Approaches and Debates:
Psychodynamic approach:
Developed by Freud, workings of mind revolve around conflicts in psyche, refined
by Adler, Jung, Erikson
Larry Lotz killed his wife, adored her but snapped, behaviour due to unresolved
conflict in unconscious, conflict originated as child, used defence mechanisms to
keep submerged, trigger made conflict too great
Basic assumptions – unconscious mind drives our behaviour, instincts or drives
motivate our behaviour, early childhood experiences influential in creating the
psychological self (most development before 6)
Unconscious – origin of behaviour, explained using iceberg model, below surface,
no way of seeing what beneath, greater influence than conscious, thoughts that
may never surface, traumatic/unpleasant
Pre-conscious – just below surface, thoughts that may surface in conscious at any
times, memories
Structure of personality – id (birth-18 months, ‘pleasure principle’, hedonistic,
focuses on self), ego (18 months-3 years, ‘reality principle’, delays ids drive for
pleasure, keeps balance between id and superego), superego (3-6 years, ‘morality
principle’, acts as individuals conscious, feels guilt, holds someone back from
acting certain way if it feels wrong, helps to form moral code) – shaped through
experience, affect how three behave, suggests much behaviour comes from
conflict between the elements
Defence mechanisms – used to reduce anxiety and defend the ego e.g repression
(unpleasant memory pushed into unconscious mind), denial (person refuses to
accept reality of unpleasant situation), displacement (person focuses or projects
strong emotion onto a neutral thing) – suppression of memories weakens memory
trace, suppressed traumatic memories can have negative effect on behaviour e.g
PTSD
Gagnepain et al (2014) wanted to see whether suppressing memories into the
unconscious influences behaviour, participants learned pairs of words/pictures,
brain activity measured using FMRI, memory trace was weakened by suppression,
FMRI showed memories were disrupted, behaviour may not be affected by
suppressed memories as they cant be recalled, trying to forget could be useful to
reduce trauma effects
Psychosexual stages – oral, anal, phallic, Oedipus/Electra complex, latent, genital
Oral stage – at birth, focus for pleasure is the mouth (sucking, biting), important
to personality formation, initially oral passive (suckling, swallowing), then oral
aggressive (biting, chewing), if child had erratic feeding patterns they may
become fixated at oral stage becoming gullible, dependent, or aggressive, etc
Anal stage – around 18 months, libido moves to anus, pleasure from defecating, if
enjoys the potty they are anally expulsive (will be generous, demonstrative with
emotions, may have temper), if they’re anxious about using potty they will be
anally retentive (organised, reluctant to spend money, obsessive)
Phallic stage – around 3 years, focus for pleasure moves to genitals (either
Oedipus or Electra complex)
Oedipus complex – boy experiences sexual feelings for mother, father seen as
rival, child wants father to leave so mother can focus on him, child feels
threatened, worried father will castrate him ‘castration anxiety’, child acts similar
to father so they may see him as ally (‘identification’) resolving the complex
Electra complex – girls realise they don’t have a penis, thinks mother removed it,
develop penis envy, when not fulfilled its expressed through desire for baby, girl
desires father, identification process occurs
, Latent stage – around 6 years, libido energy displaced throughout the body,
relatively calm time, no focus for pleasure, focuses on being a child, Erikson
believes they have insecurities and inferiorities to deal with
Genital stage – libido again focused on genitals, where it stays for life, from here
child becomes an adult
Little Hans case study – Freud (1909), 5 year old, phobia of horses, father
documented what he said and did, interpreted his behaviour, reported dreams as
a problem in the phallic stage, said fascination with his penis was important
(phallic stage), when father went away he enjoyed having mothers attention
(Oedipus), hostile towards sister (Oedipus), experienced sexual attraction to
mother, father was a rival (castration anxiety) – only met him once in therapeutic
setting, info given by father so source potentially biased, published psychosexual
stages prior, possible analysis is biased, looking for evidence to support the idea,
Hans saw horse collapse in street which could be source of phobia, disproving
Freud’s analysis
Evaluation – shows how important childhood is to development, still used by some
therapists today, difficult to test reliability argued its unscientific and cant be
proven, evidence comes from case studies which lack reliability, can’t be
generalised to general population (culturally specific), argued people recovering
from mental illness following psychotherapy due to spontaneous recovery rather
than therapy (Eysenck 1952 found 70% of people with neurotic disorders who
didn’t receive treatment also recovered)
Humanistic approach:
Humanistic psychologist wouldn’t use experiment as they wouldn’t try to
generalise human behaviour, they believe each individual is unique, nothing to be
gained from studying animals
People have free will, in control of behaviour, but acknowledges constraints,
personality not determined by background, personality and behaviour affected by
range of factors so holistic approach is needed
Individuals behave/think in subjective ways so scientific way of explaining
behaviour is inappropriate, idiographic way of viewing people, believe whole life
course should be considered
Believes everyone has innate drive to reach full potential, self-actualisation,
ultimate feeling of satisfaction, Sheffield et al (1995) shows positive correlation
between self-actualisation and psychological health, Csikszentmihalyi (1990)
theory of flow, focused on activity, increases personal growth
Maslow’s hierarchy of needs for self-actualisation – basic psychological needs
(food, oxygen etc), safety needs (security, stability), belonging and love (friends,
relationships), self-esteem (respect, status), self-actualisation (realising full
potential), self-actualisation isn’t permanent
Rogers’ focus on the self – the self-concept (self you feel you are), ideal self (the
one you wish to be), the real self (the one you are), they need to be integrated to
achieve self-actualisation, an important part of achieving congruence is
‘unconditional positive regard’, loved for who they are
Conditions of worth – requirements they feel they need to meet to be loved, real
or perceived
Counselling psychology – Rogers developed this, client-therapist relationship
important, honest, help to realise barriers to becoming congruent, influences
therapies e.g CBT, Elliott (2002) showed the therapies prompted a significant
improvement in clients when compared with people not receiving treatment
Evaluation – argument we are all unique supported by research finding within-
group differences greater than between-group differences, ideas hard to test
scientifically and support with empirical evidence, subjective experience difficult
to test, acknowledges effect on behaviour, therapies developed from it effective,
