Frued’s Psychodynamic Explanation & Aggression

Intro statement - Eros and Thanatos

(AO1)

Freud’s psychodynamic approach begins with two innate drives that interact with each other and motivate all human behaviour

Eros (AO1)

Eros is the desire to preserve and enjoy life

Thanatos (AO1)

Thanatos is the drive towards death and destruction

Eros & Thanatos link to aggression

(AO1)

Eros redirects the destructive nature of Thanatos away from self harm and onto others in the form of violence and aggression in order to preserve our own life

The ID

(AO1)

• Pleasure principle developed between 0-2

• The ID exist in the unconscious mind, driven by impulses with no thought of consequences and demands immediate satisfaction

• The ID acts impulsively so if a child were to get frustrated, they would throw their toy as they do not regard consequences e.g. timeout and need the immediate pleasure

The Superego

(AO1)

• Morality principle developed between 5-6

• Represents the moral sense of what is right and wrong and our ideal image of ourselves

• The superego opposes the impulsive, aggressive drive of the head through guilt and shame and rewards self control with pride

The ego

(AO1)

• The reality principle developed between 3-5

• Exists in the conscious mind and is driven by logic and rationality

• The ego balances the unrealistic demand of the ID with reality

• The ego appreciates us sometimes it’s not appropriate to express specific behaviour such as aggression and waits to fulfil these urges

Catharsis

(AO1)

Freud also says that catharsis (the process of venting out aggression to release emotions) reduces aggression

• displacement is redirecting anger onto a person or object which is not the actual target of your anger

• Sublimation is channelling our aggression into socially acceptable behaviour rather than destructive activity e.g. boxing

Strengths of Freud’s Psychodynamic Explanation

(AO3)

I: A strength of Freud psychodynamic explanation of aggression is supportive evidence from Graham et al 2008

J: Graham found that expressing anger can be cathartic as participants who are allowed to rant were able to process emotions and therefore control pain and mood

E: Ranting allows a person to process the anger so expressing their aggression is beneficial to health which is explained by sublimation this supports for the theory of catharsis in increasing the validity of the evaluation

Weakness of Freud’s Psychodynamic Explanation

(AO3)

I: A weakness of Freud’s explanation of aggression is there contradictory evidence from Bushman 2002

J: He found that catharsis led to more aggression. Out of 600, the students that were allowed to show aggression by hitting a punching bag before an essay showed more aggression in the following essay as opposed to those not allowed.

E: This opposes catharsis suggesting that release aggression only feels further anger and aggression