Relationship formation

Question 1

Influences of childhood experiences

Answer 1

The psychodynamic approach places emphasis on the importance of healthy early relationships in order to be able to achieve healthy relationships later on in life.
Uses the idea of fixation to explain the nature of relationships in adulthood.

Question 2

The unconscious mind

Answer 2

Forming relationships in adulthood may bring back unpleasant emotions from the past.
People may use ego defences to avoid anxiety.
Defence mechanisms affect our overall personality and therefore our relationships.

Question 3

Influences of childhood experiences - example

Answer 3

Overindulgence at the oral stage (0 - 18 months) could result in over dependency on others later in life.

Question 4

Shaver et al (1988)

Answer 4

Claimed that what we experience as romantic love in adulthood is an integration of attachment, caregiving and sexuality systems experienced in childhood.

Question 5

Bowlby’s maternal deprivation hypothesis

Answer 5

The ability to form meaningful social relationships in adulthood was reliant on a close warm continuous relationship with the mother (or mother figure) in the first few years of life.
The first two and a half years are the most important.
(Critical period.)
This relationships acts as a proto - type for all future relationships so disruption impairs our ability to relate to others.