personality- psychodynamic Flashcards
psychodynamic perspective people
freud 1856 freud and jung were friends but then broke up
jung 1875-1961
adler 1870-1937
-no longer a very credible theory
-as a systematic theory its not very reliable
freud background
-his previous research as a neurologist
-evidence for research
-neurologist in vienna
-was a neurologist, compared foetal and adult brains
-baby in trisemester an experience as adults ,can be frightened etc
evidence
the story of jacob
anecdotal evidence they remember what happens to them in the womb
-his weird behaviour (always searching for something) was analysed and is evidence that he remembers that he had a twin and remembers he died and is still upset and trying to shake objects to life to bring him back etc
freud
what did he struggle with?
-what did he try to cope
-how did this start his theories
depression and anxiety attacks
- a collegue suggested catharsis- to talk and not bottle up things
-he then wanted to try a new method after his father died called dream analysis(the start of psychoanalysis) every day he would spend half an hour analysing what was in his dream, because he believed the unconscious thoughts you wouldn’t have during the day they come to the surface and by looking at them you can understand why you feel the way you do
-he wanted to try and apply this to his patients
-discovered not everyone can be hypnotised
freud
patients and free association
-Freud wanted to apply his findings of dream analysis to patients
-discovered not everyone can be hypnotised
-so he tried free association
-asked people to sit and relax and talk freely about everything and anything that comes to mind
-Freud would look to see if there were any hidden patterns , and then tell the patient what he thought
freuds theory
-who was he influenced by?
-influenced by helmholz principle of conservation of (energy cant escape principle)
-freud argued that humans are energy systems
-if your forced to supress the energy from something it will try to come out in another form
-energy can never be lost, only changed to another form
components of freuds theory
-according to Freud mental life plays out on 3 levels
-conscious , all the thoughts that we have in the here and now
-preconscious - the thoughts we might becomes aware of if we put effort in (memories and stored knowledge)
-unconscious- stuff we are not aware of and we cant get access to unless with the help of a therapist, any fears, sexual desires, irrational wishes, immoral urges ,
freuds theory- what does the self consist of
id,ego and superego
-id , impulsive part of our personality ,acts according to the pleasure principle, wants something it really wants it
-superego says no- its the moral guidance we have internalised
-ego - one in the middle that balances it all , tries to find a compromise, conscious part which makes the decision
-eg you want to ear a choc bar at a supermarket, id says just eat it but superego says no its immoral, buy it first, ego balances it and you buy it so the id and superego are satisfied
freuds theory
life instinct
death instinct
life instincts -our desire to procreate and gives rise to sexual desires
death instinct- people have an unconscious wish to die (he think its not acceptable to our conscious that’s why its subconscious)
-instead of turning it inwards we turn it outwards and it gets expressed as aggression
freudian slips
a slip of the tongue
-ways in which our subconscious rises to the surface
id-supergo conflicts
-superego disproves wishes of the id
-this leads to anxiety if you cant do the things you want to
-so thats where the ego comes in and the ego develops defense mechanisms accprding to freyd
-denial
-prjection
-isolation and undoing
-reaction formation, sublimation
-repression
defence mechanism
denial
-action of denying something
-eg people who smoke might say , i dont smoke enough to be at risk etc
advantages
-temporary relief from emotional trauma (allows you to keep doing life eve when in trauma)
-adaptive when action is impossible,denying may be the best way
disadvantages
-prevents you from taking action when its possible (you could take action but your in denial so you havent)
defense mechanism
projection
projection-act of imagining someone else feels a particular emotion or wants something when in fact it is you who feels this way
-what you see in others is really within yourself
-something unacceptable from our superego can be projected onto someone else
assimilation
-applying concepts to the world that are readily accessible
-very similar to a concept in social psychology- if something is really accessible in your mind, your going to apply the concept to the wolrd around you more readily
defece mechanism
isolation and undoing
isolation
disconnecting memories or aspects of your life from feelings or from yourself , so you can look at a situation in a more objective detached way
-you can say this bad thing that happened to me is not me, so it stops you from feeling the negative episodes related to that bad thing
undoing
-defense mechanism where a person will try to remove or cancel out unhealthy or destructive thoughts by doing the opposite behaviour
-kids do this alot
defence mecahnisms
-reaction formation,sublimation
reaction formation - extreme anxieties occur because of unacceptable thoughts, and the ego turns it into opposite behaviour
egthoughst like im gay— then ego makes the eprson say homophobic things or ‘ i wish my children were never born’ turns into overprotection
sublimation
- a mature form of a defence mechanism
-where you take an instinct and turn into a socially acceptable form
-eg someone who feels aggressive becomes a surgeon or butcher
-people with strong sexual tendencies turn into artwork
defence mechanisms
repression
-how do we know repression exists
repression- excluding distressing memories, thoughts, or feelings from the conscious mind. can no longer remeber things form childhod because they were so bad you push them out of consiousness
-eg may repress sexual abuse or bullying
-problem how do we know repression exists ?
-if they dont report negative childhood experiences , have they repressed them or simply had a happy childhood?
-freud : they will eventuall recall it in therapy sessions
-scwartz and davidson 1979 : they measured with a scale peoples tendency to give socially desirable answer , they also asked them how anxious they felt, and then they gave them a series of sentences to complete that were all of sexual or aggressive nature, the kind of sentences that would provoke anxiety
-at the same time their skin conductance was measured -thats a physiolgical measure when people get anxious their skin starts to sweat and conduct better
-results showed those who said they were low in anxiety and showed high desirability on a scale,they showed high physicolgical anxiety when they were completing their sentences
-that pattern of results was evidence that they were supressing their anxiety
