Freud

• Background

  • Importance of the first few years of life in development of personality
  • Work concerns unconscious mind, he believed that it contains unresolved conflicts
  • conflicts can appear in fantasies and dreams in disguised forms
• Background

  oedipus complex - children pass through 5 stages of development - psychosexual stages - oral, anal, phallic, latent and genital.

  • phallic - 3-5 - is the stage where sexual identification is established, when they experience oedipus complex - highly disturbing conflicts which are resolved by the child identifying with the same sexed parents, a boy feels sexual desire for his mother and sees his father as a rival and fears his father will want to castrate him - castration anxiety.
  • Becomes similar to father so father won't be hostile
• Background

  • Hypnosis : trance - like mental state in which people experience increased attention - concentration and suggestibility
  • Dream analysis - interpretation of dreams to determine their underlying meanings and relies on symbolism
  • Free Association - Exploring unconscious mind, a person relaxes and says whatever comes to their mind
• Phobia development and unconscious

  • they're conscious of a fear and avoidance of a specific object or situation
  • there's a symbolic link between this and an unconscious unnacceptable fear that has been repressed
• Aim

  • Report the findings of the treatment of a 5 yr old boy for his phobia of horses through the use of psychoanalysis
• Method

  • case study carried out by boys father - friend and supporter
  • Freud only met the boy once - reported via letters
  • Freud subjectively interpreted the information
  • Special relationship between boy and father for discussions to be so detailed and intimate
  • reports start from 3 years old
• Results/Findings

  • 3 years old - developed interest in widdlers
  • 5 years old - father expresses concerns about horse phobia
  • Fear of horses developed after anxiety dreams about losing mother
  • Giraffe dream - Big giraffe and crumpled giraffe, big giraffe called out when Hans came and took it away and then Hans sat on crumpled giraffe. Interpreted dreams as a reworking of the morning exchange in parental bed
  • Didn't like horses with black bits around their mouth
• Results/Findings 2

  • Father asked some leading questions
  • Hans developed interest in toilet functions, had discussions about faeces and mums underwear. Had an imaginary friend named after German sausage.
  • 1st fantasy - married to.mother and father demoted to role of grandfather
  • 2nd fantasy - plumber came and removed his bottom and wider and gave him a bigger one of each
  • At 19 he said he's well and can't remember any of it.
• Explanation of results

  • Case study provided support for his oedipus complex, Little Hans displaced fear of the father onto horses which are a symbol of his father. He argued Hans wasn't abnormal but was just Abel to communicate his fears
• Evaluation of Explanation

  • Other explanations can be found - attachment theory, classical conditioning to fear horses
  • Andocentric and ethnocentric
  • It isn't falsifiable
• Strengths

  • Case study so can understand niche topics in detail
  • Very in-depth picture using lots of qualitative data - the relationship between father and son allowed for such intimate details
• Weaknesses

  • Only relates to on individual and lacks generalisability, this study is unique to little Hans
  • Entirely subjective - interpretations of his phobias freud only saw little Hans on 1 or 2 occasions