Psychoanalysis - Freud

• our personality development occurs in three stages and problems with this cause abnormal behaviours.
• assumes our childhood experiences determine our behaviours and development into adulthood.
• id: pleasure princple

  • first part of our unconscious personality to develop
  • instinctive and pleasure seeking
• superego: morality principle

  • last part of our unconscious to develop
  • conscious ethics and morals
• ego: reality principle

  • responsible for keeping the urges and demands balanced so neither dominate our personality
• weak superego: cause someone to experience and internalise guilt. id is dominant so they won't feel remorse and are more likely to commit crimes than others.
• harsh superego: cause someone to experience high guilt and anxiety. May commit crime in order to recieve punishment.
• deviant superego: as a child, socialised into a family where crime is committed. Not experience guilt associated with breaking rules.
• strength:

  one of the earliest explanations to highlight the importance of family structure and socialisation on child development and how this can affect adult behaviours such as criminality.
• weakness:

  • theory is reliant on concepts, meaning it is hard to test in a scientific way. Since the superego is not something that is observable or testable, many doubt that it exists. If this is the case, the psychodynamic explanation is flawed.
  • there are anomilies the explanation cannot account for, some people commit crime though there is no criminal in the family or some grow up in a criminal family and do not commit crime.