1. Chapter 13 Psychoanalysis: The Beginnings
Ms. Wilson, MS, LPC

2. Topics Antecedent Influences on Psychoanalysis
Sigmund Freud ( ) and the Development of Psychoanalysis
Psychoanalysis as a Method of Treatment
Psychoanalysis as a System of Personality
The Scientific Validity of Psychoanalytic Concepts
Criticisms of Psychoanalysis
Contributions of Psychoanalysis

3. The Development of Psychoanalysis
Freud believes in three great shocks to the collective human ego:
Copernicus: Earth is not the center of the universe
Darwin: the theory of evolution
Freud: the influence of unconscious forces
Psychoanalysis was distinct from mainstream psychological thought:
Goals: treat clients labeled as mentally ill
Subject matter: abnormal behavior
Methods: clinical observation

4. Antecedent Influences on Psychoanalysis
Philosophical speculations about unconscious psychological phenomena
Monadology: Leibnitz’s theory of psychic entities, called monads, which are similar to perceptions
Johann Friedrich Herbart ( ): theorizing of a threshold of consciousness; conflict develops among ideas as they struggle for conscious realization
Fechner: suggested that the mind is analogous to an iceberg; had a great impact on Freud

5. The Case of Anna O.
Anna O.
Patient of Josef Breuer; discussed case with Freud
21 yr old
Suffered from severe hysterical complaints
During hypnosis: while hypnotized she would recall specific experiences that seemed to have given rise to certain symptoms
He called this the “cathartic method.” The phenomena which were to be called transference and countertransference, were also observed during this case.

6. The Sexual Basis of Neurosis
In 1885, Freud studied under Jean Charcot who was investigating the usefulness of hypnosis to treat hysteria
Freud soon gave up hypnosis
Created the technique of free association: a psychotherapeutic technique in which the patient says whatever comes to mind
Patient lies on a couch and is encouraged to talk openly and simultaneously expressing every idea
Patients thoughts are not random, these are thoughts determined by unconscious conflicts
Freud found that his patients’ memories reached back to childhood; many of the repressed experiences they recalled concerned sexual issues

7. Studies on Hysteria
The book considered to mark the formal beginning of psychoanalysis
This book contained a number of case studies including Anna O.
It had two separate conclusions:
Freud’s convinced that sex was the sole cause of neurotic behavior
The childhood seduction theory:
Freud believed that sex played the determining role in neurosis.
Most of his women patients reported traumatic sexual experiences in childhood, often involving family members
Later revised to suggest that the childhood seduction experiences his patients described were not real; they had not actually happened
This promoted the emergence of infantile sexuality and particularly Oedipus complex.

8. Dream Analysis
Freud had a positivist belief that everything had a cause, including dreams
Freud attempts to analyze himself, yet cannot do so using free association
The Interpretation of Dreams (1900),
Dream analysis: a psychotherapeutic technique involving the interpretation of dreams to uncover unconscious conflict
Dreams have symbols:
Manifest content
Latent content

9. The Pinnacle of Success
The Psychopathology of Everyday Life (1901)
Parapraxes; Relatively minor errors in everyday living
Freudian slip: an act of forgetting or a lapse in speech that reflects unconscious motives or anxieties
Based on Freud’s suggestion that unconscious ideas are struggling for expression and affect our thoughts and actions
1900 to 1910: Freud’s status improved
1920’s: Freud’s fame peaks

10. Psychoanalysis as a Method of Treatment
Goal of therapy: wean patients from this childlike dependency on the therapist and help them assume an adult role in their lives
Primary concern was not to cure people but to explain the dynamics of human behavior
Patients often react in different ways:
Resistance
Repression

11. Freud and Personality Early theory differentiated among: The conscious
Those things of which we are aware at a given moment
The preconscious
Things of which we are not aware but of which we could easily become aware
The unconscious
Memories which are being actively repressed
Later expanded his views with the concepts of id, ego, and superego.

12. Psychoanalysis as a System of Personality
Levels of personality:
Id: most primitive and operates on pleasure principle
Ego: represents rationality and operates on principles of reality
Superego: internalization leads to the development of superego.
The conscience
The ego-ideal
Instincts: mental representations of internal stimuli that motivate personality and behavior
Life instinct : The drive for ensuring survival of the individual and the species by satisfying the needs for food, water, sex, and air
Death instinct: The unconscious drive towards decay, destruction, and aggression

13. Psychoanalysis as a System of Personality (cont’d.)
Anxiety: functions as a warning that the ego is being threatened
Three types of anxiety: objective anxiety; neurotic anxiety; moral anxiety
To counter anxiety we use defense mechanisms
Defense mechanisms: behaviors that represent unconscious denials or distortions of reality but which are adopted to protect the ego against anxiety

14. Defense Mechanisms Denial Displacement Projection Rationalization
Reaction formation
Regression
Repression
Sublimation
Denial
Rationalization
Reaction formation

15. Psychosexual Stages of Development
Psychosexual stages of personality development: the developmental stages of childhood centering on erogenous zones
Oral stage
Anal stage
Phallic stage
Latency stage
Genital stage

16. The Scientific Validation of Psychoanalytic Concepts
Research of greater validity was performed on Freud’s theories
Support found for: characteristics of the oral and anal personality types; castration anxiety; the notion that dreams reflect emotional concerns; aspects of the Oedipus complex in boys
Role of unconscious processes on thoughts and emotions
Support found for defense mechanisms
No support found for ideas surrounding: symbolism of dreams; the Oedipus complex and male identification with father; women’s issues with body image, identity and superego; personality formation by age five

17. Criticisms of Psychoanalysis
Overemphasis on sex
Conclusions draw from case studies of patients (lacks validity and generalizability)
Data collection was unsystematic and uncontrolled
Freud may have used suggestion, or more coercive procedures, to elicit or implant such memories when no actual seduction had occurred
Small and unrepresentative sample of people
Freud often contradicted himself

18. Contributions of Psychoanalysis
Psychoanalysis is based instead on an intuitive appearance of plausibility
Tremendous impact on popular culture and academic psychology
Led psychology to revise thinking about the contributing factors to mental illness
Freudian psychoanalysis became a vital force in modern psychology