Focuses on trying to get inside the head of individuals in
order to make sense of their relationships, experiences and
how they see the world.
• The major causes of behavior have their origin in the
unconscious unlocking the unconscious mind is the
key to understanding & changing human behaviour
• The conscious & unconscious mind are in constant
conflict therapy focuses on resolving these conflicts
• Our behavior and feelings as adults are rooted in our
childhood experiences can lead to psychological illness
Created a school of thought called
Psychoanalysis a person's
development is determined by
events in early childhood
This school of thought emphasized
the influence of the unconscious
mind on human behavior
Conflicts that occur between the conscious & unconscious
mind, can materialise in the form of mental or emotional
disturbances as we grow, our personalities are shaped
by repressed childhood thoughts & experiences
Freud believed that the human mind was composed of 3
elements: the ID, the EGO, and the SUPEREGO
These elements form our personality
ID  functions in the unconscious mind and is
responsible for instinctive and primitive behaviors.
The ID is driven by the pleasure principle, which strives
for immediate gratification of all desires, wants, & needs.
EGO  functions in the conscious & unconscious mind and
is responsible for controlling the impulses of the ID
The EGO is driven by the reality principle, which strives to
satisfy the ID's urges in realistic & socially acceptable ways.
SUPEREGO  functions in the conscious mind and is
responsible for our sense of right and wrong.
The SUPEREGO is driven by the morality principle & acts
to suppress the ID’s urges and make the EGO behave
morally rather than realistically.
His work supported
the belief that not all
psychological
illnesses were caused
by biological means
and that many
human behaviours
were the result of
repressed,
unconscious thoughts
rooted in childhood
experiences.
He believed that balancing a person’s
psyche would allow the person to
reach his or her full potential.
Jung believed the human psyche
exists in three parts:
• the ego (the conscious mind)
• the personal unconscious and
• the collective unconscious
Jung believed the collective unconscious was a reservoir of
all the experience and knowledge of the human species.
Jung contributed a great deal to the study of personality.
He theorized that our personalities were a mix of
functional types:
1. Introversion vs Extroversion
2. Sensing vs Intuition
3. Thinking vs Feeling
4. Judging vs Perceiving
Jung believed that we “consciously” gravitated to one
functional type while our “unconscious” gravitated to the
opposite type.
Erikson differed from Freud in a
couple of ways:
1. He believed that humans continue
to develop over their lifetime
rather than just in childhood
2. He believed individual growth
depends on society, not just
personal experiences
He also believed that adolescents experienced an
identity crisis a time of extreme self-consciousness
Both Freud and Erikson believed that children matured
and developed through stages
Freud believed that children developed through a series
of psycho-sexual stages. These stages occurred one
after the other. If an individual became fixated at any
one stage, they could not move on to the next stage in a
healthy way.
Erikson believed that children developed through a series
of psycho-social stages where certain needs must be
met at each stage or their social development in later
life would be impaired.
Her studies of child development
have become the groundwork for our
understanding of mother-infant
attachment AND how it influences
behaviour in later life.
She is most well known for her
“Strange Situation” experiment
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTsewNrHUHU&feature=related