Theories of Personality

• The object relations theory of Melanie Klein was built on careful observations of young children.
• In contrast to Freud, who emphasized the first 4 – 6 years of life, Klein stressed the importance of the first 4 – 6 months after birth.
• Klein insisted that the infant’s drives (hunger, sex, and so forth) are directed to an object — a breast, a penis, a vagina, and so on.
• According to Klein, the child’s relation to the breast is fundamental and serves as a prototype for later relations to whole objects, such as mother and father.
• The very early tendency of infants to relate to partial objects gives their experiences an unrealistic or fantasy-like quality that affects all later interpersonal relations.
• Later, the boy projects his destructive drive onto his father, who he fears will bite or castrate him.
• The male Oedipus complex is resolved when the boy establishes good relations with both parents and feels comfortable about his parents having sexual intercourse with each other.
• With most girls, the female Oedipus complex is resolved without any antagonism or jealousy toward their mother.
• The little boy also adopts a feminine position during the early Oedipal years.
• At that time, the boy has no fear of being castrated as punishment for his sexual feelings for his mother.
• Klein’s ideas tend to shift the focus of psychoanalytic theory from organically based stages of development to the role of early fantasy in the formation of interpersonal relationships.
• Melanie Klein was born on March 30, 1882, in Vienna, Austria.
• Klein was the youngest of four children born to Dr. Moriz Reizes and his second wife, Libussa Deutsch Reizes.
• Klein believed that her birth was unplanned — a belief that led to feelings of being rejected by her parents.
• Klein grew up in a family that was neither proreligious nor antireligious.
• Her father, a struggling physician, ended up as a dental assistant, while her mother, despite her fear of snakes, ran a shop selling plants and reptiles.
• Klein aspired to become a physician but felt neglected by her elderly father and suffocated by her mother.
• Klein had a special fondness for her older sister Sidonie, who taught her arithmetic and reading.
• When Melanie was 4 years old, Sidonie died.
• After her sister's death, Klein developed a deep attachment to her brother, Emmanuel, who became her confidant.
• Klein idolized her brother, and this infatuation may have contributed to her later difficulties in relating to men.
• At 18, her father died followed by her beloved brother 2 years after.
• In mourning, Klein married Arthur Klein, a close friend of Emmanuel, and later regretted that this marriage at age 21 hindered her dream of becoming a physician.
• Klein did not have a happy marriage; she dreaded sex and abhorred pregnancy.
• Nevertheless, her marriage to Arthur produced three children: Melitta, born in 1904; Hans, born in 1907; and Erich, born in 1914.
• Kohut believed that human relatedness, not innate instinctual drives, are at the core of human personality.
• Klein believed that humans are born with two strong drives: love and hate, which form the basis of their adult relationships.
• Margaret Mahler's psychological birth theory focuses on the first three years of life, where a child gradually surrenders security for autonomy.
• As infants realize they cannot satisfy their own needs, they seek a symbiotic relationship with their primary caregiver, leading to normal symbiosis.
• The self is defined as the center of the individual psychological universe, giving unity and consistency to experiences.
• Mahler's theory suggests that a child becomes an individual separate from their primary caregiver, leading to a sense of identity.
• Heinz Kohut, a neurologist and psychoanalyst, emphasized the process of self-evolution from a vague image to a clear sense of individual identity.
• The third stage of Mahler's separation-individuation stage is separation-individuation, which occurs from the 4th or 5th month of age until the 30th to 36th month.
• During the separation-individuation stage, children become psychologically separated from their mothers, achieve a sense of individuation, and develop feelings of personal identity.
• Mahler's separation-individuation stage is divided into four substages: differentiation, practicing, rapprochement, and libidinal object constancy.
• Kohut believed that infants require adult caregivers to satisfy both physical and psychological needs, treating them as if they had a sense of self.
• Mahler's separation-individuation stage is divided into three major developmental stages and four substages.
• Mahler referred to the normal autism stage as an "objectless" stage, where an infant naturally searches for the mother's breast.
• Kohut believed that infants are naturally narcissistic, self-centered, and wishing to be admired for their actions.
• Both narcissistic self-images are necessary for healthy personality development, but they must change as the child grows older.