Running head: PSYCHOANALYTIC PERSONALITY ASSESSMENT 1

Psychoanalytic Personality Assessment

Jirapa Nanthachai

University of Phoenix

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Psychoanalytic Personality Assessment

Each individual has a difference personality. Personalities are often very hard to

understand. Many psychologists have different theories to find out why people are the way they

are. Psychoanalytic theory is one of those theories. Sigmund Freud is one of the greatest

psychologists. Freud has a different point of view on how people act compare to Jung, and Adler.

In comparison and contrast the psychoanalysis theories of Freud, Jung, and Adler are very

similar but yet are different. Freud’s concept of psychological is based on sexuality and

unconscious personality. In this paper, will discuss compare and contrast the psychoanalytic

theories of Freud, Jung, and Adler, describe the stages of Freud’s theory, explain characteristics

of personality using these components, and describe uses of at least three Freudian defense

mechanisms with real-life examples.

Types of theories of Sigmund Freud, Alfred Adler, and Carl G. Jung’s theories are

psychoanalytic theories. Their basic ideas are human behavior is determined by a person’s past

or childhood experiences, which color his or her perceptions of current events. Freud develops

the theory of psychosexual development. Adler develops individual psychology. Jung develops

analytical psychology. Freud divided three characteristics of personality to id, ego, and superego.

The id or it, is the core of personality and not influenced by the outside world. Id is responsible

for human’s desires. The ego or I is the personality structure that develops to deal with the real

world. The ego works as the middleman between the id and the reality. The superego or over-I is

the personality structure that develops to the regulator of thoughts, feeling, and behaviors of

society. Jung’s theory deals with libido, motivational energy to seek pleasure and reduce pain

and conflict. Jung divided the mind into three parts; the conscious ego, the personal unconscious,

and the collective unconscious.

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The conscious ego is the conscious awareness of self. The personal unconscious is

contained both feeling and thought that are parts of conscious. The collective unconscious, Jung

uses the term called archetypes to represent universal thoughts, symbols, or images. Adler’

viewpoint of personality is that each individual has different personality. Adler believes each

person is a unique individual. The two characteristics that I agree are animus and anima

archetypes by Jung and Adler’s interpersonal forces operating with the external environment.

Animus and anima archetypes contain both gender characteristics. This archetype explains why

women are in military and men work as fashion designers. For second characteristic that I agree

with is Alder’s theory that is about we behave differently depending on environment we are. The

two characteristics that I do not agree with are Freud’s theories of the id, ego, and superego. I do

not believe each of them is separated and operated completely on their own. They should have

some interaction between the three. Another characteristic is Adler’s view on the conscious and

unconscious areas of the mind.

The stages of Freud’s theory are oral, anal, phallic, latency, and genital stages.

Characteristics of personality using Freud’s theory as follow:

Oral stage: this stage refers to new born babies. According to Friedman & Schustack (2009),

“infants are driven to satisfy their drives of hunger and thirst, and they turn to their mother’s

breast or bottle for this satisfaction” (p. 70). Babies are in oral stage during their first year, as

example, sucking at their mother’s breast to satisfy feelings of hungry. If an infant does not

receive adequate oral gratification, a person may bite his or her nails; chew on pens, or excessive

eating or drinking.

Anal Stage: this stage starts from ages 1-3 years old. According to Cherry (2012), “during the

anal stage, Freud believed that the primary focus of the libido was on controlling bladder and

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bowel movements. The major conflict at this stage is toilet training—the child has to learn to

control his or her bodily needs. Developing this control leads to a sense of accomplishment and

independent” (para. 1). This stage, babies are learning to express negative feelings also.

Phallic Stage: this stage starts from ages 3-6. This stage, children learn about their genders. They

focus on the differences between boys and girls. Friedman & Schustack stated that Freud uses

the term Oedipus complex to describe a boy’s sexual feelings for his mother and rivalries with

his father.

Latency stage: this stage starts from ages 6-12 years old. Latency is considered to be social stage.

In this stage, children are more preoccupied with developing other skills and activities as

examples, sports, school, and friends. Children do not pay much attention to sexual motivations.

Genital stage: this stage starts from ages 12-18 years old. This is a final stage of development.

Stevenson (2001), "in the genital stage, as the child's energy once again focuses on his genitals,

interest turns to heterosexual relationships. The less energy the child has left invested in

unresolved psychosexual developments, the greater his capacity will be to develop normal

relationships with the opposite sex. If, however, he remains fixated, particularly on the phallic

stage, his development will be troubled as he struggles with further repression and defenses”

(The Genital Stage).

According to Friedman & Schustack (2009), “the processes that the ego uses to distort

reality to protect itself are called defense mechanisms” (p. 77). The three Freudian defense

mechanisms are repression, denial, and rationalization. The word “repress” means to put down

something. Friedman & Schustack (2009) stated, according to Freud, repression is the ego

defense mechanism that pushes threatening thoughts back into the unconscious. Regression

develops from the beginning of the face of unacceptable thoughts or impulses. As an example, a

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traumatized soldier sometimes cannot recall the details of the death they witnessed and torture

they witnessed and/or experienced. Denial is one of defense mechanism, denial is the refusal to

accept reality or fact, acting as if a painful event, thought or feeling did not exist. It is considered

one of the most primitive of the defense mechanisms because it is characteristic of early

childhood development. Many people use denial in their everyday lives to avoid dealing with

painful feelings or areas of their life they do not wish to admit (Grohol, 2010). As an example,

my roommate uses alcohol to avoid reality problem. He drinks wine after he gets off from work.

He usually says “I have not been drinking hard liquor or beers, wine is good for the health, and I

do not drink a lot.” The last defense mechanism in this paper is rationalization or making

excuses. “Rationalization is a mechanism involving post hoc (after the fact) logical explanations

for behaviors that were actually driven by internal unconscious motives” (Friedman &

Schustack, 2009, p. 87). Example of rationalization is students watch televisions or listen to the

music instead of doing homework, because taking a break help them to focus on their homework.

In conclusion, Freud, Jung, and Adler have similar concept of personality. However,

there are a little bit different among them. Freud believes based on sexuality and unconscious

personality. Jung believes based on archetypes. Adler believes based on individual psychology.

Each theory has advantages and disadvantages. However, we can use all theories to find out who

we are and what our personalities are.

References

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Cherry, K. (2012). Psychology. National Osteoporosis Foundation. Retrieved from

http://psychology.about.com/od/theoriesofpersonality/ss/psychosexualdev_3.htm

Friedman, H.s., & Schustack, M.W. (2009). Personality. Classic Theories and Modern Research

(4th ed.). New York, NY: Pearson.

Grohol, J.M. (2010). 15 Common defense mechanism. National Osteoporosis Foundation.

Retrieved from http://psychcentral.com/lib/2007/15-common-defense-mechanisms/

Stevenson, D.B. (2001). Freud's Psychosexual stages of development. National Osteoporosis

Foundation. Retrieved from http://www.victorianweb.org/science/freud/develop.html