Psychoanalysis and Psycho-analysis

Psychoanalytic and psychodynamic treatment

The Victorian Zeitgeist

Strict moral standards Repressed sexuality

Extreme modesty in dress Verbal/written communication about

emotion or sexual feeling not allowed (improper to even say “leg”)

Play the Victorian game

1837-1901

Dr Sigmund Freud (1856-1939)

Oldest of eight children

Married with 3 girls and 3 boys

Physician-Biologist – Scientific and Pathology oriented theory

Jewish, but anti-religion: All religion an illusion used to cope with feelings of infantile helplessness

Lived in Vienna, Austria 78 years till 1938

Based theory on personal experiences

lifelong cigar chain-smoker

Died in 1939 of cancer of jaw & mouth

Freud’s Methods

Only worked with adults, usually middle and upper-class women

Tried to be a neutral, objective listener, a blank slate

Freud’s view of human nature

Deterministic (behavior is determined by:)

Neurotic behaviors are symptoms of the unconscious’s attempt to control the intolerable urges of sex and aggression

Unconscious, irrational motivations

The six psychosexual stages

Biological and instinctual drives Libido - the life/sex instinct, goal of

life gain pleasure and avoid pain (pleasure principle)

Thanatos - the death instinct, the aggressive drive to hurt self or others

Levels of awareness

Freud's Mental Iceberg

Conscious Preconscious Unconscious

Freud’s Iceberg

Unconscious more important

Unconscious is root of neuroses

“Cure” means uncovering the unconscious

Foundations of Freudian theory

Plato’s tripartite division of self Rational Soul (wisdom) Spirited Soul (will) Appetitive Soul (emotion/desire)

Structure of the personality

The id (the pleasure principle)Strives to satisfy desires and reduce inner tension.

life instinct (Libido) death instinct (Thenatos)

The ego (the reality principle) Solves problems by planning

and weighing of pros and cons.

The superego (the conscience) Constrains individual action through internalized social norms & moral forces.

The cause of psychological problems

Fixation in a developmental stage (especially phallic) produces psychic conflict

Later theorists discussed attachment problems as cause of psychic conflict

Psychic conflict (among the 3 systems) produces anxiety

Anxiety leads to defense mechanisms (e.g. repression, identification), and, if unresolved, to neurotic symptoms

Defense mechanisms

Defense mechanisms are ways that people cope or defend against this anxiety

1. Projection

2. Denial

3. Repression

4. Regression

5. Reaction formation

6. Rationalization

7. Sublimation

Personality Assessment

Projective hypothesis (Lawrence Frank, 1939)

“When people try to understand vague or ambiguous unstructured stimuli, the interpretation they produce reflects their needs, feelings, experience, prior conditioning, thought processes

Assessment/treatment methods

History taking (face to face)

Freudian slips

Dream interpretation (dreams are wish fulfillment)

Free association

Formal testing (developed later) Rorschach TAT Projective drawings

Symbolic play (for children)

Freudian slips:

Around for a long, long timee.g., Henry Peacham, The Compleat Gentleman: “Sir, I must goe dye a beggar” (1634)

Reverend William Spooner, dean New College, Oxford (1844-1930)

“Work is the curse of the drinking classes”

“Noble tons of soil”

“You have hissed all my lectures. I saw you fight a liar in the back quad; in fact, you have tasted the whole worm.”

God bless the queer old dean”

Fox News: “More likely to give …a curb job than a block party”

George Bush Sr: “We’ve had some setbacks”

"A Freudian slip is like saying one thing, but meaning your mother."

Freudian slips: Was Freud right?

There is empirical evidence that “unconscious” slips happen. But why?

Freudian explanation only explains a subset of slips (see here)

Alternative explanations:

Strong habit substitution (MacMahon, 1995)

Anticipation: e.g., “bake my bike” instead of “take my bike”

Perseveration e.g., “he pulled a pantrum” instead of “he pulled a tantrum”

Phonological conditioning e.g., “don’t shell so loudly” instead of “don’t yell/shout so loudly”

Freud: “Such disturbances of speech may be the result of complicated psychical influences, of elements outside the same word, sentence or sequence of spoken words.” ~ The Psychopathology of Everyday Life

In other words: It is the unconscious at work, such that slips are unintentional expressions of repressed desire.

Dream Interpretation

Manifest Content: what a person remembers and consciously considers

Latent Content: underlying (symbolic) hidden meaning (believed to be a manifestation of the unconscious)

Dream Interpretation

“Royal road to the unconscious”

What is important in dreams is the infantile wish fulfillment represented in them

Freud assumed every dream has a meaning that can be interpreted by decoding representations of the unconscious material

Dream symbol = represents some person, thing, or activity involved in the unconscious process

Dream Interpretations(common symbols)

Knife, umbrella, snake

Box, oven, ship

Falling

Staircase, ladder

Water

Baldness, tooth removal

Left (direction)

Children playing

Fire

Robber

Room, table with food

Penis

Uterus

Anxiety

Sexual intercourse

Birth, mother

Castration

Crime, sexual deviation

Masturbation

Bedwetting

Father

Women

Rorschach

Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)

Developed by Henry Murray (1938)

30 grayscale pictures (each contain a dramatic event or critical situation ) + one blank

Not all pictures are (though all may be) seen by everyone 11 for adults (males and females) 7 for males (adults and boys, BM), 7 for females (adults and girls, GF), 1 each for adult males (12M), adult females (12F), children of either sex

(12BG), male child (13B), female child (13G) and blank (16) Most subjects see 10-12 cards, over two sessions

Story themes = Interaction between needs and environmental determinants

Standardization of administration and scoring is minimal

Many variations exist

TAT scoring (sample card)

Response 1:This is the story of a little girl who is very disappointed. She’s been struggling to learn to play the violin but she can’t do it. It’s just too difficult. She’s upset and she’s going to tell her mother and father she doesn’t want to take violin lessons anymore. She feels frustrated that she’s tried to play it and has failed. She’s feeling discouraged about the whole thing.

Response 2:This is the story of a little girl who intends to play the violin. It’s a very challenging instrument to master but she is determined to learn how to play it – one note at a time. In her mind, in her imagination she sees herself playing to appreciative audiences all over the world, culminating in loud applause.

Murray’s psychological needs

Achievement

Affiliation

Aggression

Autonomy

Dominance

Exhibition

Nurturance

Order

Power

House-Tree-PersonTest

More interpretation elements

The inherent problem with projection

"Objectivity in human relationships is impossible. Therapists affect the behavior and feelings of patients, and patients affect therapists. When a chart notes that a patient is 'hostile', it should also note, in the interests of balance, that the therapist is 'paranoid'. If a therapist calls a patient 'defensive', chances are that the patient would call the therapist 'aggressive'. Both should be noted in a chart, if either is, since both are equally probable."

Shelagh Lynne Supeene (As For The Sky, Falling)

Important therapeutic elements

Methods described above (assessment and therapy are same)

Analysis proceeds from more superficial (conscious) elements to deeper, unconscious ones

Understanding of repression No accident No responsibility

Analysis of resistance Usually unconscious An example of a defense mechanism

Analysis of transference (re-enactment of past relationships)

Interpretation of comments in therapy

Working through (overcoming childhood amnesia) Repetition Elaboration Amplification

Transference and Countertransference

Transference The client reacts to the therapist as he did to an

earlier significant other This allows the client to experience feelings that

would otherwise be inaccessible ANALYSIS OF TRANSFERENCE — allows the client

to achieve insight into the influence of the past

Countertransference The reaction of the therapist toward the client that

may interfere with objectivity

Contemporary approaches

Ego psychology Analysis of internal conflict Deals with both early and later development More emphasis on psychosocial development (e.g., Erikson) Defense analysis

B. Object relations “Object” refers to object that gratifies a need Separation anxiety and transitional objects Oedipus complex

C. Interpersonal therapy (H.S. Sullivan) Replaced the libido with analysis of the self. “Good me” vs. “Bad me”

Good refers to positive movements toward intimacy Bad refers to destructive movements of hostility and avoidance

Importance of pre-adolescent period of same-sex friendships

Identity Development (Erickson)

Contemporary approaches

A. Ego psychology Analysis of internal conflict Deals with both early and later development More emphasis on psychosocial development (e.g., Erikson) Defense analysis

B. Object relations “Object” refers to object that gratifies a need Separation anxiety and transitional objects Oedipus complex

C. Interpersonal therapy (H.S. Sullivan) Replaced the libido with analysis of the self. “Good me” vs. “Bad me”

Good refers to positive movements toward intimacy Bad refers to destructive movements of hostility and avoidance

Importance of pre-adolescent period of same-sex friendships