The Psychodynamic Approach

Question 1

What is the Role of the Unconscious?

Answer 1

• Freud suggested the conscious mind is the ‘tip of the iceberg’, most of our mind is unconscious (biological drives/instincts that influence behaviour significantly)
• Contains disturbing memories that are accessed through dreams and parapraxes
• just under our conscious mind is the preconscious containing memories we aren’t aware of but can access if desired

Question 2

How is the personality structured?

Answer 2

ID: is primitive part of personality, ‘pleasure principle’ - mass of unconscious instincts, only ID is present at birth (Freud said babies are ‘bundles of ID’) entirely selfish

Ego: ‘reality principle’ acts as a mediator - develops at age 2 and role is to reduce conflict through defense mechanisms

Superego: formed end of phallic stage (5) ‘morality principle’ represents morals of child’s same sex parent/punishes ego through guilt

Question 3

What is the Oral Stage?

Answer 3

0-1
- Pleasure in the mouth, mothers breast object of desire
- Consequence of oral fixation (smoking, biting nails, sarcasm)

Question 4

What is the Anal stage?

Answer 4

1-3
- Pleasure in the anus, withholding/expelling faeces
- Anal retentive (perfectionist, obsessive) Anal expulsive (thoughtless, messy)

Question 5

What is the Phallic stage?

Answer 5

3-6
- Pleasure in the genitals
- Phallic personality (narcissistic, reckless)

Question 6

What is Latency?

Answer 6

• Earlier conflicts are repressed

Question 7

What is Genital?

Answer 7

• Sexual desires become conscious alongside puberty
• Difficulty forming heterosexual relationships

Question 8

What is the significance of Psychosexual stages?

Answer 8

• each stage (apart from latency) is marked by a conflict that must be resolved in order to progress to the next stage
• unresolved stage leads to fixation

Question 9

What are Defense Mechanisms?

Answer 9

• unconscious, prevent us from being overwhelmed by trauma, often involve distortion of reality and as a long-term solution are unhealthy
  Repression: forcing memory out of conscious mind
  Denial: refusing to acknowledge an aspect of reality
  Displacement: transferring feelings from true target to substitute target

Question 10

What are the Oedipus/Electra complex?

Answer 10

• Phallic stage boys develop incestuous feelings towards mother and murderous hatred towards father, fearing castration, boys repress feelings and identify with father
• Girls experience penis envy and hate mother, this is replaced with the desire for a baby

Question 11

What was the Little Hans case study?

Answer 11

• 5 yr old Hans saw a horse collapse and developed a phobia of them, Freud said his fear of his father castrating him was displaced onto horses

Question 12

What is one way in which the Psychodynamic approach is useful in the real world?

Answer 12

• introduced the idea of psychotherapy/psychoanalysis over physical therapy. Psychoanalysis is the forerunner in many modern therapies such as talking therapies (brings forward repressed emotions)

Question 13

What is one limitation of Freuds theory?

Answer 13

• Popper said it is not falsifiable and not open to empirical testing as concepts occur at an unconscious level and so are untestable - studies based on subjective interpretations

Question 14

What is ethically unsound about Freuds theory?

Answer 14

• Concept of Penis envy is sexist
• and the idea that unresolved conflicts lead to homosexuality is homophobic suggesting homosexuality is abnormal and a result of a flaw