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Freud & Psychoanalysis
Freud & Psychoanalysis
Dreams
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Relevance Today
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Freud’s Life
• Born 1865 in Freiberg, Moravia to Jacob, his wool-
mcerchant father. Mother was Jacob’s third wife.
• In 1860, family moved to Vienna, where Freud grew
up and lived until 1938.
• Vienna exciting place of opportunity and optimism.
In 1867, Jews granted political rights and accepted
into society.
• Freud assimilated, identifying as a German.
• Embraced humanistic values of political liberalism
and affirmed universal goals of rationality and
human freedom.
• About the time he was 15, liberal political
atmosphere evaporated and anti-Semitism became
virulent. Freud’s hopes for assimilation shattered,
replaced by disappointment & bitterness.
• Graduated from University of Vienna medical school
with strong interest in research but quickly married
and realized only private practice would provide
needed financial support.
• Published well received scholarly papers on
neurological disorders.
• Outbreak of WW II forced him to flee to London,
where he died a year later in 1939.
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Freud’s theory is complex because:
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Two Fundamental Hypotheses
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The Drives
• Link with biology
– Freud hoped to link up his thoeries with biological knowledge
– We’re still not able to do that
– Freud used the term “instincts” in this regard but the term is
misleading in English
– Drive = Tension or excitation looking for release, i.e. need
--> motor activity --> gratification
• Psychic energy & cathexis
– Freud postulates a psychic energy analogous to physical
energy
– Amount of psychic energy directed towards memories,
thoughts, and fantasies of an object is called “cathexis”
• e.g. child’s mother is an object highly cathected with
psychic energy
– Two forms of drive energy (like ying/yang)
• Libido - sexual/erotic
• Thanatos - aggressive/destructive
• Freud assumes these are always fused but not
necessarily in the same amounts
– Cruelty may have ucs. erotic component
– Acts of love may have ucs. aggressive component
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Psychosexual Development
• Stages
– Oral stage - First 1 1/2 years
• Flow of libido presumed to be in the mouth, lips,
tongue
– Anal stage - next 1 1/2 years
– Phallic stage - from 3 to 6 years
– Latency
– Mature adult genital stage
• Fixation & Regression
– Freud’s analogy about the troops
– If a new pleasure proves unsatisfactory, the individual
reverts to one that is tried and true
• e.g. small child reverting to thumb sucking upon birth
of a sibling
• Autoeroticism
– When object not available, such as breast, fingers may
substitute
– Frees child from domination of the environment but also
may be precursor to withdrawal from reality
– Aggressive drive too may reveal itself in the libidinal zones
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The Psychic Apparatus
• Topographical system
– Conscious
– Preconscious
– Unconscious
• Structural theory
– Id
– Ego - mediates between id & environment - tests for
what’s real
– Superego (develops around 5 or 6 years of age)
• Ego Functions
– Motor control
– Perception
– Memory
– Affects
– Thinking (delay of gratification)
– Ego develops in response to maturation and
environment
– Importance of identification in ego development
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Dream Formation
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Function of The Dream
• To protect sleep
• Wish fulfillment
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Primary and Secondary Process
Thinking
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Primary/Secondary Cont.
• Primary Process Thinking (“Baby Thinking”)
– Tends toward immediate gratification
– Amoral
– Non-temporal
– Non-causal
– Concrete
– Visual
– Absence of negatives, conditionals, or other qualifiers
– Opposites and contradictions may coexist
– Representation by allusion, analogy, or object parts
(pars pro toto)
– Displacement - substitution of one idea or image by
another one which associatively connected with it
– Condensation - representation of several ideas or
images by a single word or image
– Symbolic - meanings relatively constant from patient to
patient
• Pair of sisters = breasts
• Journey or absence = death
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My Position on Freud & Dreams
• Agree
– Day residue
– Free association
– Primary process thinking
• Disagree
– Sex/aggression as sole drives
– Censorship
– Wish fulfillment
• I Favor Growth Model
– Expression of health (a la Taylor)
– Creativity
– Precognition
– Confirmation of growth
– Guidance and Advice
– Rehearsal for action
– Spiritual dimension
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Freud vs. Jung Dream Theories
• Freud • Jung
– View of Unconscious – View of Unconscious
• Dangerous • Potentially
• Personal dangerous force
unconscious of nature
• Negative id • Personal &
drives of Collective
sex/aggression unconscious
– Function of dream • Bright shadow
• Wish fulfillment – Function of dream
– Logic of dream • Compensation
• Primary process – Logic of dream
& censorship • Language of
– Analytic tool metaphor
• Free association – Analytic tool
• Amplification
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