Sigmund Freud (1856 -1939)

Developments Since Freud: Modern Psychodynamic School

  • less focus on sexuality as primary drive

  • more focus on functions of ego

  • more focus on interpersonal relatedness

  • more focus on normal development

  • more focus on the present

  • techniques of therapy changed

  • empirical research by psychologists

Classic Psychoanalytic Theory

  • goal of psychoanalytic treatment

    • bring unconscious to consciousness

    • overcome repression and resistance

  • drive theory

    • sex (libidinal) and aggression

  • Tripartite Structure (1923)

    • ID → ego ← superego

  • defenses as resistance to treatment

Anna Freud (1895 - 1892)

  • sixth and youngest child

  • schoolteacher at age 20

  • entered training analysis at age 22

  • member of Viennese Psychoanalytic Society at age 29

  • Psychoanalytic techniques for children

  • 1936, Ego and Mechanisms of Defense

  • founded Hampstead Clinic in London

Ego Analytic Theory

  • ego functions independently from the ID

  • ego functions operate in the present

    • conflicts in past but ego operates in here and now

  • ego is the source of unique individuality

    • intellect, personality, and character

  • defenses can be adaptive mechanisms

  • goal of ego-analytic treatment

    • interpret defense mechanisms

    • replace with adaptive defenses

  • defense mechanisms represent a developmental progression

Henry A. Murray (1893-1988)

  • BA in 1916 in History from Harvard

  • MD in 1919 from Columbia University

  • PhD in biochemistry from Cambridge

  • psychoanalysis with Carl Jung in 1926

  • appointed with Director of Harvard Psychological Clinic in 1928

  • 1935 - developed Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) with Christiana Morgan

  • WW2 consultant on selection to OSS (now CIA)

  • 1959-1962 controversial stress experiment

Harvard Longitudinal “Study of Men”

  • 268 Harvard men, classes of 1939-1942

  • most served in WWII

  • administered TAT and other psychological tests

  • extensive interviews about personal adjustment

  • 95 men followed into late adulthood

  • mature defenses increased with age

  • immature defenses decreased with age

  • mature defenses predicted better social adjustment in adulthood

Gorge Vaillant (1934- )

  • Ego mechanisms and maturity

    • vaillant’s developmental Hierarchy

      • Infantile

        • denial, regression

      • Immature

        • projection, displacement

      • Neurotic

        • rationalization, reaction formation

      • Mature

        • sublimation, humor

Jane Loevinger (1918-2008)

  • ego development

    • ego function’s as “master trait”

    • stage theory of lifespan development

    • 8 progressive, qualitative stages

    • three aspects of each stage: 

      • control of impulses

      • conscious preoccupations

      • interpersonal mode

        • how do you relate to ppl; what are ppl good for, for u; how do u handle ur relationships

Assessment of Ego Level

  • Washington University sentence Completion Test (Loevinger, 1970; Hy & Loevinger, 1996)

    • unstrunctured method of assessment

    • 36 items (“Stems”) - incomplete sentencesreequires trained raters for scoring