Theoretical Perspective, Psychotherapy, Psychodynamic mechanisms
Psychology is considered a young field of study, and the development and testing of theories of personality are still gaining sophistication. Many conflicting theories of personality have been developed, each having positive and negative aspects that discussing both sides of the theories helps to revitalize the discussion about personality. Personality psychology has many creative thinkers, whose approaches have been of enormous value in the understanding of the origin of personality, its development and functions. The phenomena covered by human personality are too multifaceted and diverse that an individual cannot have them in a single, coherent framework of the theory, meaning that one school of thought cannot succeed in constructing a complete adequate theory for personality.
Personality psychiatrists employ the use of the scientific approach in studying individual differences as this approach is viewed as an efficient way to help gather accurate information concerning personality functioning. Freud is considered the creator of psychoanalysis, and to many people, he is a person who brought into life the modern theory of personality. The main conventions of personality and psychotherapy reflect a number of fundamental thoughts into the structure and dynamics of human psychology (Burger, 2010). Freud transformed psychology by demonstrating that processes of complex thoughts should, and need to take place, not within the borders of consciousness only and that the thoughts should translate the model of mind from that considered a philosophical speculation to that of reality. Freud clarified a number of psychodynamic mechanisms that had importance in the interpretation of human psychology. As a result, the unconscious mentality ideas and psychoanalysis terminologies became deeply established in a commonplace language (Burger, 2010).
[...] The basic premise of Freud was that human nature is ingrained in a set of instinctual drives that force them indiscriminately towards the need to satisfy their survival wants. However, his libido theory received fundamental disagreement from Adler and Jung, followed by others in Freud's camp. Adler, for instance, downplayed the significance of the sexual factor in behavior determination and brought forward the concept of the struggle for power in its place. Adler, as well, de-emphasizes the repression theory and infantile sexuality (Stepansky, 2013). [...]
[...] She also brought forward emphasis on cultural and societal factors to have importance on personality, combined with the importance of the relationship between parents and their children. Freud is considered a creative thinker who constructed a highly comprehensive theory. His theory had a remarkable range and diversity of behavior and experiences that he explained and interpreted. Freud sought to explore not only the various kinds of emotional and behavioral disorders, but many other phenomena that included marriage, wealth, death and friendship among many. The thoughts of Freud are the most conceptual systems ever created in psychotherapy study. [...]
[...] J., & Roberts, T.-A. (2013). Theories of personality. New York: McGraw-Hill. Stepansky, P. E. (2013). In Freud's Shadow: Adler in Context. Hoboken: Taylor and Francis. [...]
[...] However, the precision and testability of Freudian theory is the relative vagueness of its concepts and the difficulty in deriving explicit and testable hypothesis. A related criticism is that much of his theory is presented in metaphors, or in terms that do not lend to scientific testing; for instance, the life and death instincts. In addition, Freud's theory fails to satisfactorily meet the precision and testability criterion, unlike the other theories on personality such as for Adler (Feist et al., 2013). [...]
[...] The psychoanalytic perspectives of nature put more emphasis on the significance of earlier experiences and the unconscious mind (Feist et al., 2013). Freud is the man said to be behind the creation of this perspective on personality through his belief that things hidden in the unconscious are definitely to be revealed in many ways possible; including in dreams or by free association. The Neo-Freudian theorists, who comprise of Erikson, Jung, Adler, and Horney, all agreed to the importance of the unconscious, but they challenged, together with other aspects of the theories of Freud. [...]
APA Style reference
For your bibliographyOnline reading
with our online readerContent validated
by our reading committee
