120 Psychodynamic Models of Personality
TABLE 5.1 The Psychosexual Stage Model
Associated
Stage Age Range Developmental Task Character Traits
Oral 0–18 months Moving from infantile Dependency
dependency toward
autonomy and self-
sufficiency
Anal 18–36 months Learning to exercise Obsessiveness
control over one’s
body, one’s impulses,
and other people
Oedipal 5–6 years Mastering competitive Competitiveness
urges and acquiring
gender role related
behaviors
Latency 6 years– Investing energy in —
puberty conflict-free
(nonsexual) tasks
and activities
Genital Puberty Mature sexuality —
onward (blending of
sexuality and
intimacy)
Note.Dashes indicate that no associated character traits exist (fixation in the
latency and genital periods does not play a role in classical psychoanalytic
theory).has provided a surprising degree of support for this tripartite
approach in the areas of memory and information processing
(Bucci, 1997; Stein, 1997; Westen, 1998). Consciousness is
indeed linked with attentional capacity, and studies show that
a great deal of mental processing (including perceptual pro-
cessing) occurs preconsciously (Bornstein, 1999b; Erdelyi,
1985). As noted earlier, the existence of a dynamic uncon-
scious remains controversial, with some researchers arguing
that evidence favoring this construct is compelling (Westen,
1998), and others contending that “unconscious” processing
can be accounted for without positing the existence of a
Freudian repository of repressed wishes and troubling urges
and impulses (Kihlstrom, 1987, 1999).
Perhaps the most troubling aspect of the topographic
model—for Freud and for contemporary experimentalists as
well—concerns the dynamics of information flow (i.e., the
mechanisms through which information passes among
different parts of the mind). Freud (1900/1958a, 1915/1957,
1933/1964a) used a variety of analogies to describe informa-
tion movement among the conscious, preconscious, and un-
conscious, the most well-known of these being hisgatekeeper
(who helped prevent unconscious information from reaching
conscious awareness), andanteroom(where preconscious in-
formation was held temporarily before being stored in the un-
conscious). Contemporary researchers (e.g., Baddeley, 1990)
have coined terms more scientific than those Freud used (e.g.,
central executive, visuospatial scratch pad), but in fact they
have not been much more successful than Freud was at spec-
ifying the psychological and neurological mechanisms that
mediate intrapsychic information flow.
The Psychosexual Stage Model
Freud clung to the drive model (and its associated topo-
graphic framework) for several decades, in part because of his
neurological background, but also because the drive model
helped him bridge the gap between biological instincts and
his hypothesized stages of development. By 1905, Freud had
outlined the key elements of hispsychosexual stage model,
which argued that early in life humans progress through an
invariant sequence of developmental stages, each with its
own unique challenge and its own mode of drive (i.e., sexual)
gratification (Freud, 1905/1953, 1918/1955a). Freud’s psy-
chosexual stages—oral, anal, Oedipal, latency, and genital—
are well known even to nonpsychoanalytic psychologists. So
are the oral, anal, and Oedipal (or phallic) character types as-
sociated with fixation at these stages (Fisher & Greenberg,
1996). From a personality perspective, the psychosexual
stage model marks a turning point in the history of psycho-
analysis because it was only with the articulation of this
model that personality moved from the periphery to the cen-
ter of psychoanalytic theory.
Table 5.1 illustrates the basic organization of Freud’s
(1905/1953) psychosexual stage model. Frustration or over-
gratification during the infantile, oral stage was hypothesized
to result in oral fixation, and an inability to resolve the devel-
opmental issues that characterize this period (e.g., conflicts
regarding dependency and autonomy). The psychosexual
stage model further postulated that the orally fixated (or oral
dependent) person would (a) remain dependent on others for
nurturance, protection, and support; and (b) continue to ex-
hibit behaviors in adulthood that reflect the oral stage (i.e.,
preoccupation with activities of the mouth, reliance on food
and eating as a means of coping with anxiety). Research sup-
ports the former hypothesis, but has generally failed to con-
firm the latter (Bornstein, 1996).
A parallel set of dynamics (i.e., frustration or overgratifi-
cation during toilet training) were assumed to produce anal
fixation and the development of an anal character type. Be-
cause toilet training was viewed by Freud as a struggle for
control over one’s body and impulses, the anally fixated indi-
vidual was thought to be preoccupied with issues of control,
and his or her behavior would thus be characterized by a con-
stellation of three traits, sometimes termed the anal triad:
obstinacy, orderliness, and parsimony (Masling & Schwartz,
1979). Fixation during the Oedipal stage was presumed to
result in a personality style marked by aggressiveness,