The Oedipus complex

• The most important aspect of the phallic stage is the Oedipus complex
• This is one of Freud’s most controversial ideas that many reject outright.
• In the young boy, the Oedipus complex or conflict arises because the boy develops sexual (pleasurable) desires for his mother
• He wants to possess his mother exclusively and get rid of his father to enable him to do so.
• Irrationally, the boy thinks that if his father were to find out about all this, his father would take away what he loves the most.  During the phallic stage, what the boy loves most is his penis.  Hence the boy develops castration anxiety
• According to Freud, the fear of retaliation from the father (castration anxiety) eventually leads the boy to repress these incestuous desires and identify with the father, adopting his characteristics and values
• The little boy then begins to resolve this problem by imitating, copying, and joining in masculine dad-type behaviors.  This is called identification and is how the three-to-five-year-old boy resolves his Oedipus complex
• Freud (1909) offered the Little Hans case study as evidence of the Oedipus complex