The Psychodynamic Approach (Freud)

Question 1

Who is Sigmund Freud?

Answer 1

• Associated strongly with the Psychodynamic approach
• Highly influential in psychology
• Born in Austria in 1856 and practiced in Vienna for much of his professional life

Question 2

A01: Overall assumptions

Answer 2

1. They place an emphasis on the unconscious mind
2. They also focus ion that most behaviour stems from early childhood experiences.

Question 3

A01: The role of the unconscious

Answer 3

• To be the driving/motivating force behind our behaviour/ personality and protect the conscious self from anxiety/fear/trauma/conflict
• Our feelings, motives, and decisions are actually over fully influenced by our past experiences, and stored in the unconscious
• Most of the human mind is unconscious like most of an iceberg being underwater
• The unconscious is a part of the mind we can’t access. This is where all of our deep desires and traumatic memories have been repressed to.

Question 4

A01: Structure of personality

Answer 4

Our personality is made up of 3 parts: the id, the geo and the superego. This is known as a tripartite structure.
The id and the super parts of personality are in direct conflict with each other. It is the egos job to manage his conflict. This conflict takes place on an unconscious level, so we aren’t aware of it.

Question 5

The Id

Answer 5

• This is the demanding selfish part of our personality
• pleasure principle
• 0-18 months

Question 6

The Ego

Answer 6

• This is the part of the personality thatt manages the conflict between the id and superego
• reality principle
• 18 months - 3 years

Question 7

The Superego

Answer 7

• This is the moral part of our personality that tells us what is right and wrong
• Morality principle
• 3 - 6 years

Question 8

A01: Defence mechanisms

Answer 8

Defence mechanisms are what the ego uses unconsciously to try and protect us from distress and anxiety.
However the overuse of them can maladaptive and lead to abnormalities and symptoms of a disorder.

Question 9

Repression

Answer 9

• An unconscious mechanism employed by the ego to keep disturbing or threatening thoughts from becoming conscious
• Thoughts that would result in feelings of guilt from the superego
• For example, in the Oedipus complex, aggressive thoughts about the same sex parents are repressed

Question 10

Denial

Answer 10

• Involves blocking external events from awareness. If it is too much to handle the person just refuses to accept it
• For example, smokers may refuse to admit to themselves that smoking is bad for their health.

Question 11

Displacement

Answer 11

• The redirection of an impulse onto a powerless substitute target
• Someone who is frustrated by his or her superiors may go home and punch a wall or beat up a family member

Question 12

Regression

Answer 12

• A movement back in psychological time when one is faced with stress
• A child may begin to suck their thumb again or wet the bed when they need to spend more time in the hospital.

Question 13

Projection

Answer 13

• Involves individuals attribution their own thoughts, feeling and motives to another person.
• For example, you may hate someone, but your superego tells you that such hatred is unacceptable. You can solve the problem by believing that they hate you and therefore the hatred is justified.

Question 14

A01: Psychosexual stages

Answer 14

According to Freud there are 5 stages of child development.
We develop gradually thruyht the psychosexual stages.
There is different conflict at each stage that they must resolve
If we are frustrated or over-indulged within any of these stages, we may become fixated in that stage which can affect our adult behaviour

Question 15

Oral (0-1 yrs)

Answer 15

• This is where the focus of the pleasure is on the mouth e.g. sucking a thumb.
• Oral fixation leads to chain smoking, biting nails in adulthood.

Question 16

Anal (1-3 yrs)

Answer 16

• Focus of pleasure is the anus. Child gets pleasure by either withholding or expelling faeces.
• Successful completion is marked by potty training
• Fixation is in 2 possible ways:
  
  • Anal retentive - perfectionist, OCD super cleanliness
  • Anal expulsive - messy

Question 17

Phallic (3-5 yrs)

Answer 17

• Focus of pleasure is on genital area.
• Boys go through the Oedipus complex and girls go through the Electra complex.
• Leafs to possible homosexuality

Question 18

Latency (6-11 yrs)

Answer 18

• Repress earlier conflicts.
• No effect on adult behaviour

Question 19

Genital ( 12 yrs)

Answer 19

Sexual desires become conscious with the onset of puberty
Difficulty with relationships if fixated.

Question 20

A03: Evaluation of the psychodynamic approach
+ A strength of the approach is that it has led t an effective therapy for abnormality of psychoanalysis

Answer 20

E: This therapy involves dream analysis, which is all about uncovering repressed traumas from the unconscious mind and working with the therapist to resolve this issue. This then cures their anxiety.
C: This adds ecological validity to the psychodynamic
approach as it demonstrates that we do repress our memories and that our unconscious mind drives behaviour. As a result of this knowledge, it has helped us in the real world to give therapy for people with mental health issues.

Question 21

• A weakness of the psychodynamic approach to abnormality is that it is unscientific and unfalsifiable.

Answer 21

E: Freud’s explanation is difficult to test scientifically
because the theories such as the structure of personality is based on the unconscious mind. For example, the conflict between the ID and superego happens on an unconscious level that we are unaware of, so cannot be physically seen or measured and therefore cannot be proved or disproved as it is very abstract.
C: This questions the internal validity of the Psychodynamic
approach as it cannot be empirically tested through scientific methods, due to its focus being on the unconscious mind which is not physical. This means it does not adhere to the features of a science and can be classed as an unscientific approach.

Question 22

• Another weakness of the approach is that it places too much emphasis on the past and thus has a retrospective outlook.

Answer 22

E: Freud over emphasised the childhood influences at the expenses of adult ones. Even if childhood experiences play a part in behaviour, that does not mean to say that we can ignore adult experiences that might contribute to behaviour such as an adult might become depressed after losing a family member or experience something stressful such as divorce.
C: This questions the validity of the Psychodynamic
approach as it ignores the experiences we have as adults which could affect our behaviour and therefore other approaches, that focus on present thoughts (such as the cognitive approach) may be more important in explaining adult behaviour.

Question 23

• Another weakness of the approach is that it is out of date.

Answer 23

E: As this approach was created in the 1900s and with the development of psychology as a science, these ideas may no longer be relevant. For example, The Oedipus and Electra complex are no longer relevant explanations of the consequences fixation in a psychosexual stage, as they rely heavily on the nuclear family, ignoring factors such as same sex or single parent households.
C: This therefore questions the temporal validity of the Psychodynamic approach as it neglects modern day societal factors which may affect our adult behaviour, meaning no longer valid in in todays society.

Question 24

1 - Another weakness of the psychodynamic approach is that it is physically deterministic

Answer 24

E: This is where it suggests that our behaviour is pre-determined and not in
our own control. The psychodynamic approach says that our behaviour is pre-determined by our Childhood experiences and unconscious drives. On the one hand this has a benefit as it allows us to predict and determine future behaviour. For example, If a child is fixated on the oral stage of psychosexual development , they may grow up as a chain smoker or a nail biter. On the other hand, it neglects individual differences and the fact that we are all different and therefore respond differently to the different psychosexual stages. For example, Not everyone who is fixated on the oral stage will be a chain smoke/nail biter therefore there must be other factors.

Question 25

2- continued

Answer 25

C: This therefore questions the validity of the Psychodynamic approach as it ignores individual differences and the concept of free will and suggests that all behaviour is pre-determined by our childhood and not down to things such our biology or learning form role models, which are falsifiable behaviours.

Question 26

Little Hans - Key Study

Answer 26

1. Hans desired his mother (the Oedipus complex)
2. Hans feared his father would find out and castrate him
3. His superego would not allow him to fear his father
4. His young ego could not manage the conflict so displaced the fear onto horses
5. By becoming aware of the conflict through Psychoanalysis Hans was cured