Research Paper Assignment on Freuds Psychology (Research Paper Sample)

Philosophies of Human Nature
Institution
Date
Sigmund Freud was a renowned Austrian neurologist. He developed the psychoanalytic approach to the mind that changed our understanding of the nature of human. Throughout his career, Freud postulated several theories such as the unconscious mind the psyche and psychosexual stages. The first theory postulated by Freud is the Unconscious mind. Freud created a topographical model of the mind where he described the features of the mind’s structure and function (Kelly, 1995). He used the analogy of the iceberg to illustrate the three different levels of the mind. Freud illustrated the conscious mind which incorporates all mental process of which we are aware. This is illustrated by the Tip of an iceberg.
The preconscious mind is composed of feelings and thought that a person is not currently aware of but is easily be brought to consciousness (Schuster, 1972). It exists between the conscious mind and the unconscious mind. Freud described the preconscious mind as a waiting room where thoughts remain until they succeed in attracting the eye of the conscious (Schuster, 1972). The unconscious mind is composed of mental processes that are not available to consciousness, but they influence judgment and behavior. Freud described the unconscious mind as the primary source of human behavior. He further postulates that our feelings decision and motives are influenced by our experience gained from the past and are stored in the unconscious mind; he likens the unconscious mind as part of the iceberg that is not seen, but it is important for the stability of the iceberg.
On the unconscious mind, Freud describes it as containing all sort of disturbing materials that we need to keep out of our mind because they are too scaring to fully acknowledge (Kelly, 1995). Freud found out that events and desires that were too painful to for his patients to remember or accept were locked in the unconscious mind in the process of repression (Kelly, 1995). People have created a variety of defense mechanism such as repression to avoid knowing the feelings and thoughts stored in the unconscious mind. Freud describes the importance of the unconscious mind as governing the minds behavior. The influence of the unconscious mind manifests itself in several ways such as dreams and a slip of the tongue
The hypothesis of the conscious and unconscious has several positive points such as demonstrating the role of the unconscious mind in determining human behavior on the other hand ,the hypothesis underestimates how important the unconscious mind in determining the behavior of a person, as demonstrated in Freud’s iceberg analogy, the unconscious mind is represented by the huge part of the submerged iceberg, therefore, the mind works efficiently by relegating a significant portion of high-level processing to the unconscious mind.
Based on this hypothesis, I do agree with Freud because it is a very comprehensive theory. Though initially the theory was developed to explain the psychological and therapeutic concepts, it can be used to explain and analyze an array of other concepts such as religion, the nature of companies and their leadership and art.
The second hypothesis postulated by Freud is the human psyche or personality. He postulated that the human personality has different aspects and classified it into three structures, the ego, id-superego (Kelly, 1995) which develops in different stages of the human life. Freud postulated that the structures are not parts of the mind but are systems of the mind. They comprise of unique features, but they interact with each other to determine the human behavior.
The id is the instinctive part of the personality; it incorporates the inherited elements of personality present at birth. They include the sex life instinct called Eros and death life instinct called Thanatos (Schuster, 1972). The id is the unconscious part of the personality that reacts directly to instincts. (Schuster, 1972). When a child is born, his personality is all id and the ego, and superego develops later on. The id remains immature in its function throughout the life of a person and doesn’t change with life experiences, reality or logic. The id operated on the principle of pleasure satisfaction when it is satisfied; we experience pleasure, and when it is not satisfied, we feel displeasure.
The ego or the ‘I’ is part of the id that is modified by the influence of the external world. It develops to arbitrate between the external word and the unrealistic id. The ego operates on the principles of reality (Kelly, 1995), working out pragmatic ways of satisfying the id’s order by compromising or differing satisfaction to avoid negative consequences to the society. The ego seeks satisfaction and avoids pain, but unlike the id, it does so in a realistic way. The ego has no concept of wrong or right; something is good for the ego if it satisfies its pleasure without any negative effect to the id. If the ego fails in an attempt to use reality principles and apprehension is experienced, an unconscious defense mechanism is released to ward off the anxiety and make individuals feel good.
The super ego, on the other hand, assimilates the morals and values that are learned from the society and parents, and it develops during the age of 3-5 years (Kelly, 1995). The function of the superego is to control the impulses of the id according to the rules set by the society; it also helps the ego to turn to moralistic goals besides the realistic goals. The superego is made up of two parts, the ideal self, and the conscience. The conscience can punish the ego by causing the feeling of guilt. The ideal self on the hand is an imaginary picture of how a person should be i.e. how to treat people. Behaviors that go against the ideal self are punished by the superego through guilt, but those that are in line with the ideal self are rewarded with the proud feeling. The ideal self-image is created during childhood by the parental upbringing.
Freud’s theory on psyche has an enormous influence on our awareness of human nature and has led to many developments within psychology .on the other hand, the major problem in Freud’s tripartite theory is the claim that the id or the unconscious system is the most important part of the human psyche and the dominant role it plays in determining the human personality. This view makes the human beings look like any other animal that is purely controlled by instincts without any moral reasoning which oversimplifies the human nature.
Based on the above observation, I agree with the Freud’s hypothesis on human personality because, during the human decision-making process, there are different forces within oneself that try to influence the mind decision-making process. For example, when one is wronged by another person, and excessive feelings of anger are felt, there is pressure to revenge, but one has to factor in the repercussions of such an action. One has to weigh in what is accepted by the society as morally right and the legal repercussions that arise from the decision. However, I don’t agree that the id or the unconscious part is the most influential part of the three.
Another hypothesis postulated by Freud is the psychosexual stages. Freud suggested that the development of a child takes place in a series of fixed stages called psychosexual stages (Schuster, 1972). The stages are referred to as psychosexual stages because each stage represents the fixation of sexual drive. Freud believed that life was created by pleasure and tension and that all tension was caused due to building up of libido and pleasure was caused by the release of libido (Schuster, 1972). He further suggested that each stage was associated with certain conflicts that must be solved for and individual to advance to the next stage and that the resolution of each stage requires the frittering of sexual energy and the more energy is expended in each stage, the more the important traits of that stage that stick with that individual as he matures psychologically.
The different psychosexual stages of development as suggested by Freud are. The oral stage is the first stage of personality development. In this stage which between 0-1 years, the libido attached in a baby’s mouth (Kelly, 1995) the baby gets satisfaction by putting all sorts of thing in its mouth gratify the libido and thus its id demands. At this stage, the id demand is oral oriented such as breastfeeding and sucking. The hypothesis further claims that an oral stimulation could lead life fixations such as finger chewers and thumb sucker
The second stage in the psychosexual personality development is the anal stage. At this stage, the libido is focused in the anus and the children get more satisfaction from defecating (Schuster, 1972). At this stage becomes fully aware that they are individuals in their right and that their decision and wishes can be in conflict with the outside world, at this stage their ego have developed (Schuster, 1972). Freud believes that this type of conflict is first exhibited in potty training where an adult imposes on where the child can defecate. The nature of this conflict can influence how the child will respond to authorities when he grows up. Stringent potty training can make the child be an anal-retentive personality who doesn’t like a mess and is instead obsessive with cleanliness. On the other hand, children who were subjected to less harsh training may deve...