Invitation to Psychology

Chapter 2 Theories of Personality 47

bullied his patients into accepting his explana-

tions of their symptoms and, committing the

greatest sin for anyone claiming to be a scientist,

he ignored all evidence disconfirming his ideas

(Borch-Jacobsen & Shamdasani, 2012; McNally,

2003; Powell & Boer, 1995).

On the positive side, Freud welcomed women

into the profession of psychoanalysis, wrote elo-

quently about the devastating results for women

of society’s suppression of their sexuality, and

argued, ahead of his time, that homosexuality was

neither a sin nor a perversion but a “variation of

the sexual function” and “nothing to be ashamed

of” (Freud, 1961). Freud was thus a mixture of

intellectual vision and blindness, sensitivity and

arrogance. His provocative ideas left a powerful

legacy to psychology, one that others began to

tinker with immediately.

conflict between the id (what you would like to
do) and the superego (your conscience).
As you might imagine, Freud’s ideas were
not exactly received with yawns. Sexual feel-
ings in 5-year-old children! Repressed longings
in respectable adults! Unconscious meanings in
dreams! Penis envy! This was strong stuff in the
early years of the twentieth century, and before
long, psychoanalysis had captured the public
imagination in Europe and the United States.
But psychoanalysis also produced a sharp rift
with the emerging schools of empirical psychol-
ogy, because so many of Freud’s ideas were sci-
entifically untestable or failed to be supported
when they were tested. Modern critics have dis-
covered that Freud was not the theoretical genius,
impartial scientist, or even successful clinician that
he claimed to be. On the contrary, Freud often

Recite & Review

Recite: Tell your imaginary analyst as much as you can about psychoanalysis, especially Freud’s

notions about the id, ego, and superego; defense mechanisms; and the five psychosexual stages

of personality development, including the Oedipus complex.

Review: Next, go back and read this section again.

Now take this Quick Quiz:

Which Freudian concepts do the following events suggest?

1. A 4-year-old girl wants to snuggle on Daddy’s lap but refuses to kiss her mother.


2. A celibate priest writes poetry about sexual passion.


3. A man who is angry with his boss shouts at his kids for making noise.


4. A woman tells her husband, who has gambled away thousands of dollars of the family’s sav-
   ings, that she fears he is addicted to gambling. “Nonsense,” he says. “Losing money at the
   races could happen to anyone.”


5. A 9-year-old girl who moves to a new city starts having tantrums.
   Answers:

Study and Review at mypsychlab

regression 5. denial4. displacement3. sublimation2. Oedipus complex1.

Other Psychodynamic Approaches

LO 2.5, LO 2.6

Some of Freud’s followers stayed in the psychoan-
alytic tradition and modified Freud’s theories from
within. Women, as you might imagine, were not
too pleased about “penis envy.” Clara Thompson
(1943/1973) and Karen Horney [HORN-eye]
(1926/1973) argued that it was insulting and unsci-
entific to claim that half the human race is dissatis-
fied with its anatomy. When women feel inferior
to men, they said, we should look for explanations
in the disadvantages that women live with and

their second-class status. Other psychoanalysts

broke away from Freud, or were actively rejected

by him, and went off to start their own schools.

Jungian Theory. Carl Jung (1875–1961) was

originally one of Freud’s closest friends and a

member of his inner circle, but the friendship

ended with a furious quarrel about the nature of

the unconscious. In addition to the individual’s

own unconscious, said Jung (1967), all human

beings share a vast collective unconscious, contain-

ing universal memories, symbols, and themes,

which he called archetypes.

collective uncon-

scious In Jungian theory,

the universal memories

and experiences of

humankind, represented

in the symbols, stories,

and images (archetypes)

that occur across all

cultures.