Chapter 4 Flashcards
Projective tests
The person being assessed is asked to respond to each of a series of ambiguous test items. In order to respond to the item, the person must interpret it/figure out what the test item looks like or means
Top 2 projective test types
Rorschach Inkblot test
Thematic apperception test
How is the Rorschach test interpreted?
The subjects are shown various inkblots and asked to interpret what they think the blot is of. Then they are asked to explain why they perceive the inkblot to be that way
How is the Thematic Apperception test interpreted? (TAT)
The test shows the subject various cards with scenes on them of two people. The subject then has to come up with a story for what is going on in the scene.
Why don’t projective tests work well?
Inter-rate reliability (interpretive bias) The content of the projective test items commonly has nothing to do with the content of the test-taker’s day-to-day life (fake context constructed during test. not applicable to day-to-day life)
Three personality types
- Oral
- Anal
- Phallic
Oral Personality Type
narcissistic
fixation on taking things into and for oneself
selfish
Anal Personality Type
the need to keep things clean and orderly in order to combat their desire for unclean things.
interested in holding onto things
seek to be in control and dominant
Phallic Personality
for men: the need to be manly, assert manliness on others, look “big”, underlying anxiety to castration
for women: hysterical complex. flirtatious behavior to get attention but will deny sexual intent, idealize romance
psychoanalytic theory
proposes that psychopathology results from individual’s efforts to gratify instincts that were fixated at an earlier stage of development
there is conflict between a drive or wish (instinct) and the ego’s sense (anxiety) that danger will ensue if the wish is expressed (discharged)
Transference
a patient’s development of attitudes toward the analyst based on attitudes held by the patient toward earlier parental figure
transference value to the psychoanalytic approach?
In expressing transference attitudes toward the analyst, patients duplicate in therapy their interactions with people in their lives and their past interactions with significant figures
Adler vs. Freud
Adler focused more on social urges than sexual ones
Jung vs. Freud
Jung reinterpreted Freud’s original views of libido and strayed from Freud’s tunnel-visioned views on sexuality being tied to personality
Karen Horney’s three trends in dealing with anxiety
- moving toward
- moving against
- moving away
moving toward
a person attempts to deal with anxiety by an excessive interest in being accepted, needed, and approved of
moving against
a person assumes that everyone is hostile and that life is a struggle against all
moving away
the person shrinks away from others into neurotic detachment
Sullivan vs. Freud
emotional experiences are not based in biological drives, but in relations with others
interpersonal approach, which placed greater emphasis on developmental experiences that occur after the Oedipal period (preadolescence)
object relations theory
interested in how experiences with important people in the past are represented as parts or aspects of the self and then, in turn, affect one’s relationships with others in the present. Ex. childhood mistrust towards mother projected into adulthood towards others
self-psychology
similar to object relations theory, but in self psychology it is thought that developmental experiences influence mental representations of oneself
(focus on narcissism)
attachment theory
it is a system that motivates the infant to be close to (i.e. to seek physical proximity to) caregivers, especially when there is a threat in the environment (e.g. a young child clinging to adults for comfort and security)
Mary Ainsworth’s attachment types
- secure attachment
- anxious-avoidant
- anxious-ambivalent
Secure attachment via romantic and work relationships
view romantic feelings as being somewhat stable but also waxing and waning, and they discount the kind of head-over-heels romantic love often depicted in movies
approach work with confidence, are relatively unburdened by fears of failure, and do not allow work to
interfere with personal relationships
Anxious-Avoidant via romantic and work relationships
skeptical of the lasting quality of romantic love and felt that it was rare to find a person one can really fall in love with
very much influenced by praise and fear rejection at work and allow love concerns to interfere with work performance
Anxious-ambivalent via romantic and work relationships
easy to fall in love but rare to find true love
use work to avoid social interaction and, although they do well financially, are less satisfied with their jobs than secure people
strengths of the psychoanalytic theory
- Provides for the discovery and investigation of many interesting phenomena
- Develops techniques for research and therapy (free association, dream interpretation, transference analysis)
- Recognizes the complexity of human behavior
- Encompasses a broad range of phenomena
limitations to the psychoanalytic theory
- Fails to define all its concepts clearly and distinctly
- Makes empirical testing difficult, at times impossible
- Endorses the questionable view of the person as an energy system
- Tolerates resistance by parts of the profession to empirical research and change in the theory
