Assumptions

• Influence of childhood experiences- ego isn’t developed enough to deal with trauma, so it’s repressed. Later in life, people can rexperience their traumas leading to unexpressed emotions being targeted inwards, causing depression.
• Influences of childhood experiences - key stages of development:

  • Oral (0-2) / mouth / weaning onto solid food / smoking, sucking thumb
  • anal (2-3) / anus / toilet training / orderliness, messiness
  • phallic (3-7) / genitals / Oedipus and electra complex / sexual dysfunction
  • latency (7-11) / N/A / socialism skills / N/A
  • genital (11-adult) / genitals / sexual maturity / mentally healthy
• Freud's theory on personality structure - ID = instinctual desires, EGO = mediates between id and superego, SUPEREGO = moral values and conscience. The ego has three functions; reality testing, defence mechanism, and conflict resolution.