Lecture 5: Human and animal Flashcards
What does psychoanalysis focus on?
What does this contrast to?
Internal psychological processes
Behaviourism
What did Freud say were the primary influences of behaviour?
What did he say weren’t the primary influences?
Unconscious drives like sexuality and aggression, they sometimes slip into consciousness; they’re called Freudian slips
Forces outside the body (behaviourism) like rewards and punishment.
Describe the thought processes in terms of S-R according to introspectionists
Behaviourists
Cognitivism
Psychoanalysis
Stimulus –> Thoughts –> Response
Stimulus –> No mind –> Response
Stimulus –> Computer mechanism –> Response
Stimulus –> Sex and anger –> Response
What are the three components that the human psyche consists of according to Freud?
Describe each compnent
Ego: The decision maker, the ego deals with threats from the outside world, it experiences anxiety and then sends signals to take corrective actions. This can be straightforward or not, meaning we have to change our perceptions of threats.
Superego: Moral standards
ID: Primitive instincts
What are the three components that the human psyche consists of according to Freud?
Describe each compnent
Ego: The decision maker, the ego deals with threats from the outside world, it experiences anxiety and then sends signals to take corrective actions. This can be straightforward or not, meaning we have to change our perceptions of threats.
Superego: Moral standards
ID: Primitive instincts
List the 5 types of defence mechanisms according to Freud
Describe each
Denial: The motivated forgetting of distressing experiences, convincing yourself it didn’t happen
Regression: Psychologically returning to a younger and safer time
Rationalisation: Providing a reasonable sounding explanation for unreasonable behaviours
Identification with the aggressor: Adopting the psychological characteristics of people we find threatening
Repression: Motivated forgetting of emotionally threatening memories
List the 5 types of defence mechanisms according to Freud
Describe each
Denial: The motivated forgetting of distressing experiences, convincing yourself it didn’t happen
Regression: Psychologically returning to a younger and safer time
Rationalisation: Providing a reasonable sounding explanation for unreasonable behaviours
Identification with the aggressor: Adopting the psychological characteristics of people we find threatening
Repression: Motivated forgetting of emotionally threatening memories
What happens to repressed memories according to Freud?
They fuse with other unconscious material to form complexes. This can become conscious but it’s transformed so that the original content is concealed, for example dreams which express the material symbolically. Therefore, dreams need to be interpreted.
The repressed thoughts lay at the heart of psychological dysfunction so psychoanalysts need to uncover them and bring them into conscious thought, this will therefore solve the dysfunction.
When did Freud die?
Do people still use his ideas?
1939
Yes but his work is very controversial
Describe false recovered memories
This started in the US in the 1980s and spread to the UK in the 1990s. Adults that had some kind of therapy would allegedly report repressed memories of being sexually abused by their parents. They claimed they had no knowledge of this before the therapy. People said this was the repression in action. Critics argue that people don’t repress memories of trauma and that these memories might be false.
Describe false recovered memories
This started in the US in the 1980s and spread to the UK in the 1990s. Adults that had some kind of therapy would allegedly report repressed memories of being sexually abused by their parents. They claimed they had no knowledge of this before the therapy. People said this was the repression in action. Critics argue that people don’t repress memories of trauma and that these memories might be false.
Describe the standard history of Freud
Not the accurate history
In his early career, he focused on treating hysteria. Hysteria meant any disorder where the patient experiences physical symptoms that have a psychological cause. He didn’t look at organic causes and the patients were almost exclusively female. The symptoms of hysteria are: fainting, nervousness, muscle spasms, loss of appetite, insomnia and fluid retention. It’s no longer recognised as a disorder. He believed it was caused by repressed memories (that operate unconsciously) of sexual assault when they are children, this is the seduction hypothesis. Therapy aimed to make these memories conscious, this is the insight of cause. He believed this where all psychological causes start. However, this theory was very discredited, for example, Reiger said it was giving credit to paranoid drivel which establishes deplorable old wives psychiatry. He then argued that hysteria was caused by fantasies of these scenes. This is the Oedipus complex. In the 1970s people began questioning his work. However, his work still stayed in highly regarded textbooks for much longer. Many therapies still follow his ideas that recovering hidden traumas solves dysfunction.
Describe the standard history of Freud
Not the accurate history
In his early career, he focused on treating hysteria. Hysteria meant any disorder where the patient experiences physical symptoms that have a psychological cause. He didn’t look at organic causes and the patients were almost exclusively female. The symptoms of hysteria are: fainting, nervousness, muscle spasms, loss of appetite, insomnia and fluid retention. It’s no longer recognised as a disorder. He believed it was caused by repressed memories (that operate unconsciously) of sexual assault when they are children, this is the seduction hypothesis. Therapy aimed to make these memories conscious, this is the insight of cause. He believed this where all psychological causes start. However, this theory was very discredited, for example, Reiger said it was giving credit to paranoid drivel which establishes deplorable old wives psychiatry. He then argued that hysteria was caused by fantasies of these scenes. This is the Oedipus complex
Describe the standard history of Freud
Not the accurate history
In his early career, he focused on treating hysteria. Hysteria meant any disorder where the patient experiences physical symptoms that have a psychological cause. He didn’t look at organic causes and the patients were almost exclusively female. The symptoms of hysteria are: fainting, nervousness, muscle spasms, loss of appetite, insomnia and fluid retention. It’s no longer recognised as a disorder. He believed it was caused by repressed memories (that operate unconsciously) of sexual assault when they are children, this is the seduction hypothesis. Therapy aimed to make these memories conscious, this is the insight of cause. He believed this where all psychological causes start. However, this theory was very discredited, for example, Reiger said it was giving credit to paranoid drivel which establishes deplorable old wives psychiatry. He then argued that hysteria was caused by fantasies of these scenes. This is the Oedipus complex.
Describe some critiques of the seduction theory
Who supported him?
Lerman: Freud interpreted one of his own dreams as feeling an incestuous desire for his daughter.
He had hysterics in his family so they would have seduced him.
Masson: His academic career was in peral so he decided to reject his original theory
A team of medical proffessors who supported his nomination as the associate proffessor at the uni of Vienna. Webster said that he was proto-feminist as he listened to the woman who had incest thoughts with understanding. Even though he retracted the seduction hypothesis, the idea carried on.
