shafranske_midterm_20150415194621 Flashcards
Oral Stage Paranoid Schizoid Position
(Klein) the earliest experiences of the infant are split between wholly good experiences with “good” objects and wholly bad experiences with “bad” objects. E.g., good breast when gratifying vs. bad breast when frustrating. The early ego vacillates between a loving orientation and a hateful orientation. To tolerate these two opposing experiential states, Klein postulated that children adopt the paranoid-schizoid position. Paranoid refers to the persecutory anxiety felt as coming from the environment. Schizoid refers to the infant’s use of splitting as a defense against anxiety, i.e., the world is divided into good and bad/love and hate. [see OBJECT CONSTANCY, AMBIVALENCE, and DEPRESSIVE POSITION]
Anal-sadism
It manifests as the toddler’s aggressive wishes connected to discharging feces, which for infants represent powerful and destructive weapons. They may have fantasies of bombings and explosions. In the anal sadistic process both elimination and retention can be points of fixation. In elimination, the toddler derives hostile excretory pleasure from defecation and is invested in destroying and losing the object. When retention occurs, this is preservation of the object and pleasure occurs.
Castration Anxiety
This anxiety is grounded in response to a boy’s confusion about the anatomical difference between boys and girls and his attributing the difference to the fact that the girl’s penis has been cut off. The boy, who is in the throws of the Oedipal Conflict and competing for the attentions of the mother, fears that he will be castrated by the father in response to his romantic feelings for the mother. By internalizing the father’s threat and making it a part of his own psychology, thereby sharing in the father’s sexual omnipotence, the boy is gradually able to master his castration anxiety. Think of this as a “useful fiction” - symbolic rather than real, physical threat to genitals.
Oedipus Complex:
Boy experiences sexual strivings toward his mother while wanting to replace his father for her affections. Mostly unconscious. When successfully resolved, these feelings are fully repressed, and the boy, afraid of castration, learns to identify with his father. He internalizes his parents and acquires a superego whose ego ideal replaces some of his early narcissism. The Oedipus complex is the process in childhood that civilizes us, causing us to repress our incestuous, antisocial drives and to learn to desire someone of the opposite sex. The “cornerstone” of psychological conflict (Freud). Unsuccessful resolution possibilities: 1) boy is invalidated by the father = psychological castration; leads to womanizing tendencies - having to “win” the woman; 2) boy becomes too attached to mother and trouble separating/leaving home.
Electra Complex
the feminine equivalent of the male Oedipal Complex. A chief difference is that the girl isn’t required to shift her identification from her mother to her father. this desire later gets acted out by her choice of a fatherly man to have a baby with. Identifies with mother, realizes her own “castration”, turns her love interest to father and wants a baby as substitute for not having a penis.
Penis Envy
“a woman’s repressed wish to possess a penis”. A daughter’s anger at mother because she blames her for her “castration” since she is also missing a penis. She envies the male equipment and position; the daughter feels conflict between her longing for the mother and her fear of engulfment by the mother. Turns to her father in attempt to compensate for inadequacy and thus desire for a baby. Feminist perspective sees penis envy as symbolic of the power dynamics within families.
Actual Neuroses
Neurosis is a psychological state characterized by excessive anxiety or insecurity without evidence of neurologic or other organic disease, sometimes accompanied by defensive or immature behaviors. a term originally used by Freud to refer to a neurosis which resulted from the tension of real, “actual,” frustrations or real organic dysfunctions; symptoms have a physical basis; anxiety is present. The therapeutic approach for actual neuroses is prophylaxis (prevention of or protective treatment for disease) and deconditoning (adaptation of an organism to less demanding environment, or, alternatively, the decrease of physiological adaptation to normal conditions). Currently, symptoms of actual neurosis fall under the hysteria framework. Two real problems in sexual functioning: 1) Neurasthenia: resulting from sexual excess/emission; excessive masturbation; and 2) Anxiety neuroses: resulting from unrelieved sexual stimulation; incomplete satisfaction
Psychoneuroses:
emotional maladaptation due to unresolved unconscious conflicts (as opposed to real organic dysfunctions). This leads to disturbances in thought, feelings, attitudes, and behavior. Leads to impairment, but not a loss of contact with reality.
Affect
(Freud) the qualitative expression of the quantity of instinctual energy and its fluctuations. Later, Titchener used it as a label for the pleasantness-unpleasantness dimension of feeling. If we can name it, it’s a feeling. Alexthymia is when a person can’t identify affects. Babies have affective reactions. Emotions. How drives are expressed.
Ambivalence
Ambivalence was used by Freud to indicate the simultaneous presence of love and hate towards the same object. During the oral stage the main object the child relates to is the mother’s breast. During the first sub-stage of this stage, there is no ambivalence at all towards the mother’s breast, since the only concern of the child is oral incorporation. In the second sub-stage, named “oral-sadistic,” the biting activity emerges and the phenomenon of ambivalence appears for the first time. The child is interested in both libidinal and aggressive gratifications, and the mother’s breast is at the same time loved and hated. It is being loved when it is a source of nutrition and pleasure, and it is being hated when it is a source of frustration. During the pre-oedipal stages ambivalent feelings are expressed in a dyadic relationship between the mother and the child. In the oedipal phase, ambivalence is experienced for the first time within a triangular context which involves the child, the mother, and the father. In this stage both the boy and the girl develop negative feelings of jealousy, hostility, and rivalry toward the parent of the same sex, but with different mechanisms for the two sexes. The negative feelings which arise in this phase coexist with love and affection toward the parent of the same sex and result in ambivalence which is expressed in feelings, behavior, and fantasies. [see OBJECT CONSTANCY and DEPRESSIVE POSITION]
Anxiety, Psychoanalytic Theory of
The accumulation of energy in the psyche is converted into anxiety. If this energy is not discharged or transformed, neurotic symptoms emerge. Anxiety may result from conflict between the mind’s agencies (ie. Id impulses threaten the Ego). Defense mechanisms mobilize to protect the ego when anxiety is detected. Freud’s first view of anxiety = when libido pushes for expression ego senses danger and represses libidinal urges so this drive cannot be discharged. The result is damming of the libido and subsequent anxiety. Real anxiety=threat from a known danger. Neurotic anxiety=threat from an unknown source. Automatic/Annihilation Anxiety: the infant fears their existence is at risk due to unbearable frustrations over hunger and excessive external stimulation (loud noises, extreme temperatures, etc.) Also fear of loss of the primary object. [see DRIVE/LAW of ENTROPY and ECONOMIC HYPOTHESIS].
Signal Anxiety
anxiety whose purpose is to warn of an impending threat and prepare the individual for flight, fight, or surrender. “…not directly a conflicted instinctual tension but a signal occurring in the ego of an anticipated instinctual tension” (Freud). Can conceptualize as a subset of unconscious mental processes that have a signal function of anticipating danger. Such unconscious anticipatory processes are a general feature of the mind that includes responses to both real and imagined (neurotic) appraisals of a situation.
Anxiety (Anna Freud: instinctual, superego, objective):
Ego employs defenses when faced with three types of anxiety.:- instinctual anxiety- superego anxiety- objective anxiety
Instinctual anxiety
the ego sets out to defend against instinctual impulses; defenses reflect the conflict between the id and ego. In analysis, the ego’s defenses pit themselves directly against the analyst, since the analyst is trying to unearth repressed material. The ego defends not only against the instinctual impulses, but also against affects, such as hatred, anger, and rage, associated with those instincts.
Superego anxiety
: anxiety produced by one’s conscience. the conflict is between the ego and the superego. The ego registers the emergence of an instinctual libidinal or aggressive impulse in consciousness. Since such impulses are unacceptable to the superego, which prohibits their gratification, the threat to the ego leads it to institute a set of defenses.
Objective anxiety
refers to ego defenses motivated by the dread of forces outside the self. The conflict is between the ego and the external world.
Average Expectable Environment
(Hartmann) An environment that is responsive to the child’s psychological needs and allows Conflict-Free Ego Capacities to flourish.
Conflict-Free Ego Capacities
(Hartmann) Intrinsic potentials - innate and inherited. Capacities include language, perception, memory, intention, motor activity, object comprehension, and thinking. The ability to integrate and synthesize experiences and adapt to reality. Contrasted with more traditional psychoanalytic ideas, which hold that adaptation is achieved only as an outcome of frustration and conflict. [see PRIMARY AUTONOMOUS EGO FUNCTIONS (Hartmann)]
Basic Fault
(Balint) a structural deficiency in personality as a result of not having needs met due to a faulty environment. Impairment in object relations which causes a rupture in dyadic relationships. In a relationship, the person considers only their own needs and may either avoid or cling to an object. May display schizoid, narcissistic, borderline personality features and may hamper therapeutic process. Theoretically neutralized when, after being recognized, the patient re-establishes his primary love relationship, and lets go of his compulsive object relations.
Basic Trust
(Erikson) the sustained inner feeling of optimism regarding oneself and the world-at-large. It develops out of frequent experiences of one’s childhood needs being met with satisfaction. If overcome crises and thus develop trusting, confident disposition.
Cathexis
: the attachment/concentration of libido (emotional energy) to a particular object or goal. The investment of libido in objects. Can cause schizoid personality features in children who experienced neglect or abuse.
Component Instinct
In the pregenital stages the sexual instinct consists of non-erotic component instincts such as the sadistic instinct, the instinct for knowledge, and the instinct for mastery. Component instincts often appear as pairs of opposites, for example, the instinct to see and be seen. Certain sexual component instincts (e.g., baby sucking) will eventually contribute to mature genital sexuality. Freud thought that children were “polymorphously perverse” b/c of the variety of instincts that each experiences - and that each instinct has the potential to develop into adult perversions, i.e., oral pleasure as infant develops into adult oral sexual pleasure; sadism, voyeurism, etc.
Compromise Formation
the result (compromise) of an internal conflict. The ego works to meet out a compromise between a certain amount of expression of a drive (id) and a certain amount of repression (superego). This occurs outside of our awareness. Ex: bad compromise formation is when you overreact to something, e.g., yelling at someone for making a mistake. [SEE SECONDARY PROCESS]
Depressive Position
(Klein) Infants no longer need to use splitting and begin the process of integrating good and bad object representations. This begins around 3-4 months and lasts until 6 months. In this phase, infants realize they have the power to do harm to the object and feel remorse. Infant begins to see objects as whole rather than as partial-objects; thus can see the mother as both good and bad. Fear of “loss of the loved object” occurs. This stage results from the gradual separation from the mother, resulting in the child emerging as a separate person. [see OBJECT CONSTANCY and AMBIVALENCE]
Developmental lines
Anna Freud) Infants move back and forth along multiple lines of development; a child can thus develop in one area, but not in another. These development lines tracked the unfolding of a specific maturational theme at different periods of children’s lives and indicated what was typical or atypical. Progress along these lines at times necessitated regression. The descriptions provided by the developmental lines can be used to determine a child’s readiness for a variety of life experiences, or assist in identifying deficits in child’s ability to function. In order to account for the wide variations in normal development, Anna Freud did not specify age ranges (but our text book approximates them anyway). This concept proposed that the level a child reaches on a developmental line is the result of the interaction of drives, ego development, and its relation to the nurturing environment. She proposed the existence of multiple developmental lines and made a distinction between normal and pathological development. This presented a major departure from the previous developmental model and instead depended on day-to-day observation of children. In spite of the novelty of the approach, it was designed to fit into Freud’s original metapsychology.Table 3.1 on page 69 of text has a prototype of a developmental line: from dependency to emotional self-reliance and adult object relationships?
Differentiation Subphase
(Mahler) First phase of the separation-individuation process; child shifting from symbiosis to individuation. Takes place between 5 and 10 months. Infant is more alert to external stimuli. Infant begins to explore and starts to compare what is and what is not mother (e.g. scanning faces and checking back with mother). Early movement toward individuation. Characterized by separation/stranger anxiety and by clinging to the primary caregiver or to a transitional object serving as the caregiver.
Disorganized/Disoriented Attachment
Children with a disorganized-insecure attachment style show a lack of clear attachment behavior. Their actions and responses to caregivers are often a mix of behaviors, including avoidance or resistance. These children are described as displaying dazed behavior, sometimes seeming either confused or apprehensive in the presence of a caregiver. May cry for parents then move away when picked up. Disoriented and trance-like. Children of this type are at risk for dissociative disorders, phobias, anxiety, and heightened aggressiveness. Main and Solomon (1986) proposed that inconsistent behavior on the part of parents might be a contributing factor in this style of attachment. In later research, Main and Hesse (1990) argued that parents who act as figures of both fear and reassurance to a child contribute to a disorganized attachment style. Because the child feels both comforted and frightened by the parent, confusion results. Also seen as a result of abuse/neglect within the child/parent relationship.
Drive/Law of Entropy
: Drive is the psychological manifestation of an instinct; e.g., libidinal drive is the manifestation of the sexual instinct. Physiological discomfort motivates drive. Goal is to eliminate deprivation and/or move away from a noxious stimulus. Law of Entropy refers to the idea that energy that accumulates within a system leads to a buildup of pressure, which unless relieved would lead to the destruction of the system. Freud conceived of the mind as an energy processing apparatus that obeys the laws of entropy. The accumulation of energy within the psyche is converted into anxiety; unless the energy is discharged or transformed, symptom formation ensues. Energy transformation leads to higher levels of organization whereas symptom formation leads to lower levels. In nature, systems tend to move from a higher to a lower level of organization (e.g., the death instinct leads to a disintegration of organisms.)
Economic Hypothesis
Freud’s original theory of drives - incorporates the law of entropy. Analogy between Newtonian mechanistic view of the workings of physical objects and the workings of the mind. This mechanistic view is that the concept of energy is central to the workings of the psyche. The drives are the motive forces that activate the human psyche. According to the mechanistic principles, energy that accumulates within a system leads to a buildup of pressure, which unless relieved would lead to the destruction of the system.
Drive Derivative
material representative of a repressed drive, e.g. anxiety, certain associations, etc. A wish for pleasurable libidinal and/or aggressive satisfaction. Every drive derivative is unique to the individual experiencing it. For example, a sport car can be a drive derivative of sex drive. Conscious ideation is a drive derivative of unconscious drive.
Epigenesis
Developmental events unfold based on a pre-existing sequence and rate of development. Evolution occurs along a predetermined pattern, in accordance with certain pre-determined potentials. Individuals become more complex as they grow/progress along multiple lines of development, e.g., physical, social, etc. New abilities develop from environmental influences
Eros
A motivational force/energy that binds elements of experience into a whole. The life instinct innate in all humans. The desire to create life; favors productivity and construction. Associated with genital pleasure/satisfaction. Eros pitted against the destructive death instinct of Thanatos. [see THANATOS]
Erotogenic Zone
Any part of the body susceptible of becoming excited. Freud identified specific areas, notably, the genitals, mouth, and anus. In neurosis, non-genital erotogenic zones come to function as substitutes for the genitals.
Fantasy
(Klein) conscious thoughts that are the product of the imagination; a person’s conscious creation of an imagined reality of what may be possible. This is different from “phantasies”, which are the unconscious thoughts that are associated with instincts.
Fixation
: An arrest at a phase of development because of difficulties the child cannot overcome.
Genetic viewpoint
(Freud) The course of an individual’s development follows inborn laws that represent a sequential series of invariant phases or stages. Freud’s psychosexual model is an expression of the genetic hypothesis.
Homeostasis
Stable psychic equilibrium. Agencies of the mind working in harmony; involves adaptation to external reality and internal demands. The “tendency of the organism to restore equilibrium if constancy is disturbed”.
Hysteria
“A psychiatric condition variously characterized by emotional excitability, excessive anxiety, sensory and motor disturbances, or the unconscious simulation of organic disorders.” (Charcot) Anxiety from a traumatic accident caused somatic symptoms (i.e., symptoms were a result of the psychological construction of the accident rather than physical results of the accident itself). Believed that real events (“provoking agents”) could serve as a trigger for hysterical symptoms and that a trigger activates a hereditary predisposition. Freud applied Charcot’s work on traumatic hysteria and hypothesized that neurosis appeared when a traumatic experience led to unconscious symptom-formation. Freud associated hysteria with sexual events b/c believed that held enough traumatic force to create a hysterical response. A trigger thus activated infantile sexual experience rather than hereditary predisposition. Freud’s later notion of the “day residue”. In therapy, client needs to be made aware of meaning behind symptoms so that unexpressed emotions no longer have to express themselves as physical symptoms.
Identification
a process through which the child acquires characteristics of an adult to whom he or she becomes attached. A dynamic process that occurs over time; a progressive identification with mother.
Infantile Neurosis
How we manage infantile sexual conflicts impacts our level of neurosis as adults. Neurosis in adulthood can be a result of unresolved infantile neurosis/fixation at a certain stage of psychosexual development, e.g., interest in genitals, jealousy of same-sex object, etc. Neurosis develops from the frustration of basic instincts, either because of external obstacles or because of internal mental imbalance (Freud). Child’s unconscious fantasies are the starting point of disorders. Freud demonstrated his point with the case of the “wolf man,” which was his longest psychoanalytic patient.
Instinct (Freud/Bowlby)
(Freud): an innate or genetically inherited species-specific goal directed set of behaviors. All behavior motivated by the drives (a drive is the psychological representation of an instinct and an instinct is the neurological representation of a physical need). Life instincts perpetuate (a) the life of the individual, by motivating him or her to seek food and water, and (b) the life of the species, by motivating him or her to have sex. The motivational energy we use is satisfying drives is called libido. (Bowlby): instincts related to self-preservation can be seen in the mother-child bond; attachment is formed through interactions that create dopaminergic reactions, e.g., baby smiles and mother smiles back. Specific behaviors occur as a result of the instinct for self-preservation/attachment.Characteristics of instincts: 1) source=area of body where instinct originates; 2) impetus=amount of energy needed to act upon instinct; 3) aim=instinctual goal (=satisfaction/release of tension); 4) object=person or thing through which instinct is satisfied.
Instinctual Aim
: an intended goal inherent in instinctual behavior. The aim of the instinct is always satisfaction/gratification
Instinctual Object
the object through which satisfaction can be achieved. Can be a person’s own body. Infant can be drawn to an instinctual object without having learned about its function, e.g., the mother’s breast. Failure to find an object through which to achieve the instinctual aim leads to frustration.
Introjection
Defense mechanism that involves internalizing external threats so they can be neutralized or alleviated. Involves internalizing attributes of another person. The relationship with the real object is replaced by one with an imagined object (?). A child internalizes the superego of his/her parents and uses it as his/her own. The superego develops through this defense mechanism.
Internal Objects
A person’s representation of another; memories, ideas, or fantasies about a person, place, or thing. “Object” generally refers to an actual, physical object. “Internal object” refers to an internal representation of that object.
Latent Content
the underlying psychological meaning of the dream. Freud believed that the latent content was somehow censored by the subconscious in order to protect a person from difficult content. Latent content is usually uncovered through free association and other psychodynamic techniques designed to access the preconscious meaning. For example, If you had a dream about elephants and then you free associated elephant with attachment, then your manifest content is the elephant and latent content is the attachment. [see MANIFEST CONTENT]
Libido
: (Freud) we have a limited amount of psychic energy that fuels our thought processes (originally he only attributed libido to sexual energy but then incorporated it later to include all psychic energy). There is constant competition for these resources between the id, the ego, and the superego. commonly thought of as related to sexual motivation.
Manifest Content
content that we remember as the dream itself; analysts consider it a disguise for the true latent content. [see LATENT CONTENT]
Metapsychology
A set of theories. Freud’s metapsychology is composed of 5 different points of view that incorporate most of the positions taken during his lifetime: 1) Economic: deals with the amount of energy taken up and discharged in the psyche2) Topographic: describes the conscious, unconscious, and preconscious3) Dynamic: focuses on the balance of forces and counter forces acting on the drives4) Genetic: the developmental point of view5) Structural: describes the ego, id, and the superego as the major agencies of the mind (this became the dominant perspective in ego psychology)
Multidetermined/Overdetermined
Multidetermined= A presenting problem can have a variety of root causes, e.g., a man enters therapy because of extreme anxiety which is related to witnessing a shooting, a history of abuse, his mother’s death, etc. Overdetermined=A variety of presenting problems can have one root cause, e.g., a man enters therapy because of anxiety, fear, and isolation which all relate to unresolved castration anxiety.
Naricissm, Primary
the self-involvement all infants experience; the investment of libido into oneself.
Narcissism, Secondary
a turning of libido away from objects back to the ego, as with what we now call the narcissistic personality.
Object
a mental representation of a person made up of the individual+fantasy+needs in the context of need states. So don’t talk about the mother, talk about the maternal object because the mental image is partly a result of the child’s own mental imaging and unique experiences with the mother.
Object Constancy
a process through which the child internalizes a whole image of their caregiver. The achievement of consistent internal representation of the object (the parent) that is stable and able to be maintained regardless of whether the object satisfies or doesn’t satisfy the child’s needs. The tendency for objects to remain perceptually invariable regardless of wide variation in conditions of observation. Allows for the formation of relationships that can survive disappointments / frustrations. Develops once the ego is formed and the child experiences him/herself as having separate identity from the caregiver and other people are seen to have separate existences. [see AMBIVALENCE and DEPRESSIVE POSITION]
Phylogeny
Darwinian theory: History of the evolution of a species or group, especially lines of descent and relationships among broad groups. “memory traces of countless egos gone before…” The idea that mental content can be passed down through generations.
Pleasure/Unpleasure
: the goal of psychical activity is to avoid unpleasure; increases in excitation resulting from the accumulation of undischarged energies produce unpleasure, whereas the discharge of the accumulated tension associated with those energies produces pleasure; cathartic therapy helps patients discharge their accumulated tension; part of the economic hypothesis/entropy model (Freud & Breuer)
Primal Scene
Fragmentary recollections from early childhood based on real or imagined experiences of observation of parental sexual relations (or between animals but displaced onto humans). May contribute to neuroses.
Primary Process
unconscious, primitive way in which id satisfies libidinal drive. cognition at this level is at or below linguistic threshold. An irrational state of libido that is unable to defer pleasure. [see SECONDARY PROCESS] (raw impulse)
Primitive Defenses
certain defense mechanisms are employed by the ego very early in life - mostly before age 2 and 3. More mature defenses develop as the ego becomes more organized (after object constancy established). Primitive defenses include splitting, projection, denial, and acting out. Paranoid-schizoid adaptation can be considered a primitive defense.
Projective Identification
a person projects a part of the self onto others; differs from simple projection in that leads to a self-fulfilling prophecy, e.g., a paranoid person may assume cops are out to get them and may thus attract attention by acting suspiciously and encouraging cops to act in a way that confirms the paranoid’s (false) beliefs. Or, if think someone is rude, may act standoffish; this encourages the other person to act standoffish and this fulfills the original assumption. A defense mechanism meant to protect the ego against potential persecution and separation from others.
Psychic Determinism
the assumption that behind every mental process there is a cause, either conscious or unconscious. this can be seen in the “Freudian slip”. Nothing is random. Every action is meaningful and the result of a compromise. Each thought and associated feeling is influenced or determined by the ones that preceded it.
Reality Principle
: “an ego thus educated has become reasonable; it no longer lets itself be governed by the pleasure principle, but obeys the reality principle, which also at bottom seeks to obtain pleasure, but pleasure which is assured through taking account of reality, even though it is pleasure postponed and diminished”. The ego functions according to reality as opposed to what is (purely) desired. Immediate gratification is not always feasible, so the ego allows for delayed gratification.
Regression
: A mechanism by which a child returns to an earlier phase of libidinal development when confronted with a conflict that is difficult to resolve. An adult can also regress to a more primitive developmental state when faced with anxiety/trauma.
Repetition Compulsion
the need to repeat a behavioral pattern over and over again. This can become maladaptive, e.g., in relationship patterns. Freud: drive is expressed until it reaches final gratification. Contemporary: drive is expressed until some compromise is reached.
Repression
A defense that the ego initiates to keep unacceptable id wishes from emerging in consciousness because of the threat they represent to the ego. May contribute to resistance in therapy.
Resistance
Psychological resistance is the phenomenon often encountered in clinical practice in which patients either directly or indirectly oppose changing their behavior or refuse to discuss, remember, or think about presumably clinically relevant experiences. Anything that is in opposition to the development of insight or the therapeutic process. Freud listed “five kinds of resistances that are met with in analysis” (while stressing that the list is not exhaustive):1. Repression (denial or avoidance)2. Transference, (i.e. projection) 3. Gain from illness, (i.e. secondary gain) 4. Compulsion to repeat, (i.e. acting out) 5. Sense of guilt or need for punishment, (i.e. self-sabotage)
Return of the Repressed
(Freud) idea that neurotic symptoms are a result of the struggle between repressed material trying to access executive functioning in order to be expressed (id) and mental controls trying to keep material from being expressed (ego). Repressed idea may surface (disguised) as a neurotic symptom. Freudian slips, dream material, etc. are all examples of this phenomenon.
Secondary Process
conscious mental activity directed toward the satisfaction of drives. It is the thinking and reasoning ability. This is the ego’s reality-testing and energy (libido)-binding capability. It is able to put aside immediate desire in order to work out a way to acquire the object of pleasure. The ideal adult state is characterized by a strong ego and the ability to delay need gratification. Allows internal demands and external demands to be met in rational, effective ways. Secondary process filters primary process drives. [see PRIMARY PROCESS and COMPROMISE FORMATION] (ego driven - mediated reaction by the ego)
Stimulus Barrier
Child can only process a certain amount of stimuli - if over-stimulated, may become overwhelmed and experience “psychic trauma”. Freud’s stimulus barrier has come to be regarded as a kind of precursor to ego defense functions. This is a protective mechanism for the infant prior to the formation of the ego. The infant has the innate ability to differentiate between unpleasurable states of increasing tension and pleasurable states of decreasing tension.
Structural approach
a view that differentiates between the three agencies of the mind: id, ego, and superego. Mental conflict is seen as stemming from the struggle between the three agencies (Freud). Permits “greater understanding of the individual’s negotiations with the external world and with interpersonal relationships in that world” (as opposed to the previous topographic approach). “According to the structural theory the id is concerned only with gratifying drive derivatives ( = wishes), without regard either to the limitations of external reality or to possible consequences. The ego, by contrast, is conceived of as being tied to external reality and bound by the need to take into account the limitations that external reality imposes and the possible consequences that may ensue from actions that involve the environment.” (Freud PPT slide 47). Libidinal energy shifts between the three agencies as each pushes to use as much energy as possible. Personality determined by balance of agencies; e.g., libidinal energy may be mostly invested in id impulses or guilt-inspiring superego.
Tripartite Model/Self
id, ego, and superego. the self is a construction outside of this model.
Id:
responsible for instinctual urges; completely unconscious. Operates according to the pleasure principle and primary process thinking. Functions in the irrational and emotional part of the mind. It is the source of libido (psychic energy). [see PRIMARY PROCESS]
Ego/Ego Function
Constrains the Id to reality. Develops around 2-3 years of age. Operates according to the reality principle and secondary process thinking. Mediates between the Id, Superego, and environment. “Ego-strength” refers to how well the ego copes with these conflicting forces. “Compromise formation” is one major function. It is the executive that governs, controls, and regulates personality. To undertake its work of planning, thinking and controlling the Id, the Ego uses some of the Id’s libidinal energy. The functions performed by the ego can be divided into 3 basic categories: 1) autonomous ego functions, which are not derived from its relationship to instincts and their objects; these include intelligence, thinking, perception, reality testing, learning, synthesis, and speech. 2) relational ego functions, which include object seeing, attachment, internalization, and the development and sustenance of “object constancy” (i.e. the capacity to maintain a positive tie to a love object even when it is not being need-satisfying); and 3) defensive ego functions, which ward off anxiety when unacceptable sexual and aggressive impulses and their attendant self- and -object representations threaten to push into consciousness. Goal of defensive functions is to reduce anxiety. [see OBJECT CONSTANCY and COMPROMISE FORMATION]
Primary Autonomous Ego Functions
(Hartmann): innate, inherited ego characteristics. Conflict-free. Include primary cognitive functions like perception, intelligence, comprehension, language, learning/thinking.
Secondary Autonomous Ego Functions
(Hartmann): functions that were once involved in developmental conflicts, such as oral, anal, or phallic/oedipal and were freed as a result of the resolution of those conflicts through the process of neutralization. Energy was neutralized, the conflict removed (sexual and aggressive qualities removed from drives), and the ego function then contributes to adaptation.
Synthetic Function of the Ego
(Hartmann) An autonomous ego function. The ego’s ability to synthesize drives, tendencies, and functions of personality. This allows the individual to think, feel, and act in an organized and directed manner. Opposed to repression which represents a loosening of ties with reality. Considered the “centralization of function” in personality integration.
Ego-Dystonic
Drives are either ego-dystonic or ego-syntonic. Ego-dystonic drives are unacceptable to the ego and/or experienced as foreign to the self and are consequently repressed.
Ego-Syntonic
Drives are either ego-dystonic or ego-syntonic. Ego-syntonic drives are acceptable to the ego and consistent with the ego ideal.
Ego instincts
Ego instincts are biologically based motivations that are relatively free from conflict (ex. eating, breathing, sleeping) and are aimed at self-preservation (whereas sexual instincts are aimed at the preservation of the species). These are motivations that are life-sustaining and not related to conflict/neuroses.
Superego
three functions: 1) self-observation; 2) conscience; and 3) maintaining the ideal. Moral injunctions and prohibitions as well as ideal aspirations. Develops through identification with parents around age 4-6. Observes and evaluates behavior and leads to self punishment/praise affecting self-esteem.
Ego ideal
Part of the superego that contains an idealized self based on the values of significant individuals, e.g., caretakers, educators, etc. Formed as the child is forced to abandon its infantile narcissism (b/c forced to interact with others in the environment). Ego ideal includes the moral conscience, which continuously compares the actual ego with the ego ideal. It is our expectation of how we think we should be. The ego ideal is both a critic and a champion; it comprises all the restrictions to which the ego must submit to conform with the ideal image. It can also produce a sensation of triumph and enhanced self-esteem when something in the ego coincides with the ego ideal. The ego ideal demands that the subject make changes to achieve the ideal, but the existence of the ego ideal does not mean that the subject has succeeded in achieving this goal. “A man who has exchanged his narcissism for homage to a high ego ideal has not necessarily on that account succeeded in sublimating his libidinal instincts” (1914c, p. 94). Ego ideal can be short-circuited when replaced by an idealized object: “It is even obvious in many forms of love-choice,” Freud wrote, “that the object serves as a substitute for some unattained ego ideal of our own.” Narcissistic vulnerabilities are related to the ego ideal, e.g., when person feels like not living up to who (s)he should be.
Sublimation
: In short, channeling an impulse into a socially desired activity. The ego harnesses instinctual energy and channels it into a socially acceptable pursuit. I.E. the voyeur becomes a photographer.
Symbiosis
: reciprocal relationship between two people. Symbiotic period of child development is when the child depends on the mother for survival - can be seen as “one psychic being” - at its peak btw 4/5 mos. Occurs before child develops own sense of individuality (separation-individuation).
Thanatos
the death instinct; a self-destructive force; part of Freud’s dual instinct theory; the aggressive drive is regarded as the expression of Thanatos. [see EROS]
Topographic Approach
Freud’s division of psyche into three layers: the preconscious, the conscious, and the unconscious. Freud’s topographical model represents his “configuration” of the mind. According to Freud, there are three levels of consciousness:
Consciousness/System Cs
awareness of the immediate environment. The actual contents of awareness; i.e., what one is conscious of at a given moment. Freud’s way of talking about “the conscious” is similar to what a cognitive psychologist means by attention. Anything that is thought, perceived or understood resides in this conscious
Preconscious/System pr-cs
:“distinguish two kinds of unconscious – one which is easily, under frequently occurring circumstances, transformed into something conscious, and another with which this transformation is difficult and takes place only subject to a considerable expenditure of effort or possibly never at all. [. . .] We call the unconscious which is only latent, and thus easily becomes conscious, the ‘preconscious’, and retain the term ‘unconscious’ for the other”. [Freud, New Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis (1932)] Summary: The preconscious is all the material that is stored in our memory that can be readily and voluntarily accessed.
Unconscious/System Ucs
Material passes easily back and forth between the conscious and the preconscious. Material from these two areas can slip into the unconscious. A repository for socially unacceptable ideas, wishes or desires, traumatic memories, and painful emotions. Truly unconscious material cannot be made available voluntarily. Material in the UCS has been “actively repressed”. (Palombo, p. 16) The id resides in the UCS. My understanding is that ego defense mechanisms are also unconscious (see Palombo, bottom of p. 18).
Transference
when a client projects unconscious feelings from previous relationships onto the therapist. From a PA view, transference brings repressed material to the surface where it can be processed and the sources of neurotic symptoms identified.
Freud’s Psychosexual Stages
- Oral2. Anal3. Phallic4. Genital/Oedipal/5. Latency6. Late Genital/Adolescence
Each stage has:
- Erogenous Zone2. Behavioral Characteristics3. Core Defenses 4. Central Issues/Tasks5. Character Traits (that emerge from successful resolution of issues)
