psychodynamic approach

• who came up with it?

  sigmund freud
• explain the role of the unconscious


  -suggested that part of our mind that we are aware abt it (conscious mind) is merely the tip of the iceberg

  -most of our minds is made up of the unconscious which is a vast storehouse of biological drives and instincts that has a significant influence on our behaviour and personality

  -the unconscious also contains threatening and disturbing memories that have been repressed or locked away and forgotten

  -these can be accessed during dreams or thru slips of the tongue
• what are the 3 structures of personality

  -the id: operates on pleasure principle, gets what it wants. it is a seething mass of unconscious drives and instincts

  -the ego: works on reality principle and is the mediator between 2 other parts of personality, its role is to reduce conflict between demands of id and superego thru defence mechanisms

  -the superego: formed at end of phallic stage, its our internalised sense of right and wrong . based on the morality principle
• explain psychosexual stages 


  -freud claimed that child development occurs in 5 stages

  -each stage is marked by a diff conflict that a child must resolve to progress to next stage

  -any conflict that is unresolved leads to fixation where the child becomes stuck and carries certain behaviours and conflicts associated with the stage to adult life
• define defense mechanism


  -unconscious strategies that the ego uses to manage the conflict between id and superego
• explain the 5 psychosexual stages

  -oral(0-1yrs):focus of pleasure is the mouth, mothers breast is the object of desire, consequence of unresolved conflict: oral fixation e.g smoking, biting nails

  -anal(1-3yrs):focus of pleasure is anus, child gains pleasure from withholding & expelling faeces, consequences: perfectionist, messy

  -phallic(3-6):focus of pleasure is genital area, child experiences oedipus complex cons: narcissist, reckless

  -latency: earlier conflicts are repressed

  -genital: sexual desires become conscious alongside puberty cons: difficulty forming heterosexual relationships
• what are the 3 defence mechanisms

  -repression: forcing a distressing memory out of conscious mind

  -denial: refusing to acknowledge some aspect of reality

  -displacement: transferring feelings from true source of distressing emotion onto a substitute target