Psychodynamic Theories
Sigmund Freud’s Psychoanalysis
1. The origins of Freud’s ideas
• Early neurological practice
• Work with Dr. Joseph Breuer’s
patient, “Anna O,” who suffered
from hysteria (i.e., physical
symptoms without organic cause)
2. Beginnings of Psychoanalytic
therapy and theory
• from patients like Anna, concluded
that neurotic symptoms related to
previous, traumatic experiences
• to treat patients, developed
method of free association =
“telling everything”
• symptom removal requires
catharsis:
both - recall traumatic event
AND - express associated emotion
• resistance
to attempts to remember events
taken as evidence of
repression
• developed a theory of personality
to account for the behavior
observed in patients
3. Fundamental assumption
Psychoanalysis is a dynamic
(motivational) conception “which
traces mental life back to an interplay
between forces that favour or inhibit
each other (Freud, 1910)”
• behavior is the product of
“opposing mental forces”
- impulse expression vs. inhibition
• Freud has a spatial or mechanical
conception of the personality
structure in which mental forces
interact ...
4. Personality dynamics (motivation)
-
instinctual impulses or drives
provide the energy to run the
personality system
-
“life instincts” to preserve person &
species - e.g., hunger, thirst, sex;
- libido = sexual energy
- “death instinct” after WW I
Postulated that primary source of
sexual pleasure shifts with
development, creating 5
psychosexual stages:
- oral, anal, phallic, latency, genital
Over- or under-gratification at a stage
causes fixation & affects adult
personality
5. Structure of personality
a. Spatial theory (pre-1920s)
-
conscious, preconscious and
unconscious systems
-
repression: “keeping something
out of consciousness” by censor
Figure 6.1
b. Revised theory (1933)
- id: concerned with satisfaction of
needs (instincts)
- operates on pleasure principle
- irrational (reality = fantasy)
- entirely unconscious
- ego: concerned with survival
- reality principle
- rational, logical
- both conscious & unconscious
- superego: concerned with morality
- conscience + ego-ideal
- both conscious & unconscious
(see Figure 6.2)
6. Behavioral outcomes of the
“conflict between opposing mental
forces”
a. Anxiety
• felt when ego is threatened
(see Freud’s quote, text, p 103-4)
• Threat from:
external world = realistic anxiety
id = neurotic anxiety
superego = moral anxiety
The proverb tells us that one cannot
serve two masters. The poor ego
has a still harder time of it; it has to
serve three harsh masters, and has
to do its best to reconcile the
demands and claims of all three.
These demands are always divergent
and often seem quite incompatible;
no wonder that the ego so frequently
gives up its task. The three tyrants
are the external world, the superego,
and the id ...
The ego ... feels itself hemmed in on
three sides and threatened by three
kinds of danger, towards which it
reacts by developing anxiety when it
is too hard pressed.
(Freud,1932, p.103).
b. Defense mechanisms (with A. Freud)
Repress threatening/painful idea
AND do something else to release
pent-up energy in a safer or more
acceptable manner
Displacement
Repress impulse + direct it toward less
threatening object
Sublimation
Repress impulse + direct it toward less
threatening, socially desirable object
Projection
Repress impulse + see it in others
Reaction formation
Repress impulse + express its opposite
Rationalization
Repress impulse + express more
desirable motive
c. Dreams
“a royal road to the unconscious”
- represent fulfilment of wishes
(often unconscious or socially
unacceptable)
- latent content is transformed into
more acceptable manifest content
- less threatening, so “dream is the
guardian of sleep”
Example: Dream reported by
“Little Hans” -- aged 5 years
In the night, there was a big giraffe in
the room and a crumpled one; and
the big one called out because I took
the crumpled one away from it. Then
it stopped calling out; and then I sat
down on top of the crumpled one.
May reflect:
d. Neurotic symptoms
• Maladaptive or inappropriate
behavior or thoughts
• Reflect severe repression or
defensive behaviors
Freud’s treatment: Psychoanalysis
Goals of psychoanalytic theory:
• make unconscious ideas
conscious
• allow mature, rational
consideration of them
• strengthen ego for greater
conscious control of behavior
in future
Later Psychodynamic Theorists:
• Shared Freud’s belief that
unconscious motivation was key
• Greater emphasis on general
motivation toward life and
creativity; less on the explicitly
sexual nature of motivation
• More emphasis on interpersonal
relations; less on internal workings
of individual’s mind.
• More emphasis on conscious,
rational thought processes (ego);
less on unconscious processes.
• Less focus on childhood origins of
personality; more on lifespan
Carl Jung’s Analytical Psychology
• distinguishes conscious, personal
unconscious, & collective
unconscious (contains inherited
archetypes)
• 2 attitudes:
extroversion vs. introversion
• ways of experiencing:
sensing vs. intuition,
feeling vs. thinking,
judging vs. perceiving
• self strives for unity & actualization
through union of opposites
Why are Freud & Jung Important?
• 1st modern models of personality;
behavioral & humanistic theorists
reacted against psychodynamic
theories
• Psychoanalytic & Jungian
therapies continue as treatment
methods
• Lasting cultural effects:
- changed our culture’s view
psychological disorders, childhood
- influenced our language,
literature & criticism
- influenced our implicit personality
theories
BUT, beware:
• Incomplete or inconsistent
theoretical ideas
(e.g., Freud’s female psychology)
• Many propositions difficult to test
empirically (e.g., archetypes)
• Many tenets lack research support
although cognitive unconscious
well supported
• Verbal therapies not more
effective than others