PSYCHODYNAMIC/SCHIZOPHRENOGENIC MOTHER AO1

• Freud argued that schizophrenics become fixated during the first one to two months of the oral stage. During the oral stage the ego is not well developed. The role of the ego is to control the id’s impulses and to try to balance the demands of the id within the moral limitation imposed by the superego.
• However, if an individual regresses back to a point where the ego effectively doesn’t exist, there is nothing stopping the id from operating completely unrestricted. Symptoms such as hallucinations and delusions represent the unchecked activities of the id according to this theory. The person loses touch with reality, being unable to distinguish between reality and their desires and fantasies.
• Addition to Freud’s theory

  This state is little better than that of a new-born infant, and as such the individual with schizophrenia is typified by the primary narcissism (a selfish instinct that guides our survival) seen in all new-borns. In comparison, well-adjusted adults have well developed egos that set limits on fantasy activity, this is not the case in adults with schizophrenia.
• In addition, psychodynamic theories believe that the mother-child relationship is one of the crucial factors in the development of schizophrenia. This concept proposes that the mothers of individuals who develop schizophrenia are overprotective and controlling but at the same time rejecting and distant. The mother’s overprotection stifles the child’s emotional development, while her emotional distance deprives the child of personal security, thereby leaving an individual who is very vulnerable when faced with stress.