Psychodynamic approach Flashcards
Other explanations of gender development (11 cards)
Who proposed the psychoanalytical theory?
Freud
What is Freuds general developmental theory?
Children pass through 5 biologically-driven psychosexual stages
Oral stage and ends with genital stage
3rd stage - phallic stage
3-6 years
Prior to this stage children have no concept of gender identity
No understanding of male and female
Phallic stage - Focuses of pleasure for the child switches to genitals
What is the Oedipus complex?
Boys develop incestuous feeling towards their mother
Harbour jealous and murderous hatred towards father
Father stands in way of boy possessing his mother
Boy recognises father is more power than him
Fears he may be castrated by father for feelings towards mother
Castration anxiety
To resolve conflict - boy gives up love for mother and begins to identify with his father
What is the Electra complex?
Girls experience penis envy
Seeing themselves and their mother in competition for fathers love
Develop double resentment toward their mother
1st the mother is a love rival standing in way of father
2nd mother is blamed by daughter for having no penis
Believed mother castrated her at same time as herself
Jung
Girls over time come to accept they will never have penis and substitute penis envy with desire to have children, identifying with their mothers
What is identification?
A desire to be associated with a particular person or group often because the person or group possesses certain desirable characteristics
What is internalisation?
An individual adopts the attitudes and/or behaviour of another
Explain Little Hans.
5 year old boy
Morbid fear of being bitten by a horse
Fear stemmed from incident when he has seen horse collapse and die in the street
Fear was represented in his fear of castration (by father because hans love for his mother)
Hans had transferred his fear of his father onto horses via the unconscious defence mechanism of displacement
What is a strength of Freuds theory?
Support for Oedipus complex
Normal development depends on being raised by atleast one male parent
Rekers and Morey
Rated gender identity of 49 boys ages 3-11
Based on interviews with their families and children themselves
Those judges to be gender disturbed
75% had neither their biological father or substitute father living with them
Being raised with no father may have negative impact on gender identity
What is a weakness of Freuds theory?
Relationship between absent fathers and problems of gender identity not supported
Bos and Sandfort
Compared data from 63 children where both parents were lesbians
68 traditional families
Lesbian - less pressure to conform to gender stereotypes, less likely to assume their own gender was superior
No difference in terms of psychosocial adjustments or gender identity
Contradict Freud father are not necessarily for healthy gender identity development
What is a weakness of Freuds theory?
Inadequate account of women’s development
Admitted women were a mystery to him
Penis envy is criticised - reflecting androcentric victorian era
Where men held so much power
Horney
More powerful emotion than penis envy is a mens experience of womb envy - reaction to women’s ability to nurture and sustain life
Result of cultural rather than biological factors
Challenges idea that women’s gender development is founded on a desire to want to be like a man
What is a weakness of Freuds theory?
Lack of scientific credibility
Lack of rigour in his methods - subjective cases used
Untestable concepts - largely unconscious
Contrasts with other explanations that are objective, verifiable using controlled lab studies
Popper
Freuds theory as pseudoscientific - ideas cannot be falsified
Questioning validity of theory as it is not based on scientific evidence
