Personality Unit 10 (X) Flashcards
Personality
-An individual’s unique pattern of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors that persist over time and across situations
Sigmund Freud
- Father of psychoanalysis
- Started as a medical doctor
- Had patients with physical ailments he could not find a physical cause for
- Maybe physical problems= manifestation of unaware occurrences
- Leads to study of the unconscious mind
Unconscious mind
- Reservoir of mostly unacceptable thoughts, wishes, feelings, and memories
- Higher mind= tip of iceberg= conscious
- Thoughts we are aware of
- Iceberg under water= unconscious mind
- Sexual urges, largest driving factor
- Higher mind= tip of iceberg= conscious
Methods of Psychoanalysis
- Free association
- Hypnosis
- Dream Analysis
Free association
- Individual freely responds to stimuli
- 1st thing that comes to mind w/ word or picture
Hypnosis
- Way to get unconscious mind to forefront
- Doesn’t work
Dream analysis
- Best method
- Have someone report dream and interpret them
Personality Structures
- Concept about different elements involved in personality
- Id, Ego, Superego
Id
- Part of mind, purely unconscious
- Selfish
- Driven by whatever happens in the present (Pleasure principle)
- Motivated by aggressive, carnal tendencies
- Part of personality that wants what it wants now (present oriented)
- Impulsive (doesn’t think about consequences)
- Truest self is what the Id wants
- Most people= Id driven
Ego
- Mediator
- Contemplates what the Id wants, takes input from the superego, and makes a decision that is best for the real world
- Operates on the reality principle
- We live in the real word= consequences
- Compromises (is there a way I can act this out?)
Superego
- Ideal principle
- All internalized values and ideals (uptight)
- Sense of pride when we do what is right
- Doesn’t listen to Id (always in conflict)
Id, ego, and superego at work
- At work all the time
- Ego= under constant stress (taking both sides)
- All work done unconsciously
- Decision= conscious
- Some people= more id driven, superego driven, or balanced (ego)
Fixation
- Experiences in each psychosexual stage shape development (determine adulthood)
- Too much/too little gratification at a certain stage= some sexual energy becomes tied in that stage
- Def: Partial or complete halt in the individual’s psychosexual development
Oral Stage
- Birth–>18 months
- Pleasure comes from sucking, biting, chewing, swallowing
- Too much: overly optimistic, gullible, dependent adults
- Too little: pessimistic, sarcastic, argumentative, hostile adults
Anal Stage
- 18 months–> 3.5 years
- Primary source of sexual pleasure shifts from mouth to anus
- Toilet training occurs
- Too strict= anal retentive
- Obstinate, stingy, excessively orderly
Phallic Stage
- After age 3
- Discovers genitals
- Develop a preference for parent of opposite sex, jealous of same sex parent (Oedipus/Electra complex)
- Resolved by identifying w/ same sex parent
- Living through their parent and adopting their values
- Resolved by identifying w/ same sex parent
- Fixation: vanity, egotism or low self-esteem, shyness, worthlessness
Phallic Stage Problems
- Castration anxiety= fear of father’s actions for desiring mother
- Penis envy= feeling of inferiority, anger at mother for her apparent cassation due to desiring father
Latency Period
- Appears to have no interest in opposite sex
- Ages 5/6–> 12/13
- Boys hang with boys, girls with girls
Genital Stage
- At puberty
- Sexual impulses reawaken
- Gratification–> mature sexuality, sense of responsibility, caring for others
- How to relate to others, caring, empathy
Critics of Freud
- Some say he is too male-centric
- Developed theory with men in mind, added women as afterthought
- Questions whether genders developed along same lines
Defense Mechanism
- How ego protects against anxiety
- Anxiety is the product of the inner war between id and superego
- Allow the ego to reduce or redirect anxiety by distorting reality
Repression
- Banishes troublesome things from consciousness
- Repressed things seep out in dream symbols and slip of the tongue
Regression
-Retreats to an earlier, more infantile stage of development
Ex: 1st day of college–> want mom
Reaction Formation
- Ego unconsciously switches impulses into their opposites
- People may express feelings that are opposite of their anxiety- arousing unconscious feelings
- Ex: I hate him–> I love him