"Introduction to Psychology" Notes (2) —— Sigmund Freud

Lecture 3:Sigmund Freud

In this lecture, it introduced the biography of Freud and his personality briefly. It outlines his theory in broad way, and gives the scientific assessment of Freud.

At the core of Freud's declamation, the most interesting ideas involve the existence of an unconscious:

1. unconscious motivation: there are desires and motivations that govern your behavior that you may not be aware of.
2. unconscious dynamics or conflict which lead to mental illnesses, dreams, slips of the tongue and so on.

Consciousness v.s Nonconscious:

• Consciousness works on this higher level. It reduces the continual bombardment of sensory stimulation to only two categories:
• the relevant and noticed
• the irrelevant and ignored
• Consciousness also empowers our mental processes to analyze, compare, and interpret whatever we've extracted from the stream of experience. And it enables us to respond flexibly to experiences by integrating what we know from the past, what we perceive in the present, and what we anticipate from the future.
• Consciousness enables us to recognize our own mortality because we have that awareness of past, present, and future -- a mixed blessing if ever there was one.
• Nonconscious works on lower level, deal with learned skills which become routinized and automatic.

How to study consciousness:

• structuralism:consciousness was to be studied in terms of its contents---what's on your mind
• functionalism:consciousness was to be studied in terms of its function--what consciousness does for us.

According to Freud, there are three distinct processes going on in your head and these are in violent internal conflict. And the way you act and think are products, not of a singular rational being, but of a set of conflicting creatures. And the triad are:

1. id(本我): the primitive, unconscious part of the personality where drives and passions originate; present at birth,works on "The Pleasure Principle".
2. ego(自我): our conscious sense of self-identity, moderates between the id and superego, our primitive impulses and our sense of moral obligation; works on the "Reality Principle."
3. superego(超我): a combination of the conscience and the ideal self, the internalized rules of society's moral standards, it restrains the id.

The id and superego do their work without conscious knowledge.

The human mind can act in ways that are contrary to the individual's best interest or that so much can be swept under the rug of consciousness, with so many important ideas and feelings kept out of sight.

The mind can be a double agent: spy and counterspy at the same time; revealing and concealing, knowing and not knowing, aware and confused.

Freud believed there were five stages of personality development, and each is associated with a particular erogenous zone:

1. oral stage(口腔期):dependent and needy.
2. anal stage(肛欲期):compulsive, clean, stingy.
3. phallic stage(俄狄浦斯期):excessive masculinity,a need for attention or domination. (Oedipus or Electra complex can occur)
   
4. latency stage(潜伏期):sex is repressed, children participate in hobbies, school and friendships
   
5. genital stage(青春期):the healthy adult stage

Defense mechanisms: defending yourself against the horrible parts of yourself, mental processes employed by the ego to reduce anxiety.

1. Sublimation(升华): it is you might have a lot of energy, maybe sexual energy or aggressive energy, but instead of turning it to a sexual or aggressive target what you do is you focus it in some other way.
2. Displacement(转移):it is you have certain shameful thoughts or desires and you refocus them more appropriately.
3. Projection(投射):it is, I have certain impulses I am uncomfortable with, so rather than own them myself, I project them to somebody else.
4. rationalization(合理化): it is that when you do something or think something bad you rationalize it and you give it a more socially acceptable explanation.
5. regression(退行): it is returning to an earlier stage of development.

Freudian theory is often so vague and flexible that it can't really be tested in any reliable way. It is falsifiability which coined by the philosopher Karl Popper---If one theory couldn't be proven wrong, they're not interesting enough to be science.Though many of his ideas have been rejected, the general idea of Freud's actually been so successful both in the study of scientific psychology and in our interpretation of everyday life.

Why would an unconscious evolve? The answer is deception which is the result of evolutionary pressure. In order to become a better liar, you need to believe the like that you're telling. The best lies are lies we tell ourselves. So that certain motivations and goals, particularly sinister ones, are better made to be unconscious.