Chapter 2- Freud: Psychoanalysis Flashcards
The unconscious has two different levels:
The unconscious proper and the preconscious
All of those drives, urges, or instincts that are beyond our awareness but that nevertheless motivate most of our words, feelings, and actions
The unconscious
The blocking out of anxiety filled experiences
Repression
Inherited experiences that lie beyond an individuals personal experience
Phylogenetic endowment
Contains images that are not in awareness but that can become conscious either quite easily or with some level of difficulty
The preconscious
Those mental elements in awareness at any given point in time. It is the only level of mental life directly available to us
Consciousness
The medium for the perception of external stimuli, in other words, what we perceive through our sense organs
Perceptual conscious system
Conscious idea stem from two areas:
The perception of external or stimuli (our perceptual conscious system) and from the preconscious a (within the mental structure) after they have evaded censorship
Freud conceptualized three regions of the mind:
The ID, the ego, and the super ego
The ego cuts across the conscious, preconscious, and unconscious components. What about the super ego and ID?
The super ego is both pretty conscious and unconscious and the ID is completely unconscious
The part of the mind which is completely unconscious, serves the pleasure principle, and contains our basic instincts
The ID
The ID operates through the:
Primary process. It survival is dependent on the development of a secondary process to bring it into contact with the external world. This secondary process functions through the ego.
The only region of the mind in contact with reality. It becomes a person sole source of communication with the external world.
The ego or secondary process
The ego is governed by this principal and is responsible for reconciling the unrealistic demands of the ID and the super ego
The reality principle
Represents the moral and ideal aspects of personality and is guided by the moralistic and idealistic principles. It has no contact with the outside world.
The superego
The superego has two subsystems:
The conscience and the ego-ideal
Results from experiences with punishments for improper behavior and tells us what we should not do
The conscience
Develops from experiences with rewards for proper behavior and tells us what we should do
The ego-ideal
Those forces that motivate people
Dynamics of personality
Freud grouped all human drives urges under two primary instincts:
Sex and aggression
Every basic drive is characterized by four things:
An impetus, a source, an aim, and an object
According to Freud this is the amount of force a drive exerts
It’s impetus
According to Freud this is the region of the body in a state of excitation or tension by a drive
It’s source
According to Freud, a drive’s ______ is to seek pleasure by removing that excitation or reducing the tension
Aim