Freud and Psychoanalysis Flashcards
Defin hedonism
The belief that we do things to produce pleasure (ancient greek notion)
Two instincts that motivate ALL human behaviour according to Freud?
- Sexuality (Eros)
* Aggression (thanatos = greek word for death) – a state of no desire
Freud conceptualized both these instincts as being powered by what?
a form of internal psychic energy that he called libido.
Freud thought that the instincts were fulfilled by the actions of what?
three psychic structures.
- Id
- Ego
- Superego
What psychic structure structure do we possess at birth?
The id, but immediately upon birth the Id splits (differenciates) to start forming the ego
The Id translates _______ into ________blank
needs into psychological drives
Does the id have direct contact with the physical world?
No. But, it can access stored memories/images of what it’s seen or heard
What two concept does the id not understand?
1 - cause and effect (actions have consequences)
2- No sense of time (no past or present only now)
The Id works based on what?
the pleasure principle, if it feels good do it now! (Because there is no tomorrow!)
Whats structure initially contains all the libido?
The Id
How does the Id achieve pleasure? explain.
id achieves pleasure through the primary process, which involves attaching (cathecting) libido to internal memory images that have been associated with pleasure in the past.
Hallucinatory wish fulfillment– uses energy that has been involved in gratifying that instinct in the past
What is the id capable of doing to achieve gratification
Reflexes: grabbing, sucking, etc.
What kind of thinking does the Id use?
Predicate thinking (half blind) – has difficulty discriminating images in memory that are similar in anyway. It may invest it’s libido in the wrong memory that is not directly related to sexual urges
What is the ego’s function?
to translate the Id’s internal wishes (experienced in the form of images) into contact with actual objects.
Which structure has direct physical contact with the world?
The Ego - has direct sensory awareness of the real world (smells, tastes etc.)
The Ego works based on what?
the Reality Principle (if it feels good, do it, but only if it is safe), constraints on our desires based on reality
What is the secondary process?
Ego knows what is in the image that the Id has associated libido to. The ego then goes out and finds the sexual object. Takes the libido from the imagined object and invests it to the actual object to achieve pleasure.
- ex. Don’t imagine eating a cookie go to the kitchen and eat one
•The ego takes energy (libido) from the id for it’s own uses
How much of the ego is in the unconcious
Most of the ego (80) is in the unconscious – has the most direct contact with the Id. A small part (15-20%) is conscious
How does the ego use anti-cathecsis?
The ego can prevent the Id from attaching energy (libido) to memories that are dangerous by creating a barrier (anti-cathecsis) between the id and the image
What is the final structure to develop? when does it happen?
is the superego, which is the internal representation of the parents’ values.
•Develops at 5 or 6 and is the result of the resolution of the edipus complex
Superego consists of two parts (substructures) ?
- The conscience, which represents the internalized ‘don’ts’, things we have been punished for
- The ego ideal, which contains the internalized ‘do’s’ which we have been rewarded for
Does the superego operate in the conscious of unconscious? where does it get it’s energy?
- Like the ego, the superego operates partly in the conscious part of the mind, but mostly in the unconscious.
- Takes it’s energy from the Id
How does a child move from one psychosexual stage to the next
In each stage the child learns an important life lesson and discovers a new erogenous zone which becomes the primary source of the child’s sexual and aggressive pleasure
List the 5 stages and the ages at which they occur
- Oral Stage: birth-7m
- Anal Stage: 1-3 yrs
- Phallic Stage: 3-5yrs
- Latency Stage: 6-12
- Genital Stage: 12+
What are the two substages of the oral stage
- Birth – 7mth: Early Oral Stage (oral incorporation): Sucking and swallowing (reflexes controlled by the Id)
- 8-9mth: Late Oral Stage(oral aggression): Biting and chewing
What life lesson does the child learn at the conclusion of the oral stage?
you can’t always get what you want because parents start feeding on a schedule
What are the two substages of the anal stage
- Early Anal Stage (anal expulsion): child’s gratification comes from giving up feces
- Late Anal Stage (anal retention): Pleasure from withholding feces
What life lesson does the child learn at the conclusion of the anal stage?
You have to control bodily functions
Where does gratification come from in the phallic stage?
primarily from manipulation of the phallus - penis or clitoris.
In which stage does the Oedipus complex develop and resolve itself?
The phallic stage
How does the Oedipus complex proceed for boys
- starts when the child makes his first non-narcissistic act – sexual libido cathected to mom (mostly but not always)
- but mom is devoting some attention to dad
- Child cathects aggressive libido towards dad
- Then child has Castration Anxiety
- child decathects most sexual libido from mom and most agressive libido from dad
- Then he identifies with his dad and partly identifies with mom – if I can’t have her I can be her
how does the child determine the amount of sexual libido to invest in mom?
how much pleasure she’s given the child (warm and loving vs. cold and distance)
How is the amount of aggressive libido cathected to dad determined?
depends on how big of a rival he is
Where does the decathected libido go in boys?
- Sexual libido is reinvested through displacement to mom-like objects (possible through the Id’s predicate thinking)
- Displacement of aggressive libido to dad-like objects – figure of authority (police officer, teachers)
How does the Oedipus complex proceed for girls?
- girl attaches sexual libido to mom and aggressive libido to dad (same reason as boys)
- discovers penis stolen – by mom and develops penis envy
– she decathects sexual libido from mom and aggressive libido from dad - then cathects aggressive libido to mom and sexual libido to dad’s penis
- fears mom and decathects some aggressive libido from her some sexual libido from dad
- then identifies mostly with mom and some with dad
Why are mother daughter relationships the most troubled?
Less agressive libido is decathected from mom because she’s not as threatening as dad was for boys
Where does the remaining agressive libido
displaced to mom like objects (however they have less than boys because more was left over in mom, meaning girls will be less aggressive!)
Where does left over sexual libido go in girls?
displaced to dad-like objects (dad as a penis carrier)
According to freud why do girls like horses
because the horse goes between their legs where the missing penis would be
According to freud why do most women want a boy first?
want their first born to be male because they are theoretically regrowing the penis they lost
What is the feminist perspective of the oedipus complex?
girls don’t want the organ they want the status and power that comes with it
Freud saw the __________ as the central event in personality development.
Oedipus complex
Which of the two sexes has a stronger super ego?
- Freud says girls do not develop as strong a super ego as boys – girls are less rule governed
What happens in the latency stage?
- Sexual/aggressive energies are redirected into other areas: social life, sports, academics
- Break period
What does it mean to be fixated at a stage
- people leave more libido behind in certain stages
- either spend too long in a stage or is rushed through a stage
Ex. allowing breastfeeding for too long or too short can cause ficxation at the oral stage
People often leave the most libido behind at the _____ stage
Oral, We describe loved ones as food because the pleasures of food are the same as the pleasures of sex
What does an Oral incorporative fixation entail? where do they receive sexual pleasure? what activities do they take place in? Whats their personality like?
• Sexual pleasure through stimulation of the mouth
• Symbolic oral activities: anything that involves taking in or incorporating things in ourselves
- ex. Watching movies, TV, reading, learning, listening to music, eating, smoking, acting
• Personality - Incorporative people are gullible “they will swallow anything “
• Symptoms reflect fixation - Under stress they will overeat, suck their thumb
What does an Oral aggressive fixation entail?
• Less people leave libido here because its shorter
• sexual interests that are aggressive
Ex. Sucking, biting, bondage, rough sex
• Personality – orally aggressive, sarcastic and critical “I got chewed out by my boss”
Anal expulsive fixation?
- Retain interests that reflect the pleasure involved in giving up feces
- They are very tolerant of mess, enjoy dirty activities (mud wrestling)
- Very generous and emotionally giving
- When Ill – will develop diarrhea
Anal Retentive Fixation?
- Retain interests that reflect the pleasure of holding in feces
- As adults they are neat and orderly
- Stubborn, won’t give up or admit they are wrong
- The are stingy – hold on to their money/possessions
- “Tight Ass” – symbolic reflection of anal retention
- They collect things
- When ill – experience constipation
- Enjoy Anal sex, dirty jokes, bathroom humour
What psychic structure experiences anxiety?
• Only the conscious ego experiences anxiety
What are the 3 types of anxiety?
- Reality Anxiety: Things in the outside world that cause us concern
Ex. An upcoming exam, job interview - Moral Anxiety: felt by the ego but caused by the super ego. When we do something morally wrong
- Neurotic Anxiety: Caused by the Id – it is the fear that we will give into our Id impulses and put ourselves in the path of danger/ humiliation
What is Birth Trauma?
When we develop our tendency to experience anxiety, occurs at the moment of birth
What are the two ways we can deal with anxiety
- Consciously: being aware of the cause of the anxiety and using the conscious ego to resolve the problem
Ex. Studying for the anxiety-provoking test - Unconsciously: The unconscious ego prevents the conscious ego from knowing the truth by distorting the ego’s understanding of the situation and therefor eliminating the anxiety. The unconscious ego buries the problem from the consciousness using defence mechanisms
Define repression
- The unconscious ego creates anticathexes against the attachment of libido to forbidden images (ex. Mom → dangerous because of dad).
- conscious awareness of an anxiety-producing impulse is kept entirely out of consciousness.
What are the two ways impulses can leak through the barrier put up through repression?
- Parapraxesis (a mistake – Freudian slip) – we don’t understand the motive behind it so we don’t feel anxious about it
- Latent Dream –
o When we sleep consciousness is weakened and the Id can force itself into dream consciousness
o The conscious ego will disguise this impulses both visually and symbolically –
What are some examples of Parapraxesis?
o Ex. Verbal – “The breast in bed” instead of the “best bread”
o In the real world – forgetting a meeting means you didn’t want to go, or losing your keys before a feared doctors appointment
What do we use to create latent dreams?
oUse the Day residue – images we have from the past 24 hours – we find an image (ie. Bike) associated with the forbidden desire (ie.Mom)
What are the stages of dream work?
symbolization → displacement → Condensation (modify our mom symbol so it can also symbolize other forbidden desires) → Manifest dream (the thing we actually experience)
How does the conscious ego make sure the purpose of the dream is hidden ?
o To avoid anxiety the symbol of the desire is not the center of the dream, it is hidden in the background!
- and often we don’t remember our dreams
Why do we have nightmares according to Freud?
the wishes are the superego to punish the ego for breaches in morality
Repressed _____ are often confused with repressed _____
memories, desires
Define Displacement
Libido that was originally intended for one target is redirected to another, where it will cause less anxiety.
. A boss yells at you and you take out your anger on your dog is an example of which defence mechanism?
Displacement
A subcategory of displacement is sublimation - what is it? and example
Displacing sexual or aggressive libido to activities that society values
o all culturally valued activities - art, literature, science, religion, etc., are energized by displaced (sublimated) libido.
Ex. A son with aggressive libido becomes a quarter back to take down the father figure of the other team
Define projection and give an example
We protect ourselves from anxiety by attributing our anxiety-producing impulses to others - usually to the target of those impulses. We need not feel anxious if the offending wish is not ours, but someone else’s
• Example: If you have aggressive libido towards dad you may believe instead that dad hates you!
Give example of how defence mechanisms can be combined
a person may love mom, and displaces this feeling onto a celebrity and then uses projection to believe that the celebrity loves them
Define rationalization + example
engage in what would normally be an anxiety-producing behaviour, but feel no anxiety because unconscious ego fills our conscious ego with reasons that keep us from understanding our real (anxiety-producing) motive.
• Example: Love for mom causes son to take mom out, get her flowers, and visit her constantly. The unconscious ego tells the conscious ego that mom needs his attention and any good son would do the same!
Define reaction formation
The unconscious ego prevents anxiety over our impulses by filling the conscious ego with the opposite feeling or impulse
ex. If you have a sexual impulse for porn instead you consciously feel disgust towards it
How does freud explain phobias?
combination of displacement and rection formation
- ex. Snake phobia –I hate snakes → is actually I desire/ want snakes → I desire the penis (represents females leftover ediple lust for dad)
Define Identification
• Possitive identification – identify with someone we wish to love so we can love that part of ourselves
Define Denial
- when we have actually done something wrong
- prevent ourselves from remembering
- he unconscious ego puts up an anti cathecsis – barrier
- Not lying – defense mechanisms are about fooling the conscious ego not other people
- Most dramatic and desperate defense mechanism
What were the scientific criticisms of Freud’s theories
- biased samples of unhealthy/mentally unstable people
- Cannot replicate cases
- Self-validating method
- Terms are vague; hard to quantify
What were the philosophical criticisms of Freud
- Overemphasis on ‘base’ instincts – sex and aggression
- Over emphasis on unconscious – people say they know what they are doing
- Freud didn’t provide enough room for personality change after puberty - fundamentals are set
- Pessimistic view of human nature
What was the support for Freud’s theories
• Acceptance of the unconscious
- Subliminal influences – priming: things we don’t even know we have perceived can influence our subsequent behaviours
- Implicit attitudes – our unconscious feelings about things that often disagree with our explicit attitudes
According to Freud, the defense mechanism of _____ involves transforming neurotic anxiety into reality anxiety.
projection
- an individual planning an immoral action that she knows will never be detected or punished will experience _____ anxiety but not ______ anxiety.
moral, neurotic
- According to Freud, if we examine the psychodynamic processes involved in parapraxes and dreams, we note many similarities and relationships.
- Both involve (among other things) the displacement of an Id impulse to an object, image or act that is not the original object or goal of the Id.
- Both are ways in which Id impulses can escape or evade the efforts of the unconscious Ego to repress them.
- Both probably require or involve predicate thinking by the Id.
is it true that An individual who never experiences neurotic anxiety (but who can experience other types) will have no need for defence mechanisms.
No, they still need defence mechanisms
true or false: As the ego grows larger and more complex, it uses up more and more libido for its own purposes
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