Psychodynamic Approach - chapt 5

Key assumptions

• Events in our early childhood have a great influence on our adult lives, shaping our personality

• Our childhood relationships becomes a blueprint for our adult relationships

• Events that happen in our childhood remain in the unconscious and cause problems for adults

• Freud proposed all children go through the psychosexual stages which influences their personality

• Abnormal behaviour is the result of mental conflict between our personalities (Tripartide personality)

Why is the unconscious mind important?

• Unconscious thoughts and feelings can influence our behaviour

The conscious?

The small amount of mental activity we know about (e,g thoughts, perceptions)

The preconscious?

Things we could be aware of if we wanted or tried (e.g memories, stored knowledge)

The unconscious?

Things we are unaware of (e.g instincts, deeply buried memories)

How do you measure/asses the unconscious mind?

• Freudian slips

• Dream analysis

• Rorschach ink blot test

• Free association

Tripartide personality- The Id

• The personality we are born with

• It’s energy is called the ‘libido’

• Part of the unconscious mind

• Operates on the pleasure principle

Tripartide personality - The ego

• The ego balances the drives of the id and the superego

• Part of the conscious mind

• Operates on the reality principle

• Defends the unconscious mind against displeasure by using defence mechanisms

Tripartide personality- The Superego

• ‘Ideal’ force, civilised, socially acceptable figure

• Operates on the morality principle + includes an understanding of the right and wrong

• Superego and the Id are perpetually in conflict

• Part of the conscious and unconscious mind

Defence mechanisms?

Unconscious psychological strategies that individuals use to protect themselves from anxiety, painful thoughts or unacceptable impulses. This helps balance the demands of the id and superego

Repression?

Forcing a distressing or threatening memory out your conscious mind

Denial

Failing or refusing to acknowledge some aspect of reality

Displacement

Transferring feelings from the object of anxiety onto a substitute/target

Psychosexual stages discoveries

Personality develops in stages

Early childhood experiences affect later development + our behaviour

Psychosexual stages

oral (+fixation)

• 0-1 years old

• Infant receives gratification through oral activities such as feeding, thumb sucking and babbling - focus of pleasure is from the mouth e.g. a mother’s breast

  Fixation!

• Person would suck their thumb, chew pens, smoke or become over or under dependent on others

Psychosexual stages

anal (+fixation)

• 1-3 years old

• The child learns to respond to some of the demands of society (such as bowel movement + bladder control) - focus of pleasure is the anus and child gains pleasure from withholding/expelling faeces

  Fixation

• Person would become very tidy (anally retentive) or messy (anally expulsive)

Psychosexual stages

phallic (+fixation)

• 3-6 years old

• The child learns the differences between men and woman and become aware of sexuality - focus of pleasure is in the genital area

fixation:

Oedipus complex- boys have an unconscious sexual desire for their mother. They fear the father will castrate them so they identify with the father and imitate him.

Psychosexual stages

Latency

• 7-11

• Period of reduced sexuality but still continue this development but sexual urgers are relatively quiet, earlier conflicts are repressed

Psychosexual stages

Genital (+ fixation)

• 11- adult

• Sexual desires become conscious and the adolescent learns how to deal maturely with the opposite sex alongside the onset of puberty by being more independant

Fixation

Difficulty forming heterosexual relationships

what evidence is there for the Oedipus complex?

• Freud’s self-analysis of his childhood

• little Hans - five year old boy who developed a phobia of horses after seeing one collapsed on the street. Freud suggested that Hans’s phobia was caused by a displacement of fear of his father onto horses as the black parts on the horse represented Hans’s father’ mustache. Hans’s anxiety declined after having a fantasy that he married his mother and his father was his grandfather - Freud saw this as Hans resolving his Oedipus complex

Evaluation - real world application

strength- brought the idea of psychotherapy. Psychoanalysis trats mental health conditions by using dream analysis to help bring up patients repressed feelings. Psychoanalysis is the forerunner to many modern day talking therapies such as counselling.

Evaluation- psychoanalysis could be harmful for those who have mental health conditions (severe neuroses)

limitation - for example people who have schizophrenia have symptoms like paranoia and delusional thinking meaning that they cannot articulate their thoughts in the way required for psychoanalysis. This means that psychoanalysis does not apply to all mental health conditions

Evaluation- neuroscientific support

strength- McCrory and colleagues showed that childhood trauma is linked to changes in the structure and function of the prefrontal cortex and + the hippocampus. These areas of the brain are associated with the development of emotional and behavioural issues and the increased risk for psychiatric conditions in later life. This supports the link between childhood experience and adult personality.

evaluation -untestable concepts

limitation- Popper argued that the psychodynamic approach does not meet the scientific criteria of falsification. Freud’s ideas were based on the subjective study of a single individuals e.g. little Hans, this makes it difficult to make universal claims about human behaviour. This suggests that Freud’s theory was pseudoscientific.