evaluation

• This approach was the dominant force in the first half of the 20th century and has been used to explain a wide range of phenomena such as personality; abnormal behaviour; moral development; gender
• Psychoanalysis is a therapy designed to access the unconscious mind. It has been reported as successful in treating certain disorders but its ineffective for treating serious disorders such as schizophrenia
• Freud used case studies such as Little Hans which were detailed and carefully documented; however, critics have cast doubt over Freud’s research suggesting it impossible to draw universal conclusions over individual experiences
• Karl Popper argued that the psychodynamic approach is a pseudoscience because it doesn’t meet the scientific criticism for falsification so it’s not open to empirical testing
• Freud’s theory is regarded as having psychic determinism