Theories of Personality Development (trans 3)

Question 1

PSYCHOANALYTIC THEORY
SIGMUND FREUD (1856-1939)

Answer 1

 Jewish background, though avowed atheist
 Lived in Vienna until Nazi occupation in 1938
 Had medical background – wanted to do “neurophysiological research”
 Private practice with specialty in neurology
 Private practice in nervous and brain disorders

Question 2

PSYCHOANALYTIC THEORY
THE TOPOGRAPHIC MODEL: LEVELS OF AWARENESS
 Conscious – contains the thoughts you are currently aware of
 Preconscious – large body of retrievable information
 Unconscious – the material that we have no immediate access to

Answer 2

THE STRUCTURAL MODEL: ID, EGO, and SUPEREGO

Question 3

PSYCHOANALYTIC THEORY
ID
**Present at birth; selfish part of you, concerned with satisfying your desires

Answer 3

o Pleasure principle – only concerned with what brings immediate personal satisfaction regardless of physical or social implications; id impulses tend to be socially unacceptable
o Wish-fulfillment – used to satisfy needs that cannot immediately be met; can imagine, which temporarily satisfies the need
o Completely buried in the unconscious

Question 4

PSYCHOANALYTIC THEORY
Superego
**The moralist and idealistic part of the personality

Answer 4

o Resides in preconscious
o Operates on “ideal principle”
o Begins forming at 4-5 years of age; up to 10-12 years of age
o Initially formed from environment and others (society, family, etc)

Question 5

PSYCHOANALYTIC THEORY
Ego
**develops during the first two years of life; primary job is to satisfy the id impulses in an appropriate manner by taking consequences into consideration

Answer 5

o Reduces tension
o Moves freely among the conscious, preconscious, and unconscious parts of the mind
o Your executive functioning; what you do everyday

Question 6

PSYCHOANALYTIC THEORY

PSYCHOSEXUAL STAGE

Answer 6

 Oral (0-18 months)
 Anal (18-35 months)
 Phallic (3-6 years of age)
 Latency (6 years to puberty)
 Genital (puberty and beyond)

Question 7

PSYCHOSEXUAL STAGE
Oral
Approximate ages:
Erotic focus:
Key tasks and experiences:

Answer 7

PSYCHOSEXUAL STAGE
Oral
Approximate ages: 0-1
Erotic focus: mouth (suckling, bitting)
Key tasks and experiences: weaning (from breast or bottle)

Question 8

PSYCHOSEXUAL STAGE
Anal
Approximate ages:
Erotic focus:
Key tasks and experiences:

Answer 8

PSYCHOSEXUAL STAGE
Anal
Approximate ages: 1-3
Erotic focus: Anus (expelling or retaining feces)
Key tasks and experiences: toilet training

Question 9

PSYCHOSEXUAL STAGE
Phallic
Approximate ages:
Erotic focus:
Key tasks and experiences:

Answer 9

PSYCHOSEXUAL STAGE
Phallic
Approximate ages: 3-6
Erotic focus: Genitals (sexuality explored)
Key tasks and experiences: Identifying with adult role models; coping with oedipal complex

Question 10

PSYCHOSEXUAL STAGE
latency
Approximate ages:
Erotic focus:
Key tasks and experiences:

Answer 10

PSYCHOSEXUAL STAGE
latency
Approximate ages: 6-12
Erotic focus: none (sexuality refined)
Key tasks and experiences: expanding social contacts

Question 11

PSYCHOSEXUAL STAGE
genitals
Approximate ages:
Erotic focus:
Key tasks and experiences:

Answer 11

PSYCHOSEXUAL STAGE
genitals
Approximate ages: puberty onwards
Erotic focus: genitals (intimacy)
Key tasks and experiences: establishing intimate relationships, contributing to society through working

Question 12

REMEMBER

phallic stage is Usually one of the reasons why a person has problems

Answer 12

Oedipus Complex – occurs in the later part of the phallic stage; children at this age develop an attraction to their opposite-sex parent
**Castration Anxiety – boys develop the fear that their father will discover their feelings and cut off their penis.

Question 13

REMEMBER
Resolution of the oedipus complex: Children repress their desire for their opposite-sex parent, they realize that they will never have them as long as the other parent is around

Answer 13

 Upon resolution the child begins to identify with the samesex parent.
 Development of the superego

Question 14

EGO OR NEO-ANALYSTS
 Importance of the feelings of self (ego) that arise from interactions and conflicts
 Sense of self (ego) central core of personality
 Ego = core individuality of person
 Start from Psychoanalysis
 Emphasis on motivation and social interaction

Answer 14

POST-FREUDIAN PSYCHODYNAMIC THEORIES
 Erik Erikson’s psychosocial development
 Carl Jung’s collective unconscious
 Alfred Adler’s individual psychology
 Karen Horney’s focus on security

Question 15

NEO-ANALYST THEORIES
ERIK ERIKSON (1902-1994)

Answer 15

 Born in Frankfurt to Danish parents
 Abandoned prior to birth by father
 Step-dad – Jewish pediatrician
 Uncertain about identity in youth
 No advanced degree
 Trained under Anna Freud (a child analyst)

Question 16

NEO-ANALYST THEORIES

ERIKSON’S STAGES

Answer 16

 Trust vs. Mistrust – Oral Stage – Infancy
 Autonomy vs. Shame and Doubt – Anal Stage – Early Childhood
 Initiative vs. Guilt – Phallic Stage – Middle Childhood
 Industry vs. Inferiority – Latency Stage – Late Childhood
 Identity vs. Role Confusion – Genital Stage – Teens
 Intimacy vs. Isolation – Early Adulthood
 Generativity vs. Stagnation – Middle Adulthood (midlife crisis)
 Ego Integrity vs. Despair – Late Adulthood

Question 17

ERIKSON’S STAGES
Trust vs. Mistrust
Resolution or virtue:
Culmination in old age:

Answer 17

ERIKSON’S STAGES
Trust vs. Mistrust
Resolution or virtue: Hope
Culmination in old age: appreciation of interdependence and relatedness

Question 18

ERIKSON’S STAGES
Autonomy vs. Shame and Doubt
Resolution or virtue:
Culmination in old age:

Answer 18

ERIKSON’S STAGES
Autonomy vs. Shame and Doubt
Resolution or virtue: Will
Culmination in old age: acceptance of the cycle of life; from integration to disintegration

Question 19

ERIKSON’S STAGES
Initiative vs. Guilt
Resolution or virtue:
Culmination in old age:

Answer 19

ERIKSON’S STAGES
Initiative vs. Guilt
Resolution or virtue: Purpose
Culmination in old age: Humor; empathy; resilience

Question 20

ERIKSON’S STAGES
Industry vs. Inferiority
Resolution or virtue:
Culmination in old age:

Answer 20

ERIKSON’S STAGES
Industry vs. Inferiority
Resolution or virtue: Competence
Culmination in old age: Humility; acceptance of the course of ones life and unfulfilled hopes

Question 21

ERIKSON’S STAGES
Identity vs. Role Confusion
Resolution or virtue:
Culmination in old age:

Answer 21

ERIKSON’S STAGES
Identity vs. Role Confusion
Resolution or virtue: Fidelity
Culmination in old age: Sense of the complexity of relationships; value of tenderness and loving freely

Question 22

ERIKSON’S STAGES
Intimacy vs. Isolation
Resolution or virtue:
Culmination in old age:

Answer 22

ERIKSON’S STAGES
Intimacy vs. Isolation
Resolution or virtue: Love
Culmination in old age: Sense of the complexity of relationships; value of tenderness and loving freely

Question 23

ERIKSON’S STAGES
Generativity vs. Stagnation
Resolution or virtue:
Culmination in old age:

Answer 23

ERIKSON’S STAGES
Generativity vs. Stagnation
Resolution or virtue: Care
Culmination in old age: Caritas; caring for others, and agape, empathy and concern

Question 24

ERIKSON’S STAGES
Ego Integrity vs. Despair
Resolution or virtue:
Culmination in old age:

Answer 24

ERIKSON’S STAGES
Ego Integrity vs. Despair
Resolution or virtue: Wisdom
Culmination in old age: existential identity; a sense of integrity strong enough to withstand physical disintegration

Question 25

NEO-ANALYST THEORIES
CARL JUNG (1875-1961)

Answer 25

 Kesswill, Switzerland
 Son of minister
 Dominant childhood beliefs formed his theory
- Visions and dreams were important
- Collective unconscious came from this

Question 26

NEO-ANALYST THEORIES

JUNG’S ANALYTIC PSYCHOLOGY

Answer 26

Mind or psyche is divided into 3 parts (modified from
Freud):
O Conscious Ego – sense of self
O Personal Unconscious
- Thoughts and feelings not part of conscious awareness
- Past and future material
- Compensates or balances conscious attitude and ideas
O Collective Unconscious

Question 27

NEO-ANALYST THEORIES

JUNG’S ANALYTIC PSYCHOLOGY

Answer 27

ARCHETYPES
 Animus – male aspect of the female psyche
 Anima – female aspect of the male psyche
 Mother – generativity, fertility
 Hero – king, savior, champion, “Looking Good”
 Demon – cruel, evil, “Trouble Person”
 Trickster – magician, wizard, sorcerer, “entertainer”
 Persona – “acceptable side”, people pleasing
 Shadow – “dark side”, evil twin, “acting out”

Question 28

NEO-ANALYST THEORIES

JUNG’S ATTITUDES OF THE MIND

Answer 28

 Exists in each person – one is more dominant than other in each person
 Extroversion – direct psychic energy towards the things in external world
 Introversion – direct psychic energy more inwardly
focused

Question 29

NEO-ANALYST THEORIES

COMPLEXES

Answer 29

Inferiority Complex
O Normal feelings of incompetence and exaggerates them
O Impossible to achieve goals
O Hopeless
 Superiority Complex
O Very high opinion of self-bragging and quick to argue personal solutions to problems are right one
O Convince others of being valuable to them and to self

Question 30

NEO-ANALYST THEORIES

ADLER’S CONCEPTS

Answer 30

 Organ Inferiority
O Everyone Is born with some physical weakness
O Motivate life choices
 Aggression Drive
O Reaction to perceived helplessness or inferiority
O Lashing out against the inability to achieve or master
 Masculine Protest
O Kids work to become independent from and equal to adults and people in power
O Autonomous
O Positive assertive

Question 31

NEO-ANALYST THEORIES
KAREN HORNEY (1885-1952)

Answer 31

 Born in Germany
 Of Norwegian parents
 Problems with dominant father, supportive mother
 Perceived self as homely
 Pressured to go to medical school
 1932 – migrated to USA
 Women’s rights advocate during her time

Question 32

NEO-ANALYST THEORIES

MAJOR CONCEPTS FROM HORNEY

Answer 32

Rejection of Penis Envy Concept
O Women’s sense of inferiority did not come from genital inferiority but rather from the way they were raised in society
O Came from belief that women must secure the love of a man
O Culture elevated masculinity and devaluated femininity
Basic Anxiety
O Child’s fear of being alone, helpless and insecure
O Children are powerless – unable to gain their place in society immediately
O In turn, these children must repress feelings of hostility and anger towards powerful adults, and strive to please them to get their needs met
O Neurosis rises from social conflicts in family and larger conflicts within society

Question 33

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS
 Important in understanding personality type.
 Often used by child psychiatrists to understand what happened to the child.
 Used to understand the relationship between a child and a parent.
 Parent or caregiver is the object.
 If a caregiver or parent is always out or not always present, child will have a problem with object relations. So then, the child does not master separation individuation.
 It is important for one to be consistent for the child to master the separation for mental image to develop.
 If mental image is not developed, personality problems and anxiety arise.

Answer 33

BASIC TENETS
 Examines the relationship between and among people.
 Examines how the history of interpersonal relationships is transferred from the past to the present through behavior.
 Looks at the primary caregiver (this is culturally defined and might be the mother, father, grandparents, extended family or community.)

Question 34

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS

THEORY OF PERSONALITY

Answer 34

 Humans are born with autonomous motivation to relate to other people.
 Humans are born with a wide range of capabilities, possibilities and capacities.
 Children who feel loved, prized, nurtured, feel secure and develop trust for the caretaker, can internalize positive effects.

Question 35

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS

DEVELOPMENT OF PERSONALITY

Answer 35

 The caretaker becomes the object that nurtures the infant’s attachment.
 Without attachment formation, the infant will die.
 Personality is formed through interaction with others.
 The need for relationships throughout life is at the center of personality development.

Question 36

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS

NATURE OF MALADJUSTMENT

Answer 36

 Pathology is viewed in terms of developmental arrest
 Developmental arrest results in unfinished, disorganized and unintegrated parts of personality.
 Individuals can also become traumatized by early attachment disturbances.

Question 37

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS

MAIN CONCEPTS

Answer 37

 Object: A person who provides gratification to the infant or person or with whom a person relates.
 Object relations is essentially an individual’s need of important others from infancy to old age.
 Humans are essentially social and the need for relationships is at the core of the self.
 Humans exist both in an external and internal world.
 The object that libido is continuously seeking is another human being.
 Motivation is understood in terms of striving for a relationship.
 Splitting: Infants who are exposed to a high degree of uncertainty and stress may find it impossible to form an attachment. The infant then separates everything bad from everything good.

Question 38

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS

MELANIE KLEIN

Answer 38

 Stressed the importance of the first 4-6 months of an infant’s life
 Infants do not begin life as blank slate but with a predisposition to reduce anxiety
 Infants are constantly engaged in a basic conflict between the life and death instinct
 As the ego moves toward integration, infants naturally prefer gratifying sensations over frustrating ones
 In the attempt to deal with the dichotomy, infants organize experiences into positions
**Two basic positions:
o Paranoid-schizoid position
o Depressive position

Question 39

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS

MARGARET MAHLER

Answer 39

 Primarily concerned with the psychological birth of the infant that takes place during the first three years of life
 In psychological birth, the child becomes an individual separate from his caregiver
 This is an accomplishment that leads ultimately to a sense of identity.

Question 40

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS

Margaret Mahler’s Stages of Development

Answer 40

1. NORMAL AUTISM
2. NORMAL SYMBIOSIS
3. SEPARATION-INDIVIDUATION
   - Differentiation
   - Practicing
   - Rapprochement
   - Object Constancy

Question 41

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS

Margaret Mahler’s Stages of Development: Normal autism

Answer 41

 Spans the period from birth to age 3 or 4 weeks
 The child is analogous to an unhatched bird egg, with its sense of omnipotence
 A period of absolute primary narcissism

Question 42

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS

Margaret Mahler’s Stages of Development: Normal symbiosis

Answer 42

 Begins in the 4th week of age but reaches its zenith at the 4th month
 The infant behaves and functions as though he and his mother were an omnipotent system – a dual unity

Question 43

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS

Margaret Mahler’s Stages of Development: separation-individuation

Answer 43

 From 5th month to 36th month of age

 Children become psychologically separated from their mothers

Question 44

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS

Margaret Mahler’s Stages of Development: separation-individuation - Differentiation

Answer 44

o 5th to 10th month of age
o A bodily breaking away from the mother-infant symbiotic orbit
o Infants are curious about strangers and inspect them

Question 45

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS

Margaret Mahler’s Stages of Development: separation-individuation - Practicing

Answer 45

o 7th to 16th month of age
o Children easily distinguish their bodies from their mothers
o Do not lose sight of their mother; follow her with their eyes and show distress
o Later, they begin to walk and show a fascination with the outside world

Question 46

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS

Margaret Mahler’s Stages of Development: separation-individuation - Rapprochement

Answer 46

o From 16 to 25 months of age
o Desire to bring the mother and themselves back together both physically and psychologically
o Children share with their mother every new acquisition of skill and every new experience

Question 47

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS

Margaret Mahler’s Stages of Development: separation-individuation - Object Constancy

Answer 47

o 2nd to 3rd year of life
o Children have developed a constant inner
representation of their mother so that they can tolerate physical separation from her
o Consolidate their individuality and to develop other object relationships

Question 48

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS
OTTO KERNBERG
 Observed mostly older patients
 Believed that the key to understanding personality organization is the mother-child relationship
 Healthy early object relations leads to integrated ego, a stable self-concept, and fulfilling interpersonal relationships

Answer 48

In all levels of personality organization, he found the same structural units or internalized object relationships, namely:
o Self-image
o Object-image
o A certain affect that colors the self and object image

Question 49

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS
OTTO KERNBERG
 In relating to the mother, an infant might sometimes have the image of the good mother and the good me resulting to a strong positive feeling
 During other times, the infant experiences the bad me, the bad mother, and a strong negative affect

Answer 49

“Those who believe that they are lovable are more resilient. It is easier for them to adapt or adjust to changes”

Question 50

OBJECT RELATIONS THEORISTS

OTTO KERNBERG

Answer 50

 Departure from Freud: People are shaped by social experiences.
 Departure from Mahler: The theory is not based on observations of the child-mother interaction, and it is less specific and detailed as Mahler’s.

Question 51

ATTACHMENT THEORY
Attachment – “the emotional tone between children and their caregivers, and is evidenced by an infant’s seeking and clinging to the caregiving person, usually the mother. By their first month, infants usually have begun to show such behavior, which is designed to promote proximity to the desired person.”

Answer 51

Proponents:
 John Bowlby
 Mary Ainsworth

Question 52

ATTACHMENT THEORY
JOHN BOWLBY
 Attachments formed during childhood have an important impact on adulthood.
 This explains our current relationship with our friends and family.
 Stresses the importance of the child developing in relation to the context and environment.

Answer 52

Separation Anxiety and Its 3 Stages:
o Stage 1: Protest
o Stage 2: Despair
o Stage 3: Detachment

Question 53

ATTACHMENT THEORY

JOHN BOWLBY

Answer 53

Bowlby’s theory rests on 2 fundamental assumptions:

1) A responsive and accessible mother must create a secure base for the child.
- If this dependability is present, the child is better able to develop confidence and security in exploring the world.
2) A bonding relationship becomes internalized and serves as a mental working model on which all future friendship and love relationships are built.

Question 54

ATTACHMENT THEORY

MARY AINSWORTH

Answer 54

 Mother-infant relationship is the start of personality development.
 Developed the Strange Situation experiment
 Measures the type of attachment style between caregiver and infant

Question 55

ATTACHMENT THEORY

MARY AINSWORTH

Answer 55

Three attachment styles:

1) Secure
2) Anxious-Resistant – also called “Insecure-Ambivalent”. An anxious-resistant child “finds exploratory play difficult, even in the absence of danger, and clings to his or her inconsistent parents.”
3) Anxious-Avoidant – also called “Insecure-Avoidant”. Anxious-avoidant children usually come from abusive households. They “tend to avoid close contact with people and linger near caregivers rather than approaching them directly when faced with a threat.”
4) Insecure-Disorganized* – “According to Ainsworth, [it] is a severe form of insecure attachment and a possible precursor of severe personality disorder and dissociative phenomena in adolescence and early adulthood

Question 56

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT
JEAN PIAGET (1896-1980)

Answer 56

 Was one of the most influential researchers in the area of developmental psychology.
 Piaget’s training as a biologist influenced both aspects of his theory

Question 57

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT
JEAN PIAGET
There are two major aspects to his theory:
o Process of coming to know
o Stages we move through as we gradually acquire this ability

Answer 57

How does Piaget describe developmental change?
o Development occurs in stages, with a qualitative shift in the organization and complexity of cognition at each stage.
o Thus, children not simply slower, or less knowledgeable than adults => instead, they understand the world in a qualitatively different way.
o Stages form an invariant sequence.

Question 58

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT
JEAN PIAGET: COGNITIVE STRUCTURES
Cognitive structures develop through assimilation and accommodation

Answer 58

o Assimilation: The incorporation of new experiences into existing structures.
o Accommodation: The changing of old structures so that new experiences can be processed.
o Assimilation is conservative, while accommodation is progressive.

Question 59

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT

JEAN PIAGET: STAGES OF COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT

Answer 59

1. The Sensorimotor Period (0 – 2 years old)
2. Preoperational Stage (2 – 6 years old)
3. Concrete Operational Stage (7 years old)
4. Formal Operational Thought (Adolescence)

Question 60

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT

JEAN PIAGET: STAGES OF COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT - The Sensorimotor Period (0 – 2 years old)

Answer 60

• Only some basic motor reflexes: grasping, sucking, eye movements, orientation to sound, etc
• By exercising and coordinating these basic reflexes, infant develops intentionality and an understanding of object permanence

Question 61

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT
JEAN PIAGET: STAGES OF COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT - The Sensorimotor Period (0 – 2 years old)
Intentionality
o Refers to the ability to act in a goal-directed manner => in other words, to do one thing in order that something else occurs.
o Requires an understanding of cause and effect

Answer 61

Object permanence
o Refers to the understanding that objects continue to
exist even when no longer in view.

Question 62

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT

JEAN PIAGET: STAGES OF COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT - Preoperational Stage (2 – 6 years old)

Answer 62

• Stable concepts are formed, mental reasoning emerges, and magical beliefs are constructed.
• Inventive and fanciful drawings are seen

Question 63

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT

JEAN PIAGET: STAGES OF COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT - Concrete Operational Stage (7 years old)

Answer 63

• Concrete operational thought is made up of operations or mental actions that allow children to do mentally what they had done physically before
• The child at this stage can show conservation skills
• Seriation is present
• In this stage, children also have classification skills
• They can divide things into sets and subsets and reason about their interrelations.
• They are also able to do inductive reasoning (specific to general) but not deductive reasoning.
• However, they are unable to do abstract thinking (for example, they cannot imagine the steps in algebraic equation).

Question 64

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT

JEAN PIAGET: STAGES OF COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT - Formal Operational Thought (Adolescence)

Answer 64

• Formal operational thought is characterized by the ability to do abstract thinking
• In this stage, hypothetical-deductive reasoning is present
• Finally, adolescents are idealistic and often think about what is possible.
• They have the capacity to think about abstract ideals such as justice, peace, and equity.
• As such, they think about ideal characteristics of themselves, others, and the world.

Question 65

MORAL DEVELOPMENT

- Proposed by Lawrence Kohlberg

Answer 65

LEVEL 1: PRE-CONVENTIONAL LEVEL
- Stage 1: Obedience and Punishment
- Stage 2: Individualism and Exchange/Instrumental – Purposive Orientation
LEVEL 2: CONVENTIONAL LEVEL
- Stage 3: Interpersonal Concordance Orientation
- Stage 4: Maintaining Social Order
LEVEL 3: POST-CONVENTIONAL LEVEL
- Stage 5: Social Contract and Individual Rights
- Stage 6: Universal Principles

Question 66

MORAL DEVELOPMENT
LEVEL 1: PRE-CONVENTIONAL LEVEL
 Concerned with concrete consequences to individuals, focusing on pursuing concrete interest, while avoiding sanctions

Answer 66

Stage 1 – Obedience and Punishment
 The earliest stage of moral development is especially common in young children, but adults are capable of expressing this type of reasoning.
 At this stage, children see rules as fixed and absolute
 Obeying the rules is important because it is a means to avoid punishment
Stage 2 – Individualism and Exchange/Instrumental –
Purposive Orientation
 At this stage, children account for individual points of view and judge actions based on how they serve individual needs.
 In the Heinz dilemma, children argued that the best course of action was whichever best-served Heinz’s needs. Reciprocity is possible, but only if it serves one’s own interests

Question 67

MORAL DEVELOPMENT
LEVEL 2: CONVENTIONAL LEVEL
 Concerned with fulfilling role expectations, maintaining and supporting the social order, and identifying persons or groups involved in this order.

Answer 67

Stage 3 – Interpersonal Concordance Orientation
 Often referred to as the “good boy-good girl” orientation, this stage is focused on living up to social expectations and roles.
 There is an emphasis on conformity, being “nice,” and consideration of how choices influence relationships.
Stage 4 – Maintaining Social Order
 At this stage of moral development, people begin to consider society as a whole when making judgments.
 The focus is on maintaining law and order by following the rules, doing one’s duty, and respecting authority.

Question 68

MORAL DEVELOPMENT
LEVEL 3: POST-CONVENTIONAL LEVEL
 In this level, there is the effort to define the moral values and principles that have validity and application apart from the authority of groups or persons and the ability to see beyond laws and norms of society. It is here that one examines, adopts and applies the different ethical frameworks or principles.

Answer 68

Stage 5 – Social Contract and Individual Rights
 At this stage, people begin to account for the differing values, opinions, and beliefs of other people. Rules of law are important for maintaining a society, but members of the society should agree upon these standards.
 This stage includes what is right; individual rights and standards which have been critically examined, and agreed upon.
Stage 6 – Universal Principles
 Kolhberg’s final level of moral reasoning is based upon universal ethical principles and abstract reasoning. At this stage, people follow these internalized principles of justice, even if they conflict with laws and rules.

Question 69

SOCIOCULTURAL COGNITIVE THEORY

Proposed by Lev Vygotsky

Answer 69

Three claims:

(1) The child’s cognitive skills can be understood only when they are developmentally analyzed and interpreted.
(2) Cognitive skills are mediated by words, language, and forms of discourse which serve as psychological tools for facilitating and transforming mental activity.
(3) Cognitive skills have their origins in social relations and are embedded in a socio-cultural backdrop.

Question 70

Vygotsky
• Social constructivist
• No general stages of development proposed
• Zone of proximal dev’t, language, dialogue, tools of the culture
• Language plays a powerful role in shaping thought
• Education is central in helping children learn the tools of the culture

Answer 70

Piaget
• Cognitive constructivist
• Strong emphasis on stages
• Schema, assimilation, accommodation, conservation, hypothetical deductive reasoning
• Language has only minimal role; cognition primarily directs language
• Education merely refines the child’s cognitive skills that have already emerged

Question 71

Freud’s topographical model of the mind

The Conscious

Answer 71

The conscious system in Freud’s topographical model is the part of the mind in which perceptions coming from the outside world or from within the body or mind are brought into awareness. Consciousness is a subjective phenomenon whose content can be communicated only by means of language or behavior. Freud assumed that consciousness used a form of neutralized psychic energy that he referred to as attention cathexis, whereby persons were aware of a particular idea or feeling as a result of investing a discrete amount of psychic energy in the idea or feeling.

Question 72

Freud’s topographical model of the mind

The Preconscious

Answer 72

The preconscious system is composed of those mental events, processes, and contents that can be brought into conscious awareness by the act of focusing attention. Although most persons are not consciously aware of the appearance of their first-grade teacher, they ordinarily can bring this image to mind by deliberately focusing attention on the memory. Conceptually, the preconscious interfaces with both unconscious and conscious regions of the mind. To reach conscious awareness, contents of the unconscious must become linked with words and thus become preconscious. The preconscious system also serves to maintain the repressive barrier and to censor unacceptable wishes and desires.

Question 73

Freud’s topographical model of the mind
The Unconscious
The unconscious system is dynamic. Its mental contents and processes are kept from conscious awareness through the force of censorship or repression, and it is closely related to instinctual drives. At this point in Freud’s theory of development, instincts were thought to consist of sexual and self-preservative drives, and the unconscious was thought to contain primarily the mental representations and derivatives of the sexual instinct.

Answer 73

The unconscious system is characterized by primary process thinking, which is principally aimed at facilitating wish fulfillment and instinctual discharge. It is governed by the pleasure principle and, therefore, disregards logical connections; it has no concept of time, represents wishes as fulfillment, permits contradictions to exist simultaneously, and denies the existence of negatives. The primary process is also characterized by extreme mobility of drive cathexis; the investment of psychic energy can shift from object to object without opposition. Memories in the unconscious have been divorced from their connection with verbal symbols. Hence, when words are reapplied to forgotten memory traits, as in psychoanalytic treatment, the verbal recathexis allows the memories to reach consciousness again. The contents of the unconscious can become conscious only by passing through the preconscious. When censors are overpowered, the elements can enter consciousness.

Question 74

Freud’s instinct or drive theory
In Freud’s view, an instinct has four principal characteristics: source, impetus, aim, and object. The source refers to the part of the body from which the instinct arises. The impetus is the amount of force or intensity associated with the instinct. The aim refers to any action directed toward tension discharge or satisfaction, and the object is the target (often a person) for this action.

Answer 74

Instincts

1. Libido
2. Ego Instincts
3. Aggression
4. Life and Death Instincts

Question 75

Erikson’s psychosocial stages
Stage 1: Trust versus Mistrust (Birth to about 18 Months).
In keeping with his emphasis on the epigenetic character of psychosocial change, Erikson conceived of many forms of psychopathology as examples of what he termed aggravated development crisis, development, which having gone awry at one point, affects subsequent psychosocial change.

Answer 75

A person who, as a result of severe disturbances in the earliest dyadic relationships, fails to develop a basic sense of trust or the virtue of hope may be predisposed as an adult to the profound withdrawal and regression characteristic of schizophrenia. Erikson hypothesized that the depressed patient’s experience of being empty and of being no good is an outgrowth of a developmental derailment that causes oral pessimism to predominate. Addictions may also be traced to the mode of oral incorporation.

Question 76

Erikson’s psychosocial stages
Stage 2: Autonomy versus Shame and Doubt (about 18 Months to about 3 Years)
Much depends on the amount and type of control exercised by adults over the child. Control that is exerted too rigidly or too early defeats the toddler’s attempts to develop its own internal controls, and regression or false progression results. Parental control that fails to protect the toddler from the consequences of his or her own lack of self-control or judgment can be equally disastrous to the child’s development of a healthy sense of autonomy. In Identity: Youth and Crisis, Erikson asserted: “This stage, therefore, becomes decisive for the ratio between loving good will and hateful self-insistence, between cooperation and willfulness, and between self-expression
and compulsive self-restraint or meek compliance.”

Answer 76

A person who becomes fixated at the transition between the development of hope and autonomous will, with its residue of mistrust and doubt, may develop paranoiac fears of persecution. When psychosocial development is derailed in the second stage, other forms of pathology may emerge. The perfectionism, inflexibility, and stinginess of the person with an obsessive-compulsive personality disorder may stem from conflicting tendencies to hold on and to let go. The ruminative and ritualistic behavior of the person with an obsessive-compulsive disorder may be an outcome of the triumph of doubt over autonomy and the subsequent development of a primitively harsh conscience.

Question 77

Erikson’s psychosocial stages
Stage 3: Initiative versus Guilt (about 3 Years to about 5 Years).
The child’s increasing mastery of locomotor and language skills expands its participation in the outside world and stimulates omnipotent fantasies of wider exploration and conquest. Here the youngster’s mode of participation is active and intrusive; its social modality is that of being on the make. The intrusiveness is manifested in the child’s fervent curiosity and genital preoccupations, competitiveness, and physical aggression.

Answer 77

When there has been an inadequate resolution of the conflict between initiative and guilt, a person may ultimately develop a conversion disorder, inhibition, or phobia. Those who overcompensate for the conflict by driving themselves too hard may experience sufficient stress to produce psychosomatic symptoms.

Question 78

Erikson’s psychosocial stages
Stage 4: Industry versus Inferiority (about 5 Years to about 13 Years).
With the onset of latency, the child discovers the pleasures of production. He or she develops industry by learning new skills and takes pride in the things made.

Answer 78

The pathological outcome of a poorly navigated stage of industry versus inferiority is less well defined than in previous stages, but it may concern the emergence of a conformist immersion into the world of production in which creativity is stifled and identity is subsumed under the worker’s role.

Question 79

Erikson’s psychosocial stages
Stage 4: Industry versus Inferiority (about 5 Years to about 13 Years).
With the onset of puberty and its myriad social and physiological changes, the adolescent becomes preoccupied with the question of identity. Erikson noted in Childhood and Society that youth are now “primarily concerned with what they appear to be in the eyes of others as compared to what they feel they are, and with the question of how to connect the roles and skills cultivated earlier with the occupational prototypes of the day.”

Answer 79

Failure to negotiate this stage leaves adolescents without a solid identity; they suffer from identity diffusion or role confusion, characterized by not having a sense of self and by confusion about their place in the world. Role confusion can manifest in such behavioral abnormalities as running away, criminality, and overt psychosis. Problems in gender identity and sexual role may manifest at this time. Adolescents may defend against role diffusion by joining cliques or cults or by identifying with folk heroes.

Question 80

Erikson’s psychosocial stages
Stage 6: Intimacy versus Isolation (about 21 Years to about 40 Years).
The person who cannot tolerate the fear of ego loss arising out of experiences of self-abandonment (e.g., sexual orgasm, moments of intensity in friendships, aggression, inspiration, and intuition) is apt to become deeply isolated and self-absorbed.

Answer 80

Distantiation, an awkward term coined by Erikson to mean “the readiness to repudiate, isolate, and, if necessary, destroy those forces and persons whose essence seems dangerous to one’s own,” is the pathological outcome of conflicts surrounding intimacy and, in the absence of an ethical sense where intimate, competitive, and combative relationships are differentiated, forms the basis for various forms of prejudice, persecution, and psychopathology.

Question 81

Erikson’s psychosocial stages
Stage 7: Generativity versus Stagnation (about 40 Years to about 60 Years).
Erikson asserted in Identity: Youth and Crisis that “generativity is primarily the concern for establishing and guiding the next generation.” The term generativity applies not so much to rearing and teaching one’s offspring as it does to a protective concern for all the generations and for social institutions. It encompasses productivity and creativity as well.

Answer 81

This failure of generativity can lead to profound personal stagnation, masked by a variety of escapisms, such as alcohol and drug abuse, and sexual and other infidelities. Mid-life crisis or premature invalidism (physical and psychological) can occur. In this case, pathology appears not only in middle-aged persons but also in the organizations that depend on them for leadership.

Question 82

Erikson’s psychosocial stages
Stage 8: Integrity versus Despair (about 60 Years to Death).
In Identity: Youth and Crisis, Erikson defined integrity as “the acceptance of one’s one and only life cycle and of the persons who have become significant to it as something that had to be and that, by necessity, permitted of no substitutions.” From the vantage point of this stage of psychosocial development, the individual relinquishes the wish that important persons in his life had been different and is able to love in a more meaningful way—one that reflects accepting responsibility for one’s own life.

Answer 82

When the attempt to attain integrity has failed, the individual may become deeply disgusted with the external world and contemptuous of persons as well as institutions. Erikson wrote in Childhood and Society that such disgust masks a fear of death and a sense of despair that “time is now short, too short for the attempt to start another life and to try out alternate roads to integrity.

Question 83

ALFRED ADLER (1870–1937): neo-analyst
Alfred Adler
was born in Vienna, Austria, where he spent most of his life. A general physician, he became one of the original four members of Freud’s circle in 1902.

Answer 83

Adler never accepted the primacy of the libido theory, the sexual origin of neurosis, or the importance of infantile wishes. Adler thought that aggression was far more important, specifically in its manifestation as a striving for power, which he believed to be a masculine trait. He introduced the term masculine protest to describe the tendency to move from a passive, feminine role to a masculine, active role. Adler’s theories are collectively known as individual psychology.

Question 84

Adler was one of the first developmental theorists to recognize the importance of children’s birth order in their families of origin. The firstborn child reacts with anger to the birth of siblings and struggles against giving up the powerful position of only child. They tend not to share and become conservative. The second-born child must constantly strive to compete with the firstborn. Youngest children feel secure because they have never been displaced. Adler thought that a child’s sibling position results in lifelong influences on character and lifestyle.

Answer 84

The primary therapeutic approach in adlerian therapy is encouragement, through which Adler believed his patients could overcome feelings of inferiority. Consistent human relatedness, in his view, leads to greater hope, less isolation, and greater affliation with society. He believed that patients needed to develop a greater sense of their own dignity and worth and renewed appreciation of their abilities and strengths.

Question 85

Karen horney: neo-analyst
emphasized the preeminence of social and cultural influences on psychosexual development, focused her attention on the differing psychology of men and women and explored the vicissitudes of martial relationships. Horney believed that a person’s current personality attributes result from the interaction between the person and the environment and are not solely based on infantile libidinal strivings carried over from childhood. Her theory, known as holistic psychology, maintains that a person needs to be seen as a unitary whole who influences, and is influenced by, the environment

Answer 85

She proposed three separate concepts of the self: the actual self, the sum total of a person’s experience; the real self, the harmonious, healthy person; and the idealized self, the neurotic expectation or glorified image that a person feels he or she should be. A person’s pride system alienates him or her from the real self by overemphasizing prestige, intellect, power, strength, appearance, sexual prowess, and other qualities that can lead to self-effacement and self-hatred. Horney also established the concepts of basic anxiety and basic trust. The therapeutic process, in her view, aims for self-realization by exploring distorting influences that prevent the personality from growing.

Question 86

Melanie klein: object relations theorist
Klein viewed projection and introjection as the primary defensive operations in the frst months of life. Infants project derivatives of the death instinct into the mother and then fear attack from the “bad mother,” a phenomenon that Klein referred to as persecutory anxiety. This anxiety is intimately associated with the paranoid-schizoid position, infants’ mode of organizing experience in which all aspects of infant and mother are split into good and bad elements.

Answer 86

As the disparate views are integrated, infants become concerned that they may have harmed or destroyed the mother through the hostile and sadistic fantasies directed toward her. At this developmental point, children have arrived at the depressive position, in which the mother is viewed ambivalently as having both positive and negative aspects and as the target of a mixture of loving and hateful feelings.

Question 87

OTTO KERNBERG (1928–PRESENT): object relations theorist
much of his theory is derived from his clinical work with patients who have borderline personality disorder. Kernberg places great emphasis on the splitting of the ego and the elaboration of good and bad self-configurations and object configurations.

Answer 87

Kernberg proposed the term borderline personality organization for a broad spectrum of patients characterized by a lack of an integrated sense of identity, ego weakness, absence of superego integration, reliance on primitive defense mechanisms such as splitting and projective identification, and a tendency to shift into primary process thinking.