Chapter 12

Question 1

What is personality?

Answer 1

Personality is the unique characteristics that account for enduring patterns of inner experience and outward behaviour.
- A collection of stable states and characteristics.
- Varies from one i/d to another

Question 2

What is the psychodynamic perspective?

Answer 2

Freud and psychoanalytic theory.
Other psychodynamic theories - share the same view - personality and behaviour is shaped by interacting, or dynamic, underlying forces.

Question 3

Freud and Psychoanalytic Theory:

Answer 3

Based on his clinical practice (seeing patients), he decided that people are influenced by their “unconscious”.
Developing psychoanalysis - type of therapy based on this theory of discovering one’s unconscious.
Only one of the first to state that the parent-child relationship influences how people feels about themselves and how they handle intimacy as adults.

Question 4

The structure of personality:

Answer 4

• The conscious: the thoughts and feelings that we are aware of at any given moment.
• Preconscious: holds memories/feelings that we aren’t consciously thinking about, but can be brought to consciousness.
• Unconscious: holds memories/feelings that are so unpleasant/anxiety provoking that they are repressed.

Question 5

3 Forces of Personality:

Answer 5

• Id - basic instinctual drives: present at birth, largely unconscious. Pleasure principle - try to seek pleasure and avoid pain.
• Ego - rational thoughts: develops due to learning. Reality principle - logical, rational, realistic part of the personality. Must satisfy the drives of the id while complying with the constraints of the environment.
• Superego - moral limits: Develops during childhood. We internalize, or unconsciously adopt, the values and norms of others. Our conscience leads us to feel guilt and anxiety.

Question 6

Psychosexual Stages:

Answer 6

During each stage, the id’s pleasure-seeking tendencies focus on one are of the body.
- Primarily influenced by sexuality and aggression that cause internal conflict.
- Names after specific erogenous zones, or pleasure-producing areas of the body.
Must resolve issues of each stage before moving on to the subsequent stage.
- Failure to resolve conflicts may result in becoming fixated at the stage.

Question 7

Anxiety and Defence Mechanisms:

Answer 7

Defense mechanisms - unconscious tactics to protect us from anxiety and internal conflict by dealing with id impulses.
Repression - keeps unpleasant thoughts buried deeply in unconscious mind.
Denial - refusal to acknowledge an existing situation.