Klein: Object Relations Theory Flashcards
Klein: When is the mother-child relationship most critical for personality development?
The first 4 – 6 months
Klein: An important part of any relationship is the internal psychic representations of what?
Early significant objects, such as the mother’s breast or the father’s penis
Klein: An important part of any relationship is the ___ of early significant objects, such as the mother’s breast or the father’s penis.
Internal psychic representations
Klein: Infants ____ psychic representations of early significant objects and ____ them onto an external object (another person).
Introject, project
These internal pictures are not accurate – they’re remnants of earlier experiences.
Klein: The ego can sense both destructive and loving ___, or both a nurturing and frustrating ____.
forces, breast
Klein: According to Klein, when does the ego begin to exist?
At birth
Klein: How do infants deal with the nurturing breast and frustrating breast?
Split objects into good and bad, including their own ego, giving them a dual image of self.
Klein: How does Klein differ from Freud in terms of superego?
Klein believed it existed earlier than Freud speculated, and that it grows with the Oedipal process rather than being a product of it.
Klein: T/F: During the early female Oedipus complex, a girl has a positive feeling for her mother’s breasts and fear of her father’s penis
False – Ideally, she adopts a feminine position and has a positive feeling both for her mother’s breasts and for her father’s penis, which she believes will feed her with babies.
Klein: In female Oedipal development, describe ideal and less ideal outcomes.
Ideal : Girl takes feminine positions and has positive relationships with both parents.
Less ideal: Girl sees mom as a rival and fantasize robbing her mother of her father’s penis and stealing her mother’s babies.
Klein: T/F: With most girls, the female O. complex is resolved without any jealousy toward their mom.
True
Klein: A little boy adopts a ___ position during the early Oedipal years.
Feminine
Klein: T/F: Upon adopting a feminine position during early Oedipal years, a boy fears being castrated as punishment for his sexual feelings for his mother.
False – he has no fear of being castrated in the early Oedipal years.
Klein: Later in the male Oedipal development projects his ___ onto his father, who he fears will ___
Destructive drive, bite or castrate him.
Klein: What are phantasies?
Psychic representations of unconscious id instincts. Infants, even at birth, possess an active phantasy life.
