Brian Williams Personality According to Sigmund Freud - Essay Example

Brian Williams’ Personality According to Sigmund FreudAmerica’s top-rated news anchor, Brian Williams, confessed that he lied about being in a helicopter that was forced down over Iraq twelve years ago(Kurtz, 2015). The NBC reporter recently told the Stars & Stripes that he did not intend to make the mistake; he wondered what caused his mind to conflate one helicopter with another. Although the news anchor did not report the claim in 2003, he told the false story on air in 2013 and on 30 January 2015.

A recount by crewmembers on board the ill-fated helicopter contradicted his tale. The acknowledgement of the high-profile journalist that he invented a story that dramatized his bravery in a war sparks questions about his credibility.Sigmund Freud studied troubled adults in the process of establishing his theory of personality. He attempted to analyze their childhood memories in his experiments and examinations. His theory is thus critical in explaining Williams’ fake story event since the news anchor had a troubled personality.

Freud asserts that the structure of a human mind consists of three main parts-id, ego, and superego- that control behaviors(Lothane, 2003). Each part operates on a principle. Freud claims that there exist natural internal conflicts among the three parts at each of Fraud’s five primary stages of psychosexual development: anal, genital, oral, phallic, latency, and genital. Freud said that a mature personality is that which has achieved a healthy balance among all the parts. Otherwise, an individual’s personality becomes unstable.

The id operates on the principle of pleasure. It is the most primitive part that functions unconsciously and seeks instant gratification. It is regulated by the ego and the superego. Additionally, the id is the only part present from birth. Other parts emerge later after birth. On the other hand, the ego operates with reason on the principle of reality. It is less primitive and functions in partial consciousness. In contrast, the superego is the most modern part that works consciously and operates on the moral principle.

The superego regulates the id based on issues of morality and social learning. Successful navigation of conflicts between the parts results in mastery and shaping of each developmental stage, and finally to mature personality (Lothane, 2003, p. 26).Following Bryan William’s acknowledgement of lying, Freud’s theory of personality can be used to assert that the news anchor had a troubled personality. His id sought instant gratification by compelling him to lie in order to get pleasure from being viewed by the public as a brave participant in a war zone.

His ego seemed not to be working when he lied. Otherwise, it would have instructed his id that in the real sense, a helicopter would catch fire and explode when hit by rockets. His superego was also asleep since it did not control the id and instruct it that lying was socially unacceptable and destructive. That lying could damage his good reputation. Therefore, Bryan Williams experienced conflicts between the three parts of his brain. That is why he said that he did not know what made his mind lie.

ReferencesKurtz, H. (2015, February 5). Brian Williams lied about his copter being shot, forced down in Iraq | Fox News.Retrieved from http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/02/05/brian-williams-lied-about-his-copter-being-shot-down-in-iraq/Lothane, Z. (2003). What Did Freud Say About Persons and Relations? Psychoanalytic Psychology, 23(3), 23-28.