1. Psychology 305: Theories of Personality
Lecture 9
Psychology 305

2. Questions That Will be Answered in Today’s Lecture
Psychoanalytic Perspective on Personality
Who was Sigmund Freud and what events in his life influenced his thinking about personality?
According to psychoanalytic theory:
(a) what are the major components of the mind?
(b) what are the major components of personality?
(c) what are the major stages of personality development?
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3. Who was Sigmund Freud and what events in his life
influenced his thinking about personality?
Born in Austria in 1856, at the end of the Romantic Period and the start of the Victorian Era.
Romantic Period
Characterized by rejection of reason, order, and concern for common good.
Emphasized “passionate living” (i.e., surrendering to emotional and irrational impulses).
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4. Characterized by a scientific and rational view.
Victorian Era
Characterized by a scientific and rational view.
Emphasized morality (in particular, repression of sexuality), duty, and a need for social reform.
The ideals of both the Romantic Period and the Victorian Era appear to have had a substantial influence on Freud’s thinking.
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5. Consistent with the ideals of the Romantic Period,
Consistent with the ideals of the Romantic Period, Freud suggested that people experience emotional and irrational impulses—in particular, emotional and irrational impulses related to sex and aggression.
Consistent with the ideals of the Victorian Era, Freud suggested that the emotional and irrational impulses that people experience must be restrained or expressed indirectly in order for society to function effectively.
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6. (a) the emotional and irrational impulses that people experience.
Indeed, the 2 aspects of human experience that Freud emphasized in psychoanalytic theory are:
(a) the emotional and irrational impulses that people experience.
(b) the mechanisms that people use to restrain or redirect these impulses.
There are 7 individuals who had a noteworthy impact on Freud’s thinking:
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7. Amalie Freud Freud’s mother.
Freud felt that he was the most loved of Amalie’s 7 children. He described his feelings for his mother as the purest and least ambivalent of all of his emotional experiences.
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8. Jacob Freud Freud’s father.
Freud described his feelings for his father as highly ambivalent, characterized by both love and hate.
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9. Freud’s unfettered love for his mother and
Freud’s unfettered love for his mother and ambivalence for his father are likely to be the source of his ideas regarding the Oedipus Complex (will discuss later in class).
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10. Ernst Brucke
A physician and physiologist under whom Freud studied when he began university (1873).
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11. Brucke introduced Freud to the mechanist. perspective
Brucke introduced Freud to the mechanist perspective. According to this perspective, biological systems are best represented by machine models (i.e., models that use energy).
Freud adopted this perspective: Freud theorized that the mind is a system that transforms raw psychic energy (derived from sexual and aggressive impulses) into work (i.e., thought and behaviour).
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12. Josef Breuer and Jean-Martin Charcot
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13. Unconventional scientists who studied “hysteria. ” This
Unconventional scientists who studied “hysteria.” This condition is characterized by symptoms such as paralysis, visual/speech/auditory disturbances, hallucinations, and multiple personalities.
At the time Breuer and Charcot began studying hysteria (1880s), there appeared to be no physical cause for the condition.
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14. Through the use of hypnosis, Charcot demonstrated
Through the use of hypnosis, Charcot demonstrated that hysteria had psychological origins (e.g., demonstrated that the symptoms could be created or removed under hypnosis).
While working with a patient referred to as Anna O., Breuer discovered that the symptoms could be removed by talking about their origins. Breuer referred to this remedy for hysteria as the “talking cure.”
Freud adopted Charcot’s procedure for inducing hypnosis and Breuer’s talking cure in his own work with hysterical patients.
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15. A patient of Freud’s who suffered from hysteria.
Emmy Von N.
A patient of Freud’s who suffered from hysteria.
Freud attempted to treat Emmy Von N.’s symptoms using hypnosis and the talking cure but was unsuccessful.
Following this unsuccessful treatment effort, Emmy Von N. suggested that Freud allow her to speak freely, without interruption.
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16. On the basis of Emmy Von N. ’s suggestion, Freud
On the basis of Emmy Von N.’s suggestion, Freud developed the therapeutic technique of free association, the “fundamental rule” of psychoanalysis.
Following from his work with patients such as Emmy Von N., Freud co-authored “Studies in Hysteria,” in which he argued that hysterical symptoms are caused by problems in memory associated with traumatic childhood events.
Many scholars believe that this book marks the birth of psychoanalytic theory.
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17. Freud’s closest confidant in the early 1900s.
Wilhelm Fleiss
Freud’s closest confidant in the early 1900s.
In early correspondence with Fleiss, Freud wrote extensively about seduction theory. In this theory, Freud argued that the symptoms associated with hysteria are the result of repressed memories of childhood sexual abuse.
However, in later correspondence with Fleiss, Freud abandoned seduction theory, arguing that the sexual abuse of children was not common enough to account for the relatively high prevalence of hysteria.
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18. After abandoning seduction theory, Freud came to
After abandoning seduction theory, Freud came to believe that, in many cases, hysterics fantasized that they had engaged in sexual relations as children.
Many scholars believe that this revelation marks the point at which Freud began to explore the dynamics of the unconscious mind.
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19. According to psychoanalytic theory, what are the major
components of the mind?
Freud believed that the mind is comprised of 3 major components or regions. The 3 components reflect different levels of consciousness.
The 3 components are represented in Freud’s Topographical Model of the Mind. According to this model, the 3 components are as follows:
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20. 1. The conscious component of the mind
Makes up the surface area of the brain.
Contains information (e.g., thoughts, feelings, perceptions) that an individual is currently aware of.
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21. 2. The preconscious component of the mind
Below the conscious component of the mind.
Contains information that an individual is not currently aware of but can readily retrieve and bring into conscious awareness.
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22. 3. The unconscious component of the mind
Below the preconscious component of the mind.
Contains information that an individual cannot readily retrieve—information that has been actively repressed because it is too threatening to bring into conscious awareness.
This information is expressed largely in symbolic form (e.g., through dreams). Thus, the information continues to influence the individual.
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24. According to psychoanalytic theory, what are the
major components of personality?
Freud believed that personality is comprised of 3 major components. The 3 components function simultaneously, determining behaviour.
The 3 components are represented in Freud’s Structural Model of Personality. According to this model, the 3 components are as follows:
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25. The only component present at birth.
1. The Id
The only component present at birth.
The most primitive component. Encompasses all of our drives and instincts.
The only component that produces psychic energy (recall Freud’s mechanist perspective of the mind).
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26. Engages in primary process thought.
Operates according to the pleasure principle. Cannot tolerate delay in gratification or follow logic.
Engages in primary process thought.
Functions entirely within the unconscious.
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27. 2. The Ego Evolves from the id.
Primary task: To express the drives and instincts of the id in an effective and safe manner.
Operates according to the reality principle. Thus, brings logic to behaviour.
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28. Engages in secondary process thought.
Does not abide by any moral code. Acts entirely logically.
Functions within the unconscious, preconscious, and conscious.
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29. Last component to develop.
3. The Superego
Last component to develop.
Encompasses the values, morals, and ideals that we internalize from our parents.
Incorporates two subsystems: The ego-ideal and the conscience.
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30. (b) To ensure that the ego acts morally rather than merely logically.
Primary tasks:
(a) To inhibit drives or instincts of the id that would be frowned upon by our parents.
(b) To ensure that the ego acts morally rather than merely logically.
(c) To provide standards of perfection toward which to strive (often unrealistic).
Functions within the unconscious, preconscious, and conscious.
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31. According to psychoanalytic theory, what are the
major stages of personality development?
Freud argued that personality is largely formed by conflicts that occur in the unconscious component of the mind and the success with which we are able to resolve these conflicts.
Freud proposed the Stage Theory of Psychosexual Development to explain how unconscious conflicts influence personality development.
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32. This theory assumes the following:
From birth through to adulthood, we pass through 5 stages of development.
In each of the first 3 stages, we are confronted by an unconscious conflict that revolves around our need to obtain sexual gratification.
In each of the five stages, an erogenous zone becomes the focal point of attention. Through this erogenous zone, we obtain sexual gratification by discharging energy derived from our sexual impulses.
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33. Successful development occurs when individuals
Successful development occurs when individuals navigate through the stages without becoming fixated at any one stage.
Fixation occurs when the conflict associated with a specific stage is not well resolved.
Individuals who become fixated at different stages develop different personality characteristics.
Fixation at one stage makes it more difficult to successfully resolve conflicts at subsequent stages.
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34. The 5 stages of development that Freud proposed are as follows:
1. Oral Stage
0 – 18 months.
Erogenous zone: Mouth
Sexual impulses are largely expressed through nursing at the mother’s breast.
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35. Freud (1916/1961) wrote:
“Sucking at the mother’s breast is the starting point of the whole of sexual life, the unmatched prototype of every later sexual satisfaction, to which fantasy often enough returns in times of need. This sucking involves making the mother’s breast the object of the sexual instinct. I can give you no idea of the important bearing of this first object upon the choice of every later object, of the profound effects it has in its transformations and substitutions in even the remotest regions of our sexual life.”
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36. Main conflict at this stage occurs when the infant is
Main conflict at this stage occurs when the infant is weaned from the breast.
Fixation occurs if the infant is prematurely weaned or experiences trauma while being weaned.
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37. Sexual impulses are largely expressed through defecation.
2. Anal Stage
18 months – 3 years.
Erogenous zone: Anus
Sexual impulses are largely expressed through defecation.
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38. Main conflict at this stage occurs when the child is toilet trained.
Fixation occurs if the child is subjected to strict and rigid toilet training practices.
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39. Erogenous zone: Genital region
3. Phallic Stage
3 – 5 years.
Erogenous zone: Genital region
Sexual impulses are largely expressed through self-stimulation of the genital organs.
Main conflict at this stage is referred to as the Oedipus Complex for boys and the Electra Complex for girls.
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40. The assumptions underlying these conflicts are as follows:
(a) Oedipus Complex
Boys experience a desire to achieve sexual union with their mothers.
This desire leads boys to perceive of their fathers as rivals. Moreover, they come to believe that their fathers will retaliate against them by castrating them.
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41. This fear of castration (i. e. , castration anxiety) forces
This fear of castration (i.e., castration anxiety) forces boys to identify with their fathers.
Through identification with their fathers, boys resolve the conflict, internalize the values of their fathers, and gain vicarious satisfaction of their sexual impulses towards their mothers.
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42. Girls, too, begin life with a strong attraction towards their mothers.
(b) Electra Complex
Girls, too, begin life with a strong attraction towards their mothers.
However, when they realize that both they and their mothers do not have penises, they develop contempt and blame their mothers for their perceived deficiency.
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43. As their contempt grows, girls shift their affection towards
As their contempt grows, girls shift their affection towards their fathers. Girls develop envy for their father’s penis and, ultimately, experience a desire to achieve sexual union with their fathers.
Through identification with their mothers, girls resolve the conflict, internalize the values of their mothers, and gain vicarious satisfaction of their sexual impulses towards their fathers.
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44. Fixation results in poor moral development in both males and females.
Fixation at this stage occurs if the child is unable to identify with the same-sex parent.
Fixation results in poor moral development in both males and females.
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45. Questions That Were Answered in Today’s Lecture
Psychoanalytic Perspective on Personality
Who was Sigmund Freud and what events in his life influenced his thinking about personality?
According to psychoanalytic theory:
(a) what are the major components of the mind?
(b) what are the major components of personality?
(c) what are the major stages of personality development?
Psychology 305