The Psychodynamic Approach* Flashcards
Give a key assumption of the psychodynamic approach.
Unconscious activity is the key determent of how we behave.
What is the role of the unconscious as defined by the psychodynamic approach?
The driving force behind everyday actions e.g. children who have been abused or neglected, repress this information and, by adulthood, this information resurfaces.
List the three components of the ‘tripartite’.
ID, ego and superego.
What are the characteristics of the ID?
Selfish and demands immediate gratification.
What is the role of the ego?
Uses defence mechanisms to mediate the ID and superego.
What are the characteristics of the superego?
Internalised sense of right and wrong and is determined by parental standards.
What is the purpose of defence mechanisms?
Used by the ego to prevent anxiety in an attempt to mediate the ID and superego.
Give an example of 3 defence mechanisms.
- Repression - burying an unpleasant thought e.g. negative childhood experiences.
- Displacement - Hostility is directed towards other things e.g. slamming a door instead of hitting someone.
- Denial - A threatening thought is treated as though it were not true.
List the 5 psychosexual stages from earliest to latest.
1) . Oral - pleasure of the mouth.
2) . Anal - controlling bowel and bladder movements.
3) . Phallic stage - focus on the genital area.
4) Latency - early conflicts, from earlier stages, are repressed.
5) . Genital stage (puberty) - sexual desires become constant.
What is the Oedipus complex?
A boy will begin to envy their fathers and view them as a rival for their mother’s affection. The boy fears he will be punished by his father for these feelings known as castration anxiety.
Describe the Electra complex.
Girls experience ‘penis envy’ and they will identify with the same sex parent as a way of vicariously possessing the other parent.
Give 2 advantages of the psychodynamic approach.
Advantages:
- Holistic - can be used to describe a wide range of behaviours e.g. aggression, anxiety and depression - however its ideas are hard to disprove scientifically - e.g. it is hard to use methodology to test the unconscious mind.
- Practical validity - led to the creation of many successful treatments e.g. psychoanalysis - used to find and treat unconscious conflicts - successful in treating a wide range of mental abnormalities.
Give 2 disadvantages of the psychodynamic approach.
Disadvantage:
- Socially sensitive - Freud claimed that conflict in the genital stage may lead to trouble forming heterosexual relationships. Suggesting that homosexual relationships are a consequence of conflict in this stage - however homosexuality was removed from the DSM-1 by Kinsey et al. - this approach is perhaps outdated.
- Use of case studies - e.g. Little Hans to study the Oedipus complex - low population validity - androcentric (centred on men) sample of infants from wealthy Viennese society - make generalisation difficult.
Evaluate psychotherapy.
Recovering from mental illness during psychotherapy could be due to spontaneous recovery over time.
Eysenck - meta-analysis - psychotherapy worked for some (66%) - though he found that 70% who did not receive treatment also recovered.
Thus psychotherapy suits some, but not all.
Give a quote from Freud that sums up his assumptions.
‘Unexpressed emotions will never die. They are buried alive and will come forth later in uglier ways’. (1904)
