ch.10

• personality - the patterns of behaviours, thoughts, and characteristics an individual possesses and displays consistently that differentiates one person from another
• 4 major perspectives on personality

  • psychodynamics
  • trait
  • humanistic
  • social cognitive
• psychodynamic theories - theories that view personality with a focus on unconscious and the importance of childhood experiences
• unconscious

  • according to freud, a reservoir of mostly unacceptable thoughts, wishes, feelings, and memories
  • according to contemporary psychologists, information processing of which we are unaware
• free association - in psychoanalysis, a method of exploring the unconscious in which the person relaxes and says whatever comes to mind, no matter how trivial or embarassing
• psychoanalysis - freud's theory of personality and the associated treatment techniques
• 3 techniques to discover the unconscious

  1. free association
  2. dream interpretation - manifest and latent content
  3. freudian slips
• freudian slips - when you say one thing but mean another
• id - unconsciously strives to satisfy basic sexual and aggressive drives

  • operates on the pleasure principle
  • demands immediate gratification
• ego - mediates the demands of the id and the superego

  • operates on the reality principle
  • satisfies the id's desires in ways that will realistically brin pleasure rather than pain
• superego - represents internalized ideals and provides standards for judgement and for future aspirations

  • operates on the moral principle
• psychosexual stages - childhood stages of development which the id's pleasure seeking drives focus on distinct erogenous zones
• 5 psychosexual stages

  1. oral
  2. anal
  3. phallic
  4. latency
  5. genital
• oedipus complex - a boy's sexual desires toward his mother and feelings of jealousy and hatred for the rival father
• electra complex - a girl's experience of a parallel to the oedipus complex
• freud's oral stage - 0 - 18 months; pleasure centers on the mouth: sucking, biting, chewing
• freud's anal stage - 18 - 36 months; pleasure focuses on bowel and bladder elimination; coping with demands for control
• freud's phallic stage - 3 - 6 years; pleasure zone is the genitals; copes with incestuous sexual feelings
• freud's latency stage - 6 to puberty; phase of dormant sexual feelings
• freud's genital stage - puberty; maturation of sexual interests
• identification - the process by which children incorporate their parents' values into their developing superegos
• gender identity - sense of being male or female
• fixation - according to freud, a lingering focus of pleasure seeking drives at an earlier psychosexual stage in which conflicts were unresolved
• defense mechanisms - the ego's protective methods of reducing anxiety by unconsciously distorting reality
• defense mechanisms

  • regression
  • reaction formation
  • projection
  • rationalization
  • displacement
  • sublimation
  • repression/denial
• repression - the basic defense mechanism from consciousness anxiety arousing thoughts, feelings, and memories; root of all defense mechanisms
• regression - defense mechanism that retreats to an earlier psychosexual stage where some psychic energy remains fixated
• reaction formation - defense mechanism in switching unacceptable impulses into their opposites
• projection - defense mechanism that disguises one's own threatening impulses by attributing them to others
• rationalization - defense mechanism that offers self justifying explanations in place of the real, more threatening unconscious reasons for one's actions
• displacement - defense mechanism that shifts sexual or aggressive impulses toward a more acceptable or less threatening object or person
• sublimation - defense mechanism that transfers unacceptable impulses into socially valued motives
• denial - defense mechanism that refuses to believe or even perceive painful realities
• compensation - defense mechanism that psychologically counterbalances perceived weakness by emphasizing strengths in other areas
• neo - freudians - accepted freud's interviewing techniques and his basic ideas
• Carl Jung - focused on concepts such as the collective unconscious, archetypes, and psychological types
• Alfred Adler - believed that behaviour is driven by efforts to conquer childhood inferiority feelings that trigger our strivings for superiority and power
• Karen Horney - believed that childhood anxiety triggers our desire for love and security
• collective unconscious - Carl Jung's concept of a shared, inherited reservoir of memory traces from our species' universal experiences
• projective test - personality test such as the Rorschach, that provides ambiguous images designed to trigger projection of one's inner dynamics