The Concept of Psychoanalytic Theories - Assignment Example

?Psychoanalytic personalities have been explained using different theories by different psychologists including Freud, Jung and Adler. Psychoanalytictheories aim to explain different behaviors and psychological disorders developed by a person in later life because of different approaches used as a child. Different psychologists have different theories and they use different approaches to explain their theories. Both Freud’s and Jung’s theories explains individuals behavior based on the unconscious mind. One of the establishments that both Freud and Jung come to understanding is that, despite the fact that the unconscious is based on ego, it is not easy to get into. Both Freud and Adler agrees that personal live starts from childhood, which can be explained from the evidence shown by Freud’s theory which says that the significances of childhood events can have effects on individual development in the future. Jung and Adler both agree that the experience that a child encounters during childhood shapes personality in future, and they both have the opinion that parent’s actions towards the child can determine future behavior. The society can establish either the healthy or the unhealthy psychological behavior of a person, which is clear from the theories of both Jung and Adler (Plotnik and Kouyoumdjian 2010). Conversely, the psychologists do have the differences in their theories. While Jung thinks that personality is completely developed deeply in a person at the age of thirty or forty, Adler is of the idea that personality development is more fixed at young age, mostly five. Jung and Freud have differences in their theories based on religion. Jung proposed that religion is the most important aspect in human life because it is where individuals can identify themselves and is a place where modes of communication can be improved. However, according to Freud’s theory, religion is not supposed to be spread because it misleads others or is a place where some people can hide on. Freud also proposes that sexual desires should be fulfilled; since if not fulfilled, might lead to mental disarray, while Jung disagrees with Freud and thinks that it is not only sex; but there are many other things which can change the psychological health of an individual (Greenberg 1983). Based on the above characteristics, I agree with some of the theories put forward by the psychologists. Freud and Adler both agree on personal life stating from childhood, which I agree with in addition to the fact that a person’s psychological health can be determined during childhood. This is clear because some children, when traumatized when they are young get be affected when they grow up. I also agree with Jung and Adler’s theory on the development of a child and the role that parents play to help the child develop; both agree that the development of a child’s personality is based on the parent. Freud’s theory of childhood development that talks about sexual behavior or libido contained in the elements of personality. The psychologist says that the elements of id need to be satisfied or else will cause trouble, one is desire to have sex or libido. Freud’s theory also discusses the unconscious personality, where he argues in his theory that it is a branch in someone’s brain with the sum of painful events. Freud came up with a number of developmental stages of personality; the stages he explains on his theories are based on sexuality. The oral stage is the first stage, and in this stage, the child uses the mouth test to know the world. The child uses the mouth to eat and suckle the mother’s breast, and according to Freud, a child gets desires through the mouth and develops trust from the mother since she is the one she sees and develops pleasure. Additionally, the stage happens between the time of birth and 2 years and if it happens to be a problem or fixation, an individual would want to go back to that stage and develops unusual behaviors like chewing the thumb because he was preoccupied with oral stimulation. The next stage happens between the age of two and four years, and the psychologist called this the anal stage. The child’s sexual energy is centered on the anus, he or she will have to know how to retain or remove faces. The mother will have to train the child to know about the toilet because this where the child’s pleasure is focused on. The parent will have to develop good communication with the child to avoid situations where the child can refuse to relive herself or himself or develop anal-retentive personality. The next stage is the phallic stage that happens between the ages of 4 and 7 years. At this stage, the child notices male and female differences based on the genital region. This is a stage where the boy child will feel unhappy because of seeing his father as his challenger; the boy child would want to take over his mother from his farther but he has the fear that his father would kill him. The girl child on other side would want to have male genital organs just like her father. The latency stage is next after the phallic stage and happens from puberty onwards to adulthood. Freud’s theory shows that at this stage, libido desires are brought down. The child will focus more on extra curriculum activities and hobbies, and relate well with peers as they encounter them in school because this stage happens as the child join school. The genital stage is the last stage of psychosexual development. The stage is centered on the sexual energy of the genitals. The stage is not like the phallic stage because the child will develop desires to have intimate sexual relationships with the opposite sex (John et al 2010). Reality anxiety being the fear of things that we see and objects can cause danger to us. According to Freud, we have to be cautious of such events because they make us feel uncomfortable. We use this kind of defense mechanism to guide ourselves, for example, in case there is earthquake, we move to a place where we can avoid injuries; reality anxiety guides us. Freud’s theories explains that an individual’s personality development is guided by elements one of them being the id. Claims put forward by the psychologist suggest that id elements are raw, unplanned parts of the personality. The main objective is the management of sexual desires and aggression. Children fear expressing the desires of sex because they would be disciplined by the parent. Such desires are kept and controlled by id. Moral anxiety is one of the defense mechanism that occurs when there are differences between the superego and the id; the superego take charge of the rights and wrongs that an individual has. Since the superego takes charge of both morally right and wrongs, moral anxiety happens when we fear to express feelings that are against our moral conducts. In the society, shame is felt by individuals who are morally wrong because they have gone against moral anxiety (Schultz and Sydney 2004). Conclusion Based on the theories expressed by the three psychologists, it is clear that there is a disagreement between them. Psychologists like Jung and Adler seemed to have criticized Freud’s theories because Freud uses the sexual perspective in explaining his theories. Additionally, theories put forward by the psychologists are hard to prove scientifically, which has made people not taking such theories seriously. Conversely, personality development theories, especially Freud’s theories right from childbirth are evident in real life, for example, a child suckling and developing trust towards the mother. References Greenberg, J. R. (1983). Object Relations in Psychoanalytic Theory. USA: Harvard University Press. John, O. P., Robins, R. W. and Pervin, L. A., (2010). Handbook of Personality: Theory and Research. USA: Guilford Press. Plotnik, R. and Kouyoumdjian, H. (2010). Introduction to Psychology. Belmont, USA: Cengage Learning. Schultz, D. P. and Sydney, S. E. (2004). Theories of Personality. Belmont, USA: Cengage Learning. Read More