsible
for introducing
certain key concepts
to psychology,
namely, the
recognition that
childhood is a
critical period of
development and that
unconscious sexual
(physical) desires
influence behaviour.
 Freud founded developmental psychology (see above) and
devised a form of therapy unsurpassed for over 80 years.
Psychoanalysis has been widely used and adapted, though it
tends to be most suitable for literate and wealthy people
because of the time and expense involved.
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Weaknesses of the
psychodynamic approach
 Freud produced simple mechanistic explanations of much human
behaviour, but these explanations are reductionist and
oversimplify a really complex reality.
 Freud argued strongly that infant
behaviour is determined by innate forces,
whereas adult behaviour is determined by
childhood experiences. However, Freud’s
theories failed to spell out in much detail how
behaviour is determined. Eg: Freud claimed
that mental disorders are determined in
large measure by certain childhood
experiences, but we aren’t told much about
how events 20 or 30 years ago exert their
influence today.
 Furthermore, Freud’s theory is totally deterministic. By
suggesting that our behaviour is governed for the most part by
our unconscious, Freud is suggesting we have little, if not, no
control over our own psychological health or behaviour.
By assuming that many adult problems are related to repressed
childhood memories, Freud has been criticised for not only
placing too much emphasis on the past as opposed to the
present, but also relying on something that is unfalsifiable. If
the memory is repressed how can we know if it’s real?
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 The Psychodynamic theory is extremely unscientific. It relies
heavily on Freud’s own subjective interpretation of his own
case studies, all of which were abnormal patients with a variety
of mental disorders! Freud may have shown research bias in
his interpretations – and only paid attention to information
which supported his theories, ignoring information and other
explanations that did not fit them.
 Much of the theory of
psychoanalysis lacks falsifiability.
It is not possible to devise an
experiment to prove or disprove the
notion that the mind is divided up
into the id, ego and superego. They
are unobservable and purely
theoretical.
 Those parts of Freud’s theories that are testable have
generally been found to be wrong. Freud emphasised major
differences between boys and girls, but most of the scientific
evidence gathered indicates that males and females
development is far more similar than he believed.
 Finally, Freud put FAR too much emphasis on sex.
Even Freud’s students believed that he put too
much emphasis on sexuality. Everything, both good
and bad, seems to stem from the expression or
repression of the sex drive. Many people question
this, and wonder if there are any other forces at
work. Even Freud himself later added the death
instinct, but that proved to be another one of his
less popular ideas.
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Methodology
Freud focused on the individual, observing particular case studies in
great detail, an idiographic approach. This was the approach Freud
adopted when engaged in therapy. It has the advantage of providing
unique insight into behaviour because of the depth of the
information collected. For example his careful analyses of the
dreams reported by his patients allowed him to develop a theory of
dreams as wish fulfilment that has recently received some support
from brain-imaging studies. However, it may not be justifiable to use
unique observations to formulate general theories about all human
behaviour.
Freud also noticed that people often said or did things that were
involuntary but that revealed their hidden desires- what become
known as “Freudian slips”. He based much of his research on these
kinds of observations.
End of approach Task
1) Outline the psychoanalytic approach and give 3 strengths and 3
weaknesses of this approach.
2) Describe the methodology used in the psychoanalytic approach.
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Match the description to the approach
 Biological
 Cognitive
 Psychodynamic/Psychoanalytical
 Behaviourism
An approach which arises from a theory about the
existence of an unconscious mind. We are only
aware of 10% of our mind.
An approach which states that our behaviour, even
what we think and feel, is linked up to our
physiological make-up.
An approach that focuses on the influence of the
environment, and is not concerned with internal
mechanisms which occur inside the organism.
An approach that believes that the events
occurring within a person (such as emotions) must
be studied if behaviour is to be fully understood.
For Nat 5 you need to explain these approaches and Higher you need to
apply these approaches.
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