Emma Culloty BIRMI2A 11 Evaluate the extent to which Freud’s theory of psychosexual development can help us to understand a Client’s presenting issue. Freud’s theory of psychosexual development is a theory that has caused a large amount of debate and can be seen as quite a contentious issue, particularly when using this theory to try and understand a client’s presenting issue. This essay will look into Freud’s psychosexual theory and will describe how it relates to adult neurotic behaviour. The essay will then look at the critiques of Carl Jung and Erich Fromm and will look at the ideas surrounding Jung’s collective consciousness and Fromm’s view based on a sociological perspective, where the person is able to decide for them and how problems can arise for a client when this does not happen. This essay will also look at the role of women and homosexuality and discuss whether Freud’s views where based on a cultural prejudice when he devised the psychosexual theory.
Central to Freud's theory, and perhaps his greatest contribution to psychology, is the notion that our psyche is composed of parts within our awareness and beyond our awareness. Freud used the term psychoanalysis to label his theories and techniques for identifying and curing the mental problems of his patients. This essay will outline the main concepts that surround Freud’s theory of psychosexual development, thus showing how it can help us understand our clients presenting issues. In order for me to do this I will firstly describe the psychosexual stages in relation to personality development followed by briefly identifying some of the main criticisms. I will lastly concentrate on discussing the applications of his theory to therapy today.
Sigmund Freud was one of the most powerful intellectuals of his time. He was the tower of strength in which psychoanalysis was created, with his brilliant thoughts and researches he cultivated theories and teachings that is the groundwork for several school of thoughts for psychology. Freud’s theoretical positions incorporate the ideas of repression, the unconscious, and the infantile sexuality. These three groups offered an explanation for the formation of the mind and also suggestions for the perceptive of psychological development of an individual. According to the author, “Freud’s psychoanalytic theory of personality, the unconscious mind is a reservoir of feelings, thoughts, urges, and memories that outside of our conscious awareness most of the contents of the unconscious are unacceptable or unpleasant, such as feelings of pain, anxiety, or conflict”.
Conclusion The history of todays psychology has been influenced by many important people throughout time. Philosophers been the door opener to psychological theories by proposing questions regarding the mind and the body and how the two been connected and related to each other. If these men and women had not made such progress, psychology may never have been considered an actual. And since the world advances, it will be interesting where new ideas and theories will take
Psychology- as explored through the eyes of Carl Jung and Abraham Maslow When Carl Jung says, “Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves”, he very aptly describes the role that Psychology plays in exploring and examining the processes of the human brain and how that impacts our behaviors and personality. Comparing the theories of Jung and Maslow could take hours since each one had enough to say about what their beliefs were about the human condition. But while Carl Jung focused on how the unconscious affected our personality (Introversion and Extraversion), Abraham Maslow focused on the integration of self (Self-Actualization Theory). Jung believed that there were active centers in the unconscious
The quantitative psychometric testing and the experimental tradition in which individual difference can be known were the dominant methodologies for many decades. As Hollway (2007) would concur that scientific tradition had been historically a power related establishment that was central to the way knowledge was produced. This frustration let some clinicians, for whom the problem of individual differences became a salient feature in psychotherapy proposed an alternative theory: a personal construct theory that understood people lived experience and was freed from the constraints of the scientific tradition. In a sense, people constructing themselves by engaging in a context that is fluid and complex and always changing, rather than fixed and predictable. The personal construct theory is a critical social approach, a protest theory in reaction to psychometric and the experimental tradition (Butt, 2007).
He grew up in one of the most exciting times in human history, when the basis of modern science was being laid down by early psychophysicalists like Billroth, Helmholtz and Brucke (Sulloway, 1979). While, Freud’s Psychoanalytic Theory endured condemnation and in some cases outright ridicule when it was first published, it has produced many groundbreaking insights about unconscious, the role of internal conflict, and the importance of early childhood experiences in personality development (Weiten, W. 2004, p 480). Furthermore these theories are supported by research which demonstrated that firstly, unconscious forces can influence behavior, secondly, internal conflict plays a key role in generating psychological distress, thirdly, early childhood experiences can have powerful influences on personality and finally, people do use defense mechanisms to reduce their experience of unpleasant emotions (Westen, 1998; Westen & Gabbard, 1999). In 1915 Freud published essay Instincts and Their Vicissitudes in which he put forward an idea “the three great polarities that dominate mental life”, pleasure-unpleasure, active-passive and internal-external (Freud,
You can learn about the answers to these questions and more in this overview of personality. Theories of Personality: A number of different theories have emerged to explain different aspects of personality. Some theories focus on explaining how personality develops while others are concerned with individual differences in personality. The following are just a few of the major theories of personality proposed by different psychologists: Trait Theories * Gordon Allport's dispositional perspective * Hans Eysenck's three-trait model * Myers-Briggs Types * "Big Five" Personality Dimensions Psychoanalytic Theories: * Freud's Theory of Psychosexual Development Freud's theory of psychosexual development is on of the best known personality theories, but also one of the most controversial. Learn more about the psychosexual stages of development.
Ellis, whose work was influenced by Alfred Adler & behaviourists John Dollard & Joseph Wolpe, began developing what is now known as Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy (REBT). His model was based on the philosophy that our perception of what is happening, affects us more greatly than the actual events themselves. Psychiatrist Aaron Beck also began looking at how our behaviour is determined by attitudes & assumptions derived from previous experiences & how these could be a block to behavioural therapy on its own. He began to develop his own model using techniques that amalgamated both behavioural & cognitive therapy, which he called Cognitive Therapy. This model has evolved into what we now recognise as CBT.
My interest in Psychology began when I was studying the subject part of an access course. I was intrigued by Sigmund Freud and the Psychodynamic Approach. Freud suggested that personality is the result of how early conflicts are dealt with and believed that at each stage of development is associated with a particular conflict which needs to be overcome. The more difficult it is to overcome the more stuck or fixated the person becomes. I also find it interesting how society, culture and the attitudes and opinions of other people can have such an impact on a person's behaviour.