Darragh_Scully

2004413

Edith Cowan University

Personality

PSY3204

1.      According to Freudian theory, the id is governed by the pleasure principle. What is the Pleasure Principle?

The id consists of unconscious sexual and aggressive instincts (Stone, 1982; Levin, 1975; Massao, 1998; Ryckman, 2000; Mischel, 1999). These urges are life forces such as hunger, thirst and excretion. Freud was a doctor and understood that the body constantly seeks homeostasis through the satisfaction of all its biological systems (Massao, 1998). When the biological systems become imbalanced nerve impulses signal to the brain to take appropriate action. The sensory systems are connected by the sympathetic and parasympathetic systems to the central control regions in the brain (Massao, 1998). When excitation of the sensory nerve endings occurs the sympathetic nervous system prepares the body for action and the parasympathetic system brings the system back to resting state. Freud believed that Homeostasis is re-established when the given biological system is satisfied (Massao, 1998) which is now somewhat validated with neurology research. At the stage were equilibrium becomes imbalanced the need to re establish equilibrium is governed by the Pleasure principle (Ryckman, 2000; Stone, 1982). Freud stated that the pleasure principle refers to seeking of pleasurable sensations and the avoidance of unpleasant sensations (Stone, 1982; Levin, 1975).

Instincts are primarily determined by avoiding pain and this is done through giving the body the energy it requires (basal metabolism, synaptic substrates etc) and reacting to external stimuli with defences (Stone, 1982). This primary instinct also forms the basis for addressing anxiety (a source of pain) (Stone, 1982). Physiological arousal for example is primarily a defensive behaviour. Environmental stimuli act on the body causing arousal though the body attempts to reduce excessive arousal. One example of this is when bright light causes squinting to block out the light (Stone, 1982). This is referred to as a reflex action. Freud incorrectly labels this action as an unconscious action it is more commonly referred to as an involuntary action. When the reflex action does not produce satisfaction the id instinct is to aggressively and impatiently pursue satisfaction (Stone, 1982).  Rather than give up Freud believed satisfaction of the id would be attained at any cost and thus labelled the id as narcissistic and amoral (Stone, 1982). This is possible to some extent as the executive functions of the mind can control involuntary actions though normally this is taken care of automatically so there is no direct need to do so. However Freud applies this logic to primary processing of thoughts and places less emphasis on the physiology of primary instincts. 

The process of primary process thinking is an important aspect of the id (Stone, 1982). Primary processing can temporarily relieve tension with the recall of an object of a given need (Stone, 1982). Anxiety is often caused by excessive arousal that is not successfully released or that is continual and leads to fatigue (Stone, 1982). Examples include sexual frustration and teasing or high levels of fear. Subsequently primary processing of anxiety provoking thoughts of reoccurring stressful memories can trigger hyper arousal of the autonomic nervous system, which is outlined in the DSM IV symptoms for anxiety disorder (Thompson, 1991).

The reason the id is impatient is that extended levels of physiological arousal causes fatigue of the sensory systems associated to a given stimuli and the id attempts to relieve the arousal and reduce pain in the most efficient way possible (Stone, 1982). Unfortunately society does not always condone the most efficient ways of doing things as they are selfish and often threaten the existence of the other members of society (Ryckman, 2000), for example sexual assault on a non consensual partner is a selfish and amoral act that is outlawed. The conscious mind develops some executive control over the instincts. People are expected to manage arousal in socially acceptable ways (Ryckman, 2000). Many theorists now believe that this itself is a source of anxiety, for example masturbation is a more appropriate way of satisfying the ids sexual needs than sexual assault though it is considered to be a reinforcer of deviant feelings. The id however does not listen to the demands of others and only cares about satisfying its own bodies needs. This is what Freud called the pursuit of pleasure and the avoidance of pain or the pleasure principle.

2.      Explain the Freudian concept of Defence Mechanism in relation to personality.

Freud believed that anxiety and emotional conflict are reduced by unconscious defence mechanisms (Stone, 1982; Freud, 1979). Defence mechanisms are an aspect of the ego (Ryckman, 2000; Mischel, 1999). Repressing impulses, reality testing and rigid superego ideas calls for the ego to adapt in defensive ways (Ryckman, 2000). This believed Freud was because of anxiety that was created through psychic conflict between the id, the ego and the superego (Ryckman, 2000). The ego is the rational part of the psyche that regulates both the id and the super ego. The satisfaction of id impulses or inhibition by the superego is restricted by the reality principle (Ryckman, 2000).  The ego utilises the Reality principle by attempting to delay gratification and anxiety will result (Stone, 1982). This happens with more than just the inhibition of id impulses (Stone, 1982). The super ego demands may be too rigid and a gratification of super ego demands may have to be inhibited which may also result in anxiety (moral dilemma) (Stone, 1982). Thus Unsatisfied id and super ego demands cause anxiety (Stone, 1982). Therefore to reduce the time length of delayed gratification defence mechanisms channel the energy into the unconscious or distort the expression of impulses to disguise them (Stone, 1982).

Defences operate unconsciously because they protect the conscious mind from ideas that would strain the limited resources in the conscious mind (Stone, 1982; Freud, 1979). Freud maintained that the change of ideas from anxiety provoking to ideas that are more acceptable must remain unconscious (Ryckman, 2000). In the event of conscious awareness of a defence the individual becomes aware and anxiety begins to build up which places a strain on the conscious mind. At this point ideally new defences develop, for example, when children become more dependants on projection and identification than denial with increasing age (Cramer and Brilliant, 2001). Cramer and Brilliant (2001) have found that denial is very common in children aged 4-6. However from the age of 8 it was found that projection is more common. This is because children understand the denial defence through repetition of its use where as projection is less well developed to become conscious (Cramer and Brilliant, 2001). Developmental theories however may account for increasing complexity in defences with the fact that increasing age also brings increasing cognitive ability that can improve problem-solving capacity. One example is Piaget’s cognitive development theory (Weiten, 1999)

Freud believed that defence mechanisms help to distinguish between normal and abnormal behaviour. For example Freud believed that neurosis was a result of the failure of defence mechanisms (Freud, 1979). In psychoanalysis of individuals with personality disorders the return of proper functions of defence mechanisms may indicate that the personality disorder has been resolved (Freud, 1979). Where as when defence mechanisms are failing the causes of anxiety may be recognized and strategies to reduce the anxiety can be developed (Freud, 1979). This could possibly be something that Erickson (Weiten, 1995) touches on when describing life changes. Resolving issues as defences become invalid with age and circumstance can greatly increase the successful progress of personality development through the lifespan.

3.      Within Jung’s mode, what are the key differences between the “personal unconscious” and the “ collective unconscious”? How do they relate to personality?

The personal unconscious and collective unconscious is an important feature of Jung’s interpretation of personality. Jung believed that the collective unconscious consisted of accumulated characters that portray the stereotypes associated to the common features of life (Young-Eisendrath &Dawson, 1997; Jung, 1964; Platania, 1997; Ryckman, 2000). The Collective unconscious is universal in nature as it accumulates out of collective history and is based on universal experiences such as birth, death, love and hate (etc) (Platania, 1997). The universal immortal themes are represented by Archetypes, symbols and mythological characters often relating to art or religion and are common among existing ancient culture (Jung, 1964; Platania, 1997). In contrast is the personal unconscious as it relates to events in a given individuals lifespan that are repressed or forgotten. The personal unconscious is individual in nature as it is a direct result of an individual’s experience (Platania, 1997, Ryckman, 2000). Jung believed that the two unconscious forces interact with the conscious mind and attempt to balance out psychic conflict (Jung, 1964).

The Personal unconscious consists partly of the repression of thoughts that are similar to negative archetypes.  The repression aspect of the Personal unconscious is a theme associated to Jung’s association with Freud. Jung claimed however that the categorization of a repressed idea related to the universal theme of the archetypes influence on appropriate behaviour on an unconscious level (Jung, 1964). Archetypes are a guide to how an individual is expected to act in a given situation (Jung, 1964). In some instances they act as a warning about ones own actions (Jung, 1964). Other times they act as a guide to protect against external dangers (Jung, 1964). The collective unconscious thus has a direct interaction with the personal unconscious. Jung himself experienced this when he wrote Wotan, which depicts the rise of Hitler in Germany (Platania, 1997). Despite being a caring and genuine person Jung got caught up in the Anti Semite movements in Germany (Platania, 1997). Thus Wotan was the interaction of Jung’s true self as the archetype that came into conflict with things that became repressed or unimportant in relation to the atrocities of Nazi Germany. Previous to writing Wotan Jung dreamed the turmoil that would occur in Europe (Platania, 1997). These interactions are part of Jung’s theme of Self-realization.

Self realization refers to Continual attempts by the individual to understand his or her experiences, to develop healthy attitudes and to reconcile the opposing forces with in the psyche through transcendence (Ryckman, 2000). The unconscious thus acts as a guide to understanding the continual states of crisis that characterizes human development. When the person experiences self realization by releasing defences and assimilating with the collective unconscious self-realization is the outcome. Jung often relates these experiences to good health. When self-realization occurs Jung believed that self-realization triggers a natural state of well being characterized by the powerful spiritual feelings he termed numinousity. Numinosity can occur when the psychic conflict between ones conscious mind and unconscious mind create a situation that is positive (Platania, 1997). The numinous feelings however are most likely Jung’s explanation for the physiological effects he gained from an infatuation with yoga meditation (Platania, 1997). The following quote explains how this happens in the brain.

“To explore exactly what part of the brain meditation acts on, researchers at Harvard Medical School used MRI technology on participants to monitor brain activity while they meditated. They found that it activates the sections of the brain in charge of the autonomic nervous system, which governs the functions in our bodies that we can't control, such as digestion and blood pressure. These are also the functions that are often compromised by stress” (Barber, p. 54, 2001).

Other forms of numinous like feelings are associated to orgasm and exercise, which derive pleasure chemicals (Weiten, 1995). As Jung is concerned with anxiety provoking thoughts (Monte, 837-842, 1995) it is likely that his meditation aspects allow the associated effects to place too much emphasis on perceived para-normal events.

4.      Explain and discuss Horney’s primary concept of “basic anxiety”.

Karen Horney’s theory of Basic Anxiety revolves around hyper competitive parents who are pressured by psychologically draining forces of modern living and the effect that parenting styles have on the children of hypercompetetive parents (Ryckman, 2000). Hyper competitiveness consists of an attitude of winning at all costs and trivial indiscriminate competition for the purpose of elevating self esteem (Ryckman, 2000). Horney believed that people who develop a hypercompetitive personality style have been emotionally and physically abused (Ryckman, 2000).  The feelings of powerlessness and insignificance become repressed (Ryckman, 2000). After this has occurred Horney claims that hypercompetitive individuals fantasise about power and success to overcome the powerlessness and insignificance in their feelings (Ryckman, 2000).

Natural feelings of weakness derived from dependency needs in infancy allow infants to adopt moving toward, away or against defences that are part of normal adaptive responses to stimuli interaction with basic needs (Bernet, 2001) that Horney calls Existential anxiety. Normal development involves non-fixation on any of these responses, which occurs when environmental conditions support the child’s needs, who would then effectively cope with existential anxiety (O’Connell, 1980). If existential anxiety adaptations are not appropriately provided for by the caregiver fixations can develop and “hostile impulses towards parents” (McLellan, 1992) a condition Horney calls Basic anxiety (Horney, cited in Bernet, 2001). The basic needs that are not tended to produce feelings of anxiety that reflect weakness and helplessness and the external environment is perceived as hostile (Bernet, 2001; O’Connell, 1980).

Having a hypercompetitive parent or parents creates basic anxiety. This abnormal set of development circumstances leads to the basis concept of the neurotic personality - basic anxiety.  Parental hyper -competitiveness creates situations where feelings of isolation and helplessness cause the child to see the world as a place were harm is a likely occurrence (Bernet, 2001; Ryckman, 2000; O’Connell, 1993). These feelings will be a source of anxiety similar to the negative aspects of Freud’s primary processing mentioned above.

            According to Horney, as a result of suffering basic anxiety excessively children may have abnormal development of defence mechanisms that Horney outlines as the Neurotic coping strategies. Neurotic coping strategies may be described as maladaptive cathexis as they always involve perceived irrational needs. Horney has classified neurotic needs into three categories - moving toward, moving away and moving against people (see chart 1). The overriding factor is the persistent tendency to gratify neurotic needs. The neurotic personality today however would possibly be a differential diagnosis issue as symptoms of APD, OCD, ODD, PTSD and Feigning disorder (Allen, 2001) among others are present in Horney’s theory.  The theory may be useful for treating individuals who’ve lost parents in infancy or who were not cared for adequately. Hare’s Psychopath checklist encompasses similar concepts, which is not surprising, as the loss of a parent of Authoritarian neglectful parents has been connected with psychopathy.

5. Discuss two pitfalls of the trait approach to personality.

A problem with traits includes the tendency for traits to be generalized to all situations (Mischel cited in McAdams, 2000). This can be a problem as it has been shown that different situations utilize alternative personality aspects. This leads to the problem of heritability of traits attributes (Buss & Plumin, cited in Pervin, 1994) versus experiential and environmental factors (Roberts & Donahue, 1994). It can be argued that traits are not alone reliable when so much of an individuals personality is in-fact socially and culturally determined and vice versa. Thus McAdams (2000) outlines that the trend in personality theory is an interaction one. 

Personality traits represent heritable characteristics of behaviour (Buss & Plumin, cited in Pervin, 1994). Inherited genetics constructs are stable throughout the lifespan. Therefore temperament variables that are predominantly heritable will allow trait adjectives to accurately predict or describe personality (Buss & Plumin, cited in Pervin, 1994. This is something Costa and McCrea (cited in Funder and Colvin, 1991) posit for the reliability of the big five-trait dimension. It has been also noted that trait constructs that reflect attitudes are less dependant on inherited factors. However Penner (cited in McAdams, 2000) states that inner-directedness predicts consistency of traits across different situations. However do traits offer any explanation for internalized attitudes or goals? Pervin (1994) for example claims that they do not as these are motivated behaviours rather than innate tendencies. For example do traits account for religious values and attitudes of society that determine choices of members of religious groups? People have held firm to these values through out their lives yet they are predominantly learned, practiced and reinforced before they become part of personality. Kohlbergs (Weiten, 1995) theory of moral development however does state that not everyone progresses to the highest states of moral development indicating that heritability does influence the extent that values and attitudes can be encoded and expressed in ones personality as does the environment and culture.

McAdams (1994) argues that traits only allow us to construct a psychology of the Stranger, and personality research needs to account for the fact that personality is more than traits.

Mischel (Cited in McAdams, 2000; Shadel & Cervone, 1993) argues that personality varies from situation to situation. Mischel idea comes from Allport who noted that traits tend to generalize personality across situations and many personality theorists agreed that this was a problem (McAdams, 2000). Pervin and Farnham (1987) stated that individuals have both stable goals and variable goals based on situation factors. This presents a notable difficulty in observing personality and as Allport puts it similar behaviours have different roots while different behaviours have the same origins (Pervin, 1994). Some personality similarities and differences may be trait determined while others may be dependant on attitude. 

Roberts and Donahue (1994) have shown good support for Pervin and Farnham’s (1987) idea of stability and variability across situations. They found that  

(i)      Individuals describe themselves differently according to the type of role they are undertaking

(ii)    Individuals rate themselves more or less on different attributes

(iii)   Particular attribute are uniquely associated with certain roles

Thus people determine personality in terms of a given role and that personality attributes are rated higher or lower dependant on the role. However the more comfortable a individual is with a given role the more likely that trait conceptions will match with role specific self conceptions. This is similar to Penner's (cited in McAdams, 2000) argument that inner directedness can predict consistency of trait behaviour across situations thought it adds the element of aggregated experience for environment factors. Given that the world is a place that is always experiencing change traits alone cannot be relied on for determining personality. Though as change is often slow or that change is often definite and understood traits can help to predict how an individual reacts in a comfortable situation (work or family life) or one that the individual is prepared to deal with (eg war).

Traits however offer little insight into the attitudes and values individuals posses, which strongly impacts on determined behaviour or choices. However with experience and a stable environment individuals have been shown to have trait specific behaviours to a given role and that different roles elicit different trait behaviours.

References

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