psychodynamic explanations

• Freud’s theory of personality development includes an explanation of gender development. This describes the structure of personality and defence mechanisms, required to protect the ego from anxiety provoking thoughts. They are repressed into the unconscious mind. Freud also described the psychosexual stages where the life source (libido) is focused on different body parts. According to Freud, this occurs in stage 3, the phallic stage between 3-6 years old. At this time, the child’s focus is on the genitals. The child’s gender identity is resolved through the Oedipus complex or Electra complex.
• . The Oedipus complex proposed by Freud has 3 key components. 1) boys desire their mothers. At the age of 3/4 a young boy becomes aware of his sexuality and desires his mother, wanting her sole attention. 2) Boys then see their fathers as a rival for their mother’s love and so with their father dead. This wish creates anxiety and a fear of castration (such fears are repressed). 3) the complex is eventually resolved as the boy begins to identify with their father. Its through identification with the father that the boy internalises his fathers gender identity and takes it as his own.
• The idea of the Electra complex was by Jung. It is concerned with conflict between a child and the same sex parent as they are in competition of the other parent. Freud proposed a similar idea- the feminine Oedipus attitude. The basic concept is 1) the girl is initially attracted to their mother but this eds when they find mother has no penis. The girl blames her mother for lack of penis, and gains penis envy. 2) girls sexual desires are transferred to father. 3) this is resolved when the girl converts penis envy to a wish for a baby, reduces anger so she can take on gender behaviours.
• . The end resolution is less satisfactory for girls as identification is less strong- Freud said women have a lower status so why would anyone want to identify with them. In Freudian theory, each stage is resolved through conflict. Both frustration and overindulgence may lead to what psychoanalysts call fixation at a particular psychosexual stage. Freud also claimed fixation could be a root cause of amoral behaviour and homosexuality.

   
• A problem with the theory is that both complexes depend on the child having an awareness of genitals

  Bem found in a study that children ages 3-5 didn't know what the other sex genitalia looked like, so impossible for either complex to develop. But, other research supports that parental sex is an issue for children. A longitudinal study found that children, when younger, if they had been exposed to parental nudity/sexual activity, at age 18 there were higher rates of teenage pregnancy & STIs. 

  This suggests an association between experiences in the phallic stage and later sexual behaviour.
• A limitation is that there is no evidence for children having difficulty acquiring a gender identity is they live in one-parent families or if both parents are the same sex.

  For example, Patterson 2004 reports from a review of research than sexual identities develop in much the same way among children of lesbian mothers as they do among children with heterosexual parents. 
• Other psychodynamic explanations may be preferable.

  Nancy 1994 proposed that mothers and daughters are closer precisely because they are similar (same sex). Sons are able to become more independent due to them being different to their mothers. Research supports this with observations that mother-daughter pairs show greater physical closeness when playing.

  The strength of this account is that it doesn't involve sexual desire for the opposite sex parent and doesn't predict problems where parents are both the same sex. 
• Feminists have dismissed Freud’s idea of interior female development due to having penis envy.

  It simply seems to be a case of gender bias-Freud himself claimed that he didn’t really understand women. Lacan 1966 suggested that penis envy is symbolic envy of a male power in a male dominated society. 

  Therefore, even though Freud has been accused of gender bias, his theories may make sense if it is taken symbolically.