Schizo - Individual - Psychodynamic Flashcards
Why did freud never work with schizophrenic patients?
Freud never worked with schizophrenics as he believed they could not form the close patient-therapist relationship required in psycho analysis
Two key ideas that you need to know about to understand Freud’s explanation for schizophrenia are fixation and regression.
What are the three stages involved in this approach?
Fixation
Regression
Role of the mother child relationship
Describe the role of fixation
Fixation refers to the inability to move on effectively.
Freud claims in the oral stage that babies aged 0-18 months old crave oral pleasure such as eating and breastfeeding
He claims fixation at this stage is caused by either frustration (not enough) or overindulgence (too much)
Freud believed that individuals with schizophrenia experienced fixation during the first two months of the oral stage of psychosexual development.
Describe the role of regression
Regression is an ego defence mechanism which causes the ego to retreat to an earlier stage – Freud claims for schizophrenia they retreat to the oral stage.
Freud claims that as an adult, most people satisfy oral desires through kissing, smoking or chewing gum.
However, he claims if an adult experiences an excessive amount of stress they may regress back to the oral stage.
Freud claims that since the ego is retreating to an earlier stage, the id is left in control of the psyche causing schizophrenia.
These help explain symptoms of schizophrenia as Freud claims while our ID is in control of the psyche, our id’s ‘unchecked activities’ present themselves in the form of hallucinations and delusions.
The person will lose touch with reality as they can no longer distinguish between what’s real and what’s not.
This can lead to narcissistic symptoms such as delusions of grandeur
Describe the role of mother child relationship
Freud claims that the mother-child relationship is another crucial element is the development of schizophrenia
Freud says mothers of schizophrenics are overprotective and controlling while also rejecting and distant at the same time
The mother’s overprotection stifles the child’s emotional development, while her emotional distance deprives the child of personal security, causing them to feel insecure.
This leaves the person very vulnerable when faced with stress and may explain why many schizophrenics are highly distrustful and resentful towards others, leading to symptoms such as delusions of persecution.
Strength of this theory
Research support in Kasanin et al (1934) examined hospital case records and found evidence of maternal overprotection in 33 out of 45 cases of schizophrenia.
Weakness of this theory
The approach is unscientific, and the concepts (id, ego, regression) are extremely difficult to test and prove the existence of. Therefore, as it can’t be falsified, it leads us to question the internal validity of the theory. It should be noted that although concepts such as the id, ego and regression are difficult to observe and measure, this does not automatically invalidate the theory
Another Weakness of this theory
an effective therapy hasn’t been created from the theory, which suggests that the underlying concepts / principles of the theory are inaccurate.
However, it could be argued what gives credit to a theory can be the creation of a treatment which can successfully treat a disorder. From the start Freud believed individuals with Schizophrenia were not suitable candidates for psychoanalysis as many schizophrenics lacked insight (which is necessary for the treatment to be successful).
