Psychology

Of the many psychologists who have ever existed and dedicated their work in psychological research, few have made an enormous impact or created an astounding controversy that Sigmund Freud ever made (Boeree, 2009). Although there has been great debate on the work and theories of Sigmund in the recent years, a small number of modern theories are all-inclusive and more comprehensive than the theory of psychoanalysis developed by Sigmund Freud. This paper will discuss in detail Sigmund Freud and the theory of psychoanalysis. It will also attempt to answer the question of its relevance in the modern life.

Sigmund Freud and Psychoanalysis
Sigmund Freud, an Australian neurologist and founder of psychoanalysis in psychiatry was born in May 6th, 1856 in the town of Freiberg, in Moravia and died in September 23rd, 1939 (Boeree, 2009). He studied medicine which was a very rare occurrence for the Jews in Vienna in his days. Sigmund involved himself in research while in school with the direction of a professor of psychology called Ernst Brucke (Boeree, 2009). Sigmund worked hand in hand with Brucke and concentrated on neurophysiology. The work of Sigmund led to the innovation of a unique cell-staining technique. He involved himself in a variety of experiments and tests, whose inferences became the basis of his arguments and discoveries.

Sigmund is popularly known for his theories of defense mechanism of repression and that of the unconscious mind. He also created the clinical practice of psychoanalysis to treat psychopathologies through dialogue between the patient and a psychoanalyst. Sigmunds prominence is also seen for his redefinition of sexual desire as the primary motivational energy of human life (Margolis, 1994). He is renowned for his therapeutic techniques which include transference theory in the therapeutic relations, the application of free association and the dreams interpretation as basis into unconscious longings insight. Despite all this, with the modern advances in psychology, some of the theories of Sigmund have shown some weaknesses (Rand,  Torok, 1997). However, Sigmunds work still remains important in individuals desire for self-understanding.

Psychoanalysis is the theory or rather a group of theories developed by Sigmund. Psychoanalysis is concerned with the study of human psychological performance and behavior. There are three main applications of psychoanalysis in the modern setting. It is a method of treatment of psychological illness widely used in clinical psychology. The set of theories try to give an explanation to the human behavior which is imperative in understanding differences in individuals either in homes or in workplaces. Psychoanalysis tries to answer the question on how the human mind works and the way one thinks. Freudian psychoanalysis refers to a particular type of healing in which the patient verbalizes thoughts, fantasies, and dreams from which the psychoanalyst devises the unconscious conflicts that cause the patients symptoms and interprets them for the patient to formulate an approach for resolution of the problems. 

In psychoanalysis, the roles of a psychoanalyst normally include tackling and clarifying the patients pathological defenses, wishes and guilt. Psychoanalytic healing clarifies how patients can unconsciously realize that they are the cause of their own worst problems (Kovel, 1978). This implies that the unconscious and symbolic reactions that are stimulated by experience are the ones causing the symptoms on the patient. This is formulated through the analysis of conflicts, including those contributing to resistance and those involving transference onto the psychoanalyst of imprecise reactions (Kovel, 1978). 

Sigmunds set of theories can be distinguished easily because they touch the human behavior from different perspectives. They can be grouped into several theoretical schools of thought and it is evident that they differ in one way or another. Most of these theories emphasize the strong influence of unconscious elements that affect the mental lives of individuals (Margolis, 1994). In some cases, it is clear that there are specific elements that conflict and these such as the different types of syndromes and the disputes on the best treatments that should be administered on them. To be precise, in the fields of childcare literary criticism, cultural studies, mental health and education, the psychoanalytic ideas are based on the western cultures (Day, 1998).

Sigmund argued that the road to unconsciousness was marked by dreams. In order to understand the aspects of personality as they relate to pathology, Sigmund began by analyzing dreams. He discovered that patients could at one point find a connection between the dreams they had experienced before and the direction of their association (Day, 1998). Sigmund could further help his patients to uncover the hidden and apparent association and emotions connected with the occurrences of the dream. He would always find out the connections with sexual feelings, early childhood trauma and even with the details of the human mind. He had some belief that the human behavior was not a chance occurrence but a motivation by the unconscious to some extents, and that includes all actions and thoughts of a particular individual (Day, 1998).

Sigmund realized that the elements in every individuals dream seem to be particularly close to withdrawn unconscious content. In addition, the associations that are free, starting from those elements of the dream, quickly encounter topics leading to arousal of emotions. This is because the unconscious is stimulated, and what follows is the resistance of those feelings. Individuals have a habit of withdrawing their impulses and holding back their urges with an aim of fitting well in the civilized society.  Nevertheless, these impulses and urges have to be let out in one way or another, though in a disguised way. One of the ways is through dreams (Day, 1998).

One of the significant theories of Sigmund related to psychoanalysis was the theory about the structure of personality. It is evident that Sigmund used a biological orientation in his research works, and this was simply due to the fact that he had received training in medicine till the times he began his psychiatry. He perceived an individual as an element of dynamic energy that is incessantly searching for a way to discharge and in turn continuously wanting to be replenished. He referred to this as libido, a kind of energy that naturally empowers the instincts of life. This kind of energy is regularly used and needs to be replaced each time (Day, 1998). The replacement of the energy needs components and elements of food, love and security among others.

Sigmund in his psychoanalysis work further stipulated that the direct human behavior is directed to reduce tension in the body of an individual that is caused by the needs derived from the instincts. He termed this as the pleasure principle, an attempt to keep tension and excitation as low as required (Freud, 1910). Sigmund recognized the best directional functioning to what he called id. According to Sigmund, id consisted of other genetically determined characteristics such as the urge to love and to seek gratification.  In an individual, according to the pleasure principle, the id struggles to bring about the satisfaction of instinctual needs. The id is a representative of the inner world that doesnt have any knowledge of objective reality. The ids psychic processes are mainly primary processes that have undirected attempts at immediate satisfaction. Id is not governed by logic but contains impulses that are contradictory though they do co-exist among themselves. At the unconscious level, the individuals primary subjective reality is the id (Freud, 1910).

The id in a human mind has the capacity to formulate a necessity among other things. The id invokes ego. Since the organisms need to be comfortable with external reality, the ego develops from the id. This is to satisfy the requirements of the instincts. Sigmund describes ego as an agent that regulates demands. Ego also acts as an intermediary which registers demands and meets those various demands. This in turn brings about the coordination with the environment or rather the world of realty. The reality principle influences the ego greatly despite the fact that the ego seeks pleasure and tries to avoid pain. The reality principle delays the immediate satisfaction upon recognizing the social requirements (Freud, 1910). The operation of the reality principle depends on the secondary processes that include problem solving, perception and withdrawal, which implies logical thinking, realistic and reality testing.

The pleasure principle makes one to look out for pleasure and avoid pain. Nevertheless, as one matures and grows into adulthood, one learns and gets to be more reasonable about this act of seeking pleasure and avoiding reality simply due to the obstacles of reality. It is necessary for one to take into account to these obstacles of reality because they will need to obtain pleasure in the longer term in life. To fulfill the needs of life, an individual that is directed by the inner mind takes into account of the obstacles of reality in a rational and objective way and working towards achieving the goal of individuation through self actualization (Freud, 1910).

A mature adult function is the ego (Freud, 1927). If it is not fully developed however, the function of the superego performs the multifarious safety and acceptance demands of the environment. Sigmund described the superego as a model of social reality that is internalized. It is the superego that gives emphasis to the authority numbers within a reality.  The superego can be represented as a house made of tapes that have commands, restrictions and threats regularly in the actual voices of the original figures. When the ego is developed fully, it replaces superego introjections with its own ideals, based on its own reality testing. Introjections are the incorporations of parental and social standards (Freud, 1927).

Sigmund stipulated further that individuals with egos can comprehend objectively both the world and themselves. This implies that the individuals are possessed with insights and they have the capacity to contemplate longer time plans and schedules. They are known to opt decisively among options and follow their resolutions. It is depicted that they are aware of the drives that exist in them but they have learned to curb and channel them in the socially accepted ways (Freud, 1927). People with strong ego also have the capacity to resist pressures whether social or any type of pressure. They often go for whatever they want, and they work with what their main objective is, for instance in schools, a student with a strong ego can pick on a course, and he or she will make sure it is pursued. On the other hand, persons with weak ego are impulsive and infantile. The perceptions of their self and reality are imprecise (Freud, 1927). 

In his theory, Sigmund explains that the ego meditates among the id, the superego and the environment at the external. The main function of the ego is to find a balance between morals, drives that are primitive and realistic while satisfying the id and superego. The ego is mainly concerned with the safety of an individual and allows the desires of the ego to be expressed. However, this only happens when the results of these actions are insignificant. The ego therefore is associated with a group of cognitive functions such as reality testing, defense mechanisms, intellectual functioning, memory and synthesis of information (Freud, 1927).

Sigmunds psychoanalytical theory considers the superego as apiece of the higher id which has direct access to the ego and it is a representative of the society in the mind. The superego in made of the structure of the mind, that helps in the regulation of the relationship between the instinctual desires, the ego and the outside world. Sigmund noted that, at different periods during the human growth, different parts of an individuals body skin give the greatest pleasure. Various theorists referred these parts as erogenous zones (Fennessy, 2006). It appeared to Sigmund that an infant could find its pleasure in sucking its mothers breasts. During his research, Sigmund established the psychosexual stage theory. He established five stages in the development of sexuality in a human (Fennessy, 2006).

The first stage is the oral stage which lasts from the time when one is born to about eighteen months. The emphasis of pleasure is the mouth, and the infant really enjoys sucking and biting. Second is the anal stage which also lasts from eighteen months to three or four years. The focus of pleasure in anal stage lies at the anus. Holding it in and letting it go are greatly enjoyed (Fennessy, 2006). The third stage is the phallic stage which lasts from three or four years to seven years. Genitals are the point of pleasure in the phallic stage and children frequently masturbate during the phallic age. Stage number four is the latent stage that lasts from seven years to puberty which ends at around twelve years. Sigmund believed that the sexual impulse was concealed in the service of learning. The final stage is the genital stage which begins at puberty and represents the resurgence of the sex desire in adolescence, and the most emphasis of pleasure is in sexual intercourse (Fennessy, 2006). Sigmund had the feeling that masturbation, oral sex, homosexuality, and many other things we find acceptable in adulthood today, were all immature.

Sigmunds psychoanalysis therapy was more influential at those times than all the psychotherapies that existed. His therapy was done in a relaxed environment. This was in the favor of the patients to feel free to express anything that was in their minds. The process of psychoanalytical therapy is one of the most unique situations one where an individual needs not to have worries of possible social judgments (AROPA, 2009). There is also free association between the therapist and the patient. Sigmund had a belief that with relaxation, the unconscious conflicts will inevitably drift to the front. The whole therapy process seems like a dream, but there is a therapist who notes the clues that the patient tends to overlook (AROPA, 2009). One of the clues is resistance. For instance, when a patient tries to change the topic, fall a sleep, comes in late, or skips an appointment, it suggests that the patient is near to something in his free associations.

Sigmunds psychoanalytical theory of defense mechanisms explains how individuals tend to evade the wrongs they find themselves in. These mechanisms include delusion, lying, compulsive thinking and negative emotions (Kazlev, 2004). These defense mechanisms happen so quickly and if one is not keen enough, he or she may not notice them. A lie is the refusal to acknowledge what is perceived. Lies are used to submerge truth and keep it unconscious so that the status quo is maintained (Kazlev, 2004). 

In conclusion, Sigmund did a lot of work in the world of psychoanalysis. He wrote books, articles and journals trying to give an understanding of the human behavior. His theories have been modified and they are being used by todays scholars in different institutions. Some of his books include the future of an illusion, civilization and its discontents, the ego and the id, beyond the pleasure principle and three essays on the theory of sexuality among many others. His work in psychoanalysis will continue to play a key role in the field of clinical psychology as well as other allied fields of psychological studies.