Sigmund Freud: Psychoanalytic Therapy

Psychoanalytic therapy is the still an effective therapy and intervention today as it is found by theories of Sigmund Freud. Sigmund Freud is one of the forefathers of psychology and the founder of psychoanalysis. Sigmund Freud laid the foundation for psychotherapy with human behaviour, the role of the conscious, unconscious, subconscious and other several major concepts. Psychotherapy is a treatment used by a professional to establish a relationship with a client with the objective of finding out the disturbed pattern of behaviour. Psychoanalytic therapy takes a look at the unconscious mind by using different techniques and looking at your childhood to define some of the behaviour that you’re behaving. The conscious, subconscious and unconscious

But psychotherapy alone does not heal the client but helps to find out the main cause of the behaviour that they are facing. Psychotherapy helps understand and identify problems like death in the family, a loss of job or even a divorce. Psychoanalysis involves free association, dream interpretation, and analysis of transference to discover repressed and unconscious urge. Free association is a technique that was the first psychoanalysis that was formulated by Sigmund Freud. It is also the main method used in a psychoanalytic therapy. Free association allows patients to speak whatever that comes to their minds and not the idea of the analyst repeating itself. The client is stimulated to say whatever thought that comes to their mind, regardless of thoughts that are painful or sad. It could open up the unconscious and may take a peek into their fantasies. The therapist should identify and explain the meaning of the behaviour. In dream interpretation, Freud’s theory states that in our unconscious, we store our desires and express our desires in our dreams to protect our conscious mind from disturbing thoughts and urges. Dream interpretation is now more popular even though researches have not found out a purpose for having dreams. Analysis of transference is a transfer of feelings from an individual to another in

Id, is the ferocious drives that may approximate to the biological component. Psychosexual development is the central component of the psychoanalytic sexual drive theory, that human beings from birth, possess an instinctual libido that develops in five stages which are, the oral, the anal, the phallic, the latent, and the genital. Each stage is characterized by the erogenous zone that is the source of the libidinal drive. These are called psychosexual stages because each stage represents the fixation of libido on a different area of the body, as a person grows physically, certain areas of their body becomes important as sources of potential frustration, pleasure or both. (McLeod.S, 2008) The ego attempts to intercede between the id and the phenomenon of risks posed by the id’s desire. These are viewed as energy systems. The behaviour is decisive by this psychic energy. The id is the only component of personality that is present from birth. It is an act according to the pleasure principle seeking to avoid pain or unpleasure aroused by increases in instinctual tension. The superego reflects the internalization of cultural rules that are taught by parents who would apply their guidance and influence. The superego aims for perfection and forms an organized part of the personality structure mainly but not entirely unconscious. The superego can include an individual’s ego ideals, spiritual goals and