Theories of Personality

Sigmund Freud
Psychoanalytic Theory
● Biography
● Levels of Mental Life
● Provinces of the Mind
● Dynamics of the Personality
● DMs
● Stages of Development
● Applications
Sigmund Freud (1856 - 1939)
Jewish background, though atheist
Lived on Vienna until Nazi occupation in 1938
Had medical background and wanted to do
“neurophysiological research”
Met JM Charcot in Paris and learned hypnotism in
treating male hysteria
Josef Breuer taught Freud about catharsis
Private practice in nervous and brain disorders
● Failed in his ‘male hysteria’ report (it was not
a new discovery)
● With Breuer he wrote “Studies on Hysteria”
● Personal Isolation (crises) Self -
Patient formation of seduction Theory
(neuroses is caused by people being seduced
by their parents during childhood), but was
later abandoned
● Book Published
○ Interpretation of Dreams (1900) and On
Dreams (1901)
○ Psychopathology og Everyday Life (1901);
introduced Freudian Slips
○ Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality
(1905); Sex as the cornerstone of
psychoanalysis
○ Joke and their Relation to the Unconscious
Three Levels of Mental Life
(Awareness)
● Conscious
● Preconscious
● Unconscious
 Unconscious
● Drives, urges or instincts that are kept out of
conscious awareness; not accessible at all
● Processes that actively keep these thoughts from
awareness
● Proof: slips, parapraxes (slips), repression
(unconscious forgetting), dreams
● The GUARD (pic) alerts the person for any anxiety
- producing memories so, harmful ones are
disguised before entering consciousness
 Unconscious

● Dreams (greatest Childhood has many

unconscious material) suppression (you wanted to
● Are only surfaces when it forget) ---->repression
passes through the (forgotten, but you had no
primary censor (basic conscious contribution in
the act of forgetting)
filtering in the anteroom
and the final censor Phylogenetic Endowment:
(guard by the door) Collective experiences that
● How? Unconscious fill the gaps of individual
material is disguised experiences
● Bakit mahilig maghollahoops si Bonbon?
○ C: wala, enjoy lang
○ U1: gustong kumembot like the girls
○ U2: gusto niya ang humping motion na parang aso
● Bakit gustong mag -gym ni Boyet?
○ C: gusto niyang magpalaki ng katawan
○ U1: gusto niyang makakita ng mga hubad na kapwa lalaki
● Bakit prangka at maingay su Jenny?
○ C: Dahil fun siyang tao
○ U1: Dahil isa itong form ng catharsis (optimistic)
 Preconscious
● thoughts , memories, knowledge, wishes, feelings
we are not aware of but are for easy access when
needed; sometimes acted upon indirectly
● It does not affect us directly / in its true nature
● Two Sources:
○ Conscious perception: the presence of a
stimulus for negative feelings is perceives, but
not acted upon
○ Unconscious: “Slipping past the guards” Ex.
Jokes that are never admitted and never
conscious of its true nature
 Conscious
● Current contents of your mind that you actively
think of; What we call working memory / RAM
● Easily accessed all the time
● Has 2 Directions
○ Perceptual conscious system: our way of
meeting with the external stimuli (physical
world)
○ Non - threatening ideas and menacing - but -
disguised images: ideas, thought processes
that do not cause unhandleable anxiety
 Conscious
● Current contents of your mind that you actively
think of; What we call working memory / RAM
● Easily accessed all the time
● Has 2 Directions
○ Perceptual conscious system: our way of
meeting with the external stimuli (physical
world)
○ Non - threatening ideas and menacing - but -
disguised images: ideas, thought processes
that do not cause unhandleable anxiety
Freudian Components of Personality
(Provinces of the mind)

● The Id
● The Ego
● The Superego
 Id
● Resides completely at the unconscious level
● Can be tempered by satisfying basic desires
● Acts under the pleasure principle
○ Immediate gratification, not willing to
compromise
○ Generates all of the personality’s energy
 Superego
● The moralis and idealistic part of the
personality
● Operates on “ideal principle”
○ Begins forming at 4 - 5 years of age
○ Initially formed from environment and
others (society, family etc)
○ Internalized conventions and morals
Essentially your “conscience”
 Ego
● Resides in all levels of awareness
● Operates under “Reality Principle”
● Attempts negotiation between Id and Superego
to satisfy both realistically - this causes anxiety
● The anxiety is resolved through DMs
● Misconceptions
○ Ego is not pride (pride is more like id); Ego
lets pride function in the real world
● The Dark Room is dominated by pleasurists, but there
are a few realists and moralists
● The pleasurists convinces the realists to tell the King of
their concern, but the moralists, convinces them
otherwise
● The ego whispers to the ear of the King (conscious; what
happens in reality)
○ Somatic influences: tendencies, urges, contact with
the environment
● The complex negotiations translate into:
○ Interplay of Basic Drives (pleasurists)
○ Defense mechanisms (satisfaction of the pleasurists
and the super - ego)
 Basic Drives
● Drive - impulse, stimulus, trigger
○ Constant motivational force to seek pleasure and
reduce anxiety
○ Two kinds: Eros or sex, and Thanatos or
aggression
● Libido: sex drive
● 4 component of a drive
○ Impetus (amount of force), Source (erogenous
region of the body at the state of excitation), Aim
(pleasurable act to remove excited state), Object
(target)
 Anxiety
● Unpleasant state (affective), warns the person of danger;
produced by the ego
● 3 kinds of anxiety
○ Neurotic (id based): suppressed, irrational, abstract
■ Ex. Phobia, excessive fear of authority figures,
feelings of abandonment, etc
○ Moral (super-ego based): dilemma of temptations /
righteousness, etc.
■ Ex. Withholding urges because they are ‘wrong’;
moral dilemmas
○ Realistic (Ego - based): reasonable
■ Ex. Fear of heights, worrying for an exam
 Defense Mechanisms

● Means to avoid directly dealing with sexual and

aggressive implosives, and anxiety in general
● Everyone does this, but could lead to neurotic
behavior / dysfunction
 Repression
● What you do:
○ Keep painful thoughts and feelings away from
consciousness
○ Don’t think about it!
● Examples:
○ Early abuse
○ Lies you have told
○ Painful memories
● Problems
○ Diverts needed energy
○ Blocks out stressful situations that could be worked
out
 Denial
● Ego feels anxiety from perception of strong external
or internal danger it can’t escape or deal with directly
● What you do:
○ Tell yourself it is not happening
○ Tell yourself it is not your fault
○ Conscious denial
 Displacement
● Feeling:
○ anxiety
○ anger
● What you do:
○ Direct the feeling away from its actual target to
another, safer target
 Projection
● What you do:
○ Attribute your own undesirable impulses, feeling,
or desires to another person
● Examples:
○ “I hate her” really means “I think she hates me” (or
vice versa)
● Problems
○ Misperceive the other person’s motivations
○ Don’t deal with your own feelings
○ Overreaction (but different from reaction
formation)
 Reaction - Formation
● What you do:
○ In defense against the threatening impulse,
express the opposite impulse
● Examples:
○ Someone frightens you so you act super nice
○ Someone frightens you so you snub them
○ The sex offender becomes the great protector of
society
● Problems
○ False persona
 Rationalization
● What you do:
○ Make up excuses for inadequacies, failure, or loss
● Examples:
○ If I had wanted to try har, I could have done it too
○ If my friend were more understanding, I wouldn’t
have to lose my temper
● Problems
○ Energy would be better spent on improving
○ The truth catches up with you
 Compensation
● What you do:
○ Develop or strengthen positive traits to make up
for limitations
○ Distract attention from the weaknesses
● Examples:
○ Weak in school, excellent in sports
○ Class clown
● Problems
○ Unbalanced
○ Incompetent in some areas
 Regression
● What you do:
○ Revert back to behavior of an earlier stage
○ Use childhood coping mechanisms
● Examples:
○ Temper, tantrums, swearing, fighting, sulking,
crying
● Problems
○ Does not solve the problem
○ People think you are immature
○ You are not learning to cope well
 Fantasy
● What you do:
○ Dreaming, imagining instead of living in the
present world, because you don’t feel competent
to achieve
○ pretending
● Examples:
○ Wanting to look good and pretending to yourself
that you are one of the movie stars you read
about
○ Making up stories about how successful you are,
rather than working on your success
 Fantasy

● Problems
○ You get stuck in the fantasy rather than using your
talents to become successful
 Psychosexual Development

● Stages of development in which conflict over Id’s

impulses plays out
● Ego must control these impulses
● If not resolved, psychological issues can emerge later
in life
 Psychosexual Stages

● Oral Stage (0 - 18 months)

○ Pleasure centering around the mouth (sucking,
biting etc)
○ Focus: weaning - becoming less dependent
○ Not resolved? Aggression or dependency later in
life -- faxation with oral activities (smoking,
drinking, nail biting ec.)
 Psychosexual Stages

● Anal Stage (18 - 35 months)

○ Fixation on bowel and bladder elimination
○ Focus: search for control
○ Not resolved? Anal retentive (rigid and obsessive
personality) or anal expulsive (messy and
disorganized personality))
 Psychosexual Stages

● Phallic Stage (18 - 35 months)

○ Focus: genital area and difference between males
and females
○ Electra Complex and Oedipus Complex
 Psychosexual Stages

● Phallic Stage (18 - 35 months)

○ Oedipus Complex (boys)
■ Unconscious sexual desires towards mother,
father is competition
■ Simultaneously fears the dad - “castration
anxiety”
 Psychosexual Stages

● Phallic Stage (3 - 6 years)

○ Electra Complex (girls)
■ Unconscious sexual desires towards father and
mother is completion
■ Penis envy
○ Resolution?
■ Kid identifies with same sex parent
 Psychosexual Stages

● Latency Stage (6 years to puberty)

○ Sexual interest is repressed
○ Kids play with saame sex others -- until puberty
 Psychosexual Stages

● Genital Stage (puberty and beyond)

○ Sexual urges awaken
○ If developed “properly” develop these urges
towards opposite sex members with fixation on
the genitals