Freud and the Psychodynamic Approach

Psychodynamic: psyche (the mind/soul) dynamic (energy) +

Created the first talking therapy Saw the importance of childhood Key associations: Unconscious mind Dreams Defence mechanisms Psychosexual development The structure of the personality/psyche Freudian slips Saw the importance of sex Intro to Freud video

Read through pages in your Brain books. (stop when you get to Methodology)

ASSUMPTION 1  Behaviour is considered to be a result of unconscious thought processes.

The Three Levels of Consciousness

The conscious mind  All the mental processes that we a fully aware of at any given time.  E.g. The words you are reading, the objects you can see, any feelings of thirst/hunger/anger are all in your consciousness.

The preconscious mind  Contains thoughts that can become conscious to us. All the information outside of a person's attention but readily available if needed.  Thoughts arising from the unconscious that may at a later stage become conscious are stored here.  E.g. memories, your telephone number, the model of your car etc.

The unconscious mind  Thought by Freud to be the biggest and most important part of the mind  All thoughts originate from the unconscious  The part of the mind that is not accessible  Although we’re not aware of it, these thoughts, feelings, desires, and memories influence every aspect of our day-to-day lives

The unconscious mind  Illogical and makes no distinctions between reality and fantasy  Can hold two conflicting thoughts at the same time e.g. love and hate  Contains biological instincts  E.g. Eros – the life instinct which manifests itself as libido (can be unacceptable sexual thoughts)  Thanatos – the death instinct which manifests itself in aggression and destructiveness

Revealing unconscious thoughts  Thoughts that do not go into the preconscious must be actively repressed – this uses up our psychic energy  When we do not have enough psychic energy to repress every unconscious thought, some are channelled into other forms  E.g. dreams  Freudian slips  Neurotic symptoms

Freudian slips  Things in our unconscious mind trying to slip into our consciousness, we substitute words for an indented one: eg:  Organism or orgasm  Love or hate  However has been criticised- do all mistakes have relevance to inner emotions? See youtube clip

Top ten Freudian slips on TV

Poster activity

End of lesson 1

Starter activity

ASSUMPTION 2  There are three parts to the psyche  Id  Ego  Superego  Make an iceberg poster to show where these parts lie in our consciousness.