8 Personality development – Freud’s theory

K Arockia Maraichelvi

1. INTRODUCTION

We human beings are the same in certain ways by having human bodies, human minds, human thoughts and human feelings. But in many other ways each and every one of us are different from others and possesses certain unique qualities. This is where the term personality sets in. The term gains significance in between the common qualities and the unique features of the human community as a whole and also as an individual.

Personality does not have one final definition, but can be viewed as the combination of behaviour, emotion, motivation and thought patterns that define an individual. The field of personality psychology attempts to study similarities and differences among these patterns, which are facilitated by various approaches towards personality as proposed by eminent theorists. Some of the approaches are trait, psychodynamic, humanistic, biological, evolutionary and social learning theories. Our focus on the paper on early childhood care, education and development is much concerned with the psychodynamic theories, since the concept of personality of any child is spoken in terms of life-span stages.

2. LEARNING OUTCOMES

At the end of this module you will be able to

Understand and define personality
Realise what the psychology of personality seeks to study
Illustrate the web of entanglement and complexity of personality as proposed by Freud in terms of

1.      Levels of conscious

2.      Components of human mind

3.      Psycho sexual stages of development

Apprehend the psycho-analytic approach in order to apply to the teaching and learning area of children in their early years.

3. WHAT IS PERSONALITY?

The first and the foremost objective of this lesson is to understand the exact meaning of the word personality. The word personality originated from the Latin word ‘persona’ meaning ‘mask’. This mask referred to the theatrical mask of performers projecting various roles by disguising their identity. As personality does not have one final definition, it could be defined in various ways. But now let us see how the term personality is defined in relation to its focus – whether the focus is on an individual on human beings as a whole.

When the focus is on human beings as a whole the term personality is defined as observable psychological variations among the individuals. It would include appearance and build in physical terms and socio-emotional and behavioural characteristics in psychological terms.

However, when the focus is on an individual, then it is defined as the person’s way of being and its consistency. It would include perceiving, thinking, acting and reacting skills of that individual.

3.1 Major definitions of personality

Some major definitions of personality are quoted below

“Personality refers to individuals’ characteristic patterns of thought, emotion, and behaviour, together with the psychological mechanisms — hidden or not — behind those patterns. This definition means that among their colleagues in other subfields of psychology, those psychologists who study personality have a unique mandate: to explain whole persons” (Funder, D. C., 1997).
“Although no single definition is acceptable to all personality theorists, we can saythat personality is a pattern of relatively permanent traits and unique characteristics that give both consistency and individuality to a person’s behaviour” (Feist and Feist, 2009).

However as a whole, the term personality could be defined as a unique combination of patterns, tendencies and inclinations that influence behaviour, thought, motivation and emotion in a human being. But one has to realise that these patterns, overtime do strongly influence the personal expectation, self perception, values and attitudes of that individual.

3.2 Fundamental features of personality

When we look at the definition, it is well understood that patterns / traits of thought and emotion make up the personality. Is that all? If not only them, then what are the other characteristics that make up a personality? The fundamental features of personality are:-

3.2.1 Consistency

The extent to which an individual reacts in a similar fashion under various situations/circumstances is referred to as consistency of behaviour.

3.2.2 Psychological and physiological foundations

Though personality in psychology is considered to be a psychological construct, it is equally influenced by the physiological facts

3.2.3 Strongly influence behaviours and action

It is an individual’s over all personality that allows him to move, respond and act towards his environment.

3.2.4 Expressed in various ways

Personality is expressed through behaviour, thought, feeling, intimate and non intimate relationships.

4. PERSONALITY THEORIES

Several psychologists have proposed various theories on how personalities develop. Some of the theories are

a.Type theories- this theory is limited to the personality type of an individual with only biological connotation and the types are limited.

b. Trait theories – Various theories which viewed personality as an end product of different internal characteristics within the biological foundation

c. Psychodynamic theories – This theory has a major significance in the overall development of an individual and is the most accepted one. Two major contributors for this type of theories are Sigmund Freud and Erik Erikson.

d.Behavioural theories – are the theories that talk about the influence of environment on an individual with least consideration to the internal thought and feelings of that individual.

e. Humanist theories – focus just on the role of free will and the exposure of an individual in developing his/her personality.

Looking into the pros and cons of all these theories, it was considered to dwell into the psychological aspect of personality, because this type of theory has got major implications on the personality development theory of young children. Let us look into Sigmund Freud’s personality theory in this module and Erik Erikson’s theory in the forthcoming module.

5.FREUD’S PSYCHO ANALYTIC THEORY

Psycho analytic theory is a web of entanglement and complexity with some basic concepts and principles reflecting personality. The basic assumption of this theory is that the behaviour of a human being is just determined by irrational forces (aggressive or sexual desires) and not by free will. Hence the human behaviour is said to be deterministic by nature. Freud strongly believed that every human being is an actor in the drama of his/her own mind, pushed by desire and pulled by coincidence.

Freud in his theory argued that the conscious mind shapes behaviour and personality through the interaction between the three components of mind – id, ego and super ego and these dynamic interactions carry a human being through five psycho sexual stages of development. Hence for easy understanding and better comprehension, let us divide Freud’s theory into three major categories as follows

1. Levels of conscious

2. Components of human mind

3. Psycho sexual stages of development

5.1 Levels of consciousness

This is the mental map of the human mind that describes the degree to which mental events such as thoughts, fantasies, experiences, vary in relation to the access of its awareness level. Based on the level Freud proposed that human mind has three portions namely

Conscious
Preconscious
Unconscious

5.1.1Conscious level

This level of awareness comprises of events that a person is aware of. In other words, the current events of the mind that a person can actively think at that moment constitutes conscious domain. This could also be referred as the working memory in terms of information processing approach. The events in this level are easily accessible and are being regulated by external cues.

5.1.2 Preconscious level

This level of consciousness bridges between the conscious and unconscious regions of the mind. It comprises of events or contents of the mind that a human being is not currently aware of. However the contents namely thoughts, memories, knowledge, wishes feelings etc., could be made available whenever needed. They are in the process of becoming conscious. Hence this level is also referred as the available memory.

5.1.3 Unconscious level

This level comprises of events that are kept out of conscious awareness. This level is said to be in the submerged, deepest major stratum of the human mind and serves as a storehouse for all the primitive instinctual drives, emotions and memories. The unconscious level is found to operate on processes that actively help in keeping those primitive thoughts from awareness.

Freud found that there is always a conflict between the unconscious memory and the consciousness, and the conflict is watched and bridged by the middle level – preconscious. In developing the psycho-analytic approach, Freud modified the topographical model of human mind and renamed the term unconscious as ‘id’. This new terminology was found to have high clarity as you will understand in the next part of this module (i.e) the components of personality/human mind. Freud also found that the other two parts of the human mind are both partly conscious and partly unconscious. However the topographical model was never abandoned by Freud

The iceberg metaphor is the commonly used visual for explaining the relationship between the topographical models (the various level of consciousness) and the component of human mind (id, ego and super ego). The iceberg clearly shows that the id/unconscious is completely submerged in the underwater portion and the other two levels with a representation of ego and super-ego being displaced above the water level.

The subsequent section of the module details the components of personality, the conflict between those components and the process of resolving the conflict.

5.2 Components of Personality

According to Freud, the personality structure/psyche/mind of a person, after modifying the topographical model acts and interacts with three parts namely id, ego and super-ego. This modified model was referred as the ‘structural model’ of human mind. Let us see each part in detail.

5.2.1 Id

The word ‘id’ is a Latin word meaning ‘it’. It is the unorganized part of the personality structure of a person that comprises of impulsive, basic, instinctual drives of a human being. It is the child – like portion of the mind. Of all the three components, id is the only component that is present from birth. Hence it represents bodily needs, wants, desires and impulses that do not care about the demands/expectations of reality and without any accordance to what is right or wrong. According to Freud, id is the unconscious part of the human mind seeking pleasure.

Id acts according to Pleasure principle. Pleasure principle is defined as the psychic force that demands immediate gratification of any desire or impulse without showing a single sign of willingness to compromise.

The process of thinking that the id undergoes is called Primary process. This process refers to the illogical, irrational fantasy form of thought, wherein a person’s need is translated to wish/instincts/drives.

Hence, id is a part of the mind completely cut off from the external world and operated with its own perception.

5.2.2 Ego

The word ‘ego’ is also a Latin word meaning ‘I’. It is the organized, realistic portion of the personality structure of a person. It involves defensive, perceptual, intellectual-cognitive and executive functions. The ego separate out what is real/right and what is fantasy/wrong and then organize the thought by being sensitive to the demands/expectations of the reality. Hence ego is said to be a part of id that had been modified by the direct influence of external cues. At the beginning Freud, meant ego as a sense of self, but later he identified the meaning of ego with a set of functions namely judgement, tolerance, reality testing, control, planning etc. Ego resides in all the levels of awareness.

Ego functions as the Reality principle. Reality principle refers to the ego operating with a regulatory mechanism, and thereby seeks to please the id’s drive in realistic ways in tune with the expectations of the external world. For example, don’t you think to purchase an item, instead of grabbing it from someone else. Also ego enables the individual to delay the gratification process and function effectively in the real world.

The process adapted by ego is called Secondary process. It is the process wherein the ego searches for realistic solutions to satisfy the wishes that the id creates.

Hence, it is well understood that ego is always trying to mediate between id and reality. Freud always compared the concept of id and ego with a horse and its rider respectively, where the driver has to have a hold to check the superior strength of the horse.

5.2.3 Super-ego

It is the organized, moralist and idealistic part of the personality structure of a person. It aims at perfection, reflects the internalization of values taught by parents, educators, teachers, or even role models. Super-ego resides in the preconscious level of awareness.

As the super-ego strives towards perfection and enables a person to act in a socially appropriate manner, it is always in contradiction with the id that needs immediate gratification. Hence the ego between the id and super-ego faces a tough time in arriving at behaviour. The super-ego can be thought as conscience that punishes the wrong behaviour with feelings of guilt. Hence it is referred to the angel on one’s shoulder.

Super-ego operates on ideal principle/ morality principle. This principle refers to the internalized conventions and morals formed from environment cues and experiences. However ideal principle starts forming at 4-5 years of age.

Freud separates super-ego into two aspects. One is conscience and the other is ego- ideal.

Conscience are ideals and morals of the society preventing people from acting as per their internal drives, which are learnt by a child after internalizing the punishments and warnings faced.
Ego-ideal is also called as ideal-self, which is derived from rewards and positive models presented by the society to the child.

5.3 Conflict between Id, Ego and Superego

As proposed by Freud every human being at every moment of his/her life has to strive to resolve the conflict between the three components of personality – Id, ego and Superego.

`CONFLICT BETWEEN ID, EGO AND SUPEREGO – DEFENSE MECHANISM

The ego that is found in between id and superego tries to balance them in order to maintain a healthy state of consciousness. Therefore the human being is protected from not doing things that are distorting reality and thereby prevents the unconscious dangerous thoughts and feelings from getting into the consciousness level of awareness. In the example given above the ego sets a dynamic realistic equilibrium by allowing the child to eat pizza but with a condition and thus striking a balance between superego and id.

However, before the ego steps in to be the referee between the other two components much anxiety and stress occurs. Ego defends itself against the anxiety by using certain strategies referred to as Defence Mechanisms, thereby lowering the anxiety level and restoring the person to reality. Sigmund Freud observed a number of defence mechanisms but it is his daughter Anna Freud who elaborated on it. Let us see some major defence mechanism in the next module.

5.4 Psychosexual Stages of Development

Freud while working with troubled adults, looked deeply into how their childhood experiences and dreams contributed to their personality in adulthood. Based on this, Freud defined five basic stages of development with each stage directly related to a physical centre of pleasure and termed it as psychosexual theory of development. Also, his theory talks about the conflict that arises at every stage due to the biological drives and social expectations of that stage. He also concludes that the functioning and coping ability of an individual in his adulthood largely depends on his/her ability to resolve the conflict during those five stages.

Before getting into the details of these stages, it is important to be familiar with certain Freudian terms that explain them.

a. Erogenous zone – It refers to the physical centre of pleasure. The erogenous zone of each stage is different.

b. Libido – It is the sexual drive that a child experiences at every stage of development. c. Psychologic fixation – While trying to gratify the sexual desire (libido) the child faces parental and societal disapproval and thereby becomes anxious. In order to avoid this anxiety, the child gets fixated or preoccupied with the psychological characteristics of that erogenous zone and even is carried out in the adulthood stage.

Let us see each of these five stages in detail.

5.4.1 Oral stage

It is the first stage spanning from birth until the age of one year. The erogenous zone of libidinal gratification at this stage is the mouth. The infant at this stage finds pleasure from feeding at the mother’s breast or the nipple of the bottle and also from his /her oral exploration of the environment. The oral explorations are by sucking his/her fingers or putting object in the mouth. At this stage out of the three components of human mind, the two components – ego and super-ego is not developed and hence id dominates. So every behaviour of an infant is based on the pleasure principle.

The goal at this stage is to develop proper amount of sucking, eating, biting and talking. The infant gets fixated in the oral stage when there is too much or too little gratification of the desire and he/she grows into an immature adult.

The oral stage fixation results in passive, gullible, immature, manipulative personality and the consequences of this fixation would be over drinking, smoking, nail-biting or other mouth – based aggressive behaviours.

5.4.2 Anal stage

It is the second stage that spans from the age of 18 months to three years. Now the child’s erogenous zone changes from mouth to the anus. In other words the zone changes from the upper digestive tract to the lower digestive tract. Hence the focus of a toddler at this stage is all concerned with bowel and bladder elimination and thereby its control. It is during this stage that the ego starts to form.

By the age of two, the key anal stage experience of any child is toilet training. While experiencing the training, the child’s id demands immediate gratification, whereas the ego demands delayed gratification. Hence a conflict between id and ego sets in. However the parenting style influences the resolution of id-ego conflict. An ideal parenting style with moderate demands teaching the value and importance of physical cleanliness, along with proper toilet training practices would help in the ideal resolution of the id-ego conflict, which in turn facilitates the development of a self-controlled adult. Too much or too little gratification at this stage would lead to

Compulsive (or) Anal retentive personality – The immoderate demands of the parents on the child and over emphasis on toilet training leads to over concern with neatness and order in the child. This is called as Compulsive (or) Anal retentive personality.
Self-indulgent (or) Anal compulsive personality – If the parent yields or over responds to the id of the child (ie.) immediate gratification, the child might develop a sense of personal untidiness, environmental disorder and a weak sense of self respectively. This disorder is called Self-indulgent (or) Anal compulsive personality. The reason behind this personality type is that it is only the parents will that control things and not the child’s ego.

5.4.3 Phallic stage

It is the third stage of psycho sexual development that spans between 3 to 6 years of age. The primary erogenous zone changes from the anal region to the genital parts of the child. As children at this stage become aware of their own bodies, their parents and others, they learn the physical difference between a boy and a girl. According to Freud, the child at this stage develops sexual desires towards his/her parent. The psychosocial experience that develops because of this sexual desire is termed different for boys and girls. For boys it is called Oedipus complex and for girls it is called Electra complex.

Oedipus complex – Put in simpler words, it is the son-father competition for possession of mother.
Electra complex – It is the daughter – mother competition for the possession of father.

Though Freud’s theory in this area is still not accepted, we could still find the boys at this stage are much attached to their mother and girls to their father.

The goal at this stage is to master the internal conflict for the opposite sex parent and thereby moving towards appropriate sexual desires. Unresolved conflict causes phallic stage fixation with different effects for boys and girls.

Among boys, the fixation might lead them to be an aggressive over ambitious but vain man. Among girls, the fixation would lead to the development of a woman who strives hard to dominate men with very high but dangerous self-esteem or else she becomes an over submissive woman with very low self-esteem.

Hence the parenting style adopted plays an important role in solving this conflict and developing appropriate super-ego of the child.

5.4.4 Latency stage

It is the fourth stage of psycho-sexual development that spans from the age of 6 years until puberty. This period is called latency because the sexual drives are hidden or lies dormant. Thus no erogenous zone manifests, however it is only the consolidation of the other three previous stages. The child at this stage derives pleasure of gratification only by means of secondary process thinking. This sort of thinking focuses on the external activities namely schooling, friendships hobbies etc. Any unresolved conflict at this stage called as neuroses or fixation are due to the unresolved Oedipus or Electra conflict, and the inability of the ego to allow the child to focus on the socially acceptable activities.

5.4.5 Genital stage

It is the fifth stage that spans from puberty through the adulthood period. Also this stage marks the maximum lifespan of a human being. The erogenous zone, of course is the genitals but influenced by the sexual hormones secreted. The main difference between the phallic and genital stage is that the ego in the genital stage gets well established and hence the adolescent could shift his /her primary instinctual gratification by means of secondary process thinking aided in the latency stage. This secondary process of thinking allows them to gratify their desire by means of friendship, love relationship, family and adult responsibilities. The major goal of any adolescent at this stage is to establish successful relationship with peers. If this goal is not achieved the adolescent gets fixated and tend to have unsuccessful relationships as an adult.

6. CRITICS OF PSYCHOANALYTIC THEORY

Freud’s theory on psycho-analysis has a variety of contributions and limitations that have spurred further research in the area of personality development. Let us see the critics perspectives in brief.

6.1 Contributions

Psychoanalytic theory is the theory of personality organization and its dynamics guides psychoanalysis, which is found to be a clinical method for treating psychopathology. This theory places whole emphasis on the importance of childhood experiences and thereby brings out the fact that every child has to get better experiences and exposure. This is considered to be the one most outstanding contribution of this theory. This theory also has a major influence in philosophical analysis in general and aesthetics in particular.

6.2 Limitations

Some of the criticisms of this theory are specified below

This theory failed to include evidence of the environmental influences on the individual. It focussed only on the internal changes.
Empirical data for the theory proposed was not evident and moreover the focus is much on pathology.
Also the cultural influence did not gain importance in influencing personality of an individual according to this theory The theory was found to be much obsessed with sex and aggression

IMPLICATIONS ON LEARNING AND TEACHING

With the discovery of the unconscious level of awareness, Freud has contributed a lot to psychology and learning, though his theory was not accepted in all aspects. The implications are as follows

The unconscious domain of the human mind as identified by Freud, serves as an intrinsic motivation for every child to learn and explore the environment.
The idea of Freud on inner conflict that affects one’s behaviour gains importance in teaching on the part of the teacher. The teacher has to realize her foremost duy in putting in more efforts to solve the inner conflicts among children by providing ample attention towards their certain important needs.

For example, in the latency stage, play is the only source of directing their impulse. Hence sufficient opportunities should be provided by the teacher to every child, as children spend most of their waking time in school.

CONCLUSION

Towards the end of the module it is well understood that according to Freud, human behaviour is just the result of interaction between the three components of personality namely id, ego and super-ego. Also his theory focussed on how the levels of awareness play a major role in shaping the behaviour and personality of an individual. He also explained of how these dynamic interactions between the parts of the human mind and levels of awareness carries human beings through the five psychosexual stages of development. He also stressed upon the importance of smooth and successful transition from one stage to the other in developing personality. Though this theory has met with several criticisms, it has got its own contributions. Moreover this theory though did not provide direct implications on education, the decision and guidance is still on the teachers of how they use the psychoanalytic knowledge in assisting their students.

you can view video on Personality development – Freud’s theory

Web links

Boundless. “Freudian Psychoanalytic Theory of Personality.” Boundless Psychology. Boundless, 08 Jun. 2015. Retrieved 10 Jun. 2015
from https://www.boundless.com/psychology/textbooks/boundless-psychology-textbook/personality-16/psychodynamic-perspectives-on-personality-77/freudian-psychoanalytic-theory-of-personality-304-12839/
Boundless Psychology. Boundless, 10 Jun. 2015. Retrieved 10 Jun. 2015
from https://www.boundless.com/psychology/textbooks/boundless-psychology-textbook/personality-16/introduction-to-personality-76/defining-personality-303-12838/