PSYCHOSEXUAL DEVELOPMENT OF SIGMUND FREUD INTRODUCTION Sigmund Freud (May 6, 1856 - September 23, 1939) was an Austrian psychiatrist

and the founder of the psychoanalytic school of psychology, a movement that popularized the the ory that unconscious motives control much behavior. He became interested in hypn otism and how it could be used to help the mentally ill. He later abandoned hypn otism in favor of free association and dream analysis in developing what is now known as "the talking cure." These became the core elements of psychoanalysis. F reud was especially interested in what was then called hysteria, and is now call ed conversion syndrome. The name Freud is generally pronounced Froid in English and Froit in German. Freud's theories, and his treatment of patients, were contr oversial in 19th century Vienna, and remain hotly debated today. Freud's ideas a re often discussed and analyzed as works of literature, philosophy, and general culture in addition to continuing debate around them as scientific and medical t reatises. He is commonly referred to as "the father of psychoanalysis." A child at a given stage of development has certain needs and demands, such as t he need of the infant to nurse. Frustration occurs when these needs are not met; Overindulgence stems from such an ample meeting of these needs that the child i s reluctant to progress beyond the stage. Both frustration and overindulgence lo ck some amount of the child's libido permanently into the stage in which they oc cur; both result in a fixation. If a child progresses normally through the stage s, resolving each conflict and moving on, then little libido remains invested in each stage of development. But if he fixates at a particular stage, the method of obtaining satisfaction which characterized the stage will dominate and affect his adult personality. Freud (1905) proposed that psychological development in childhood takes place i n a series of fixed stages. These are called psychosexual stages because each s tage represents the fixation of libido (roughly translated as sexual drives or i nstincts) on a different area of the body. As a person grows physically certain areas of their body becomes important as sources of potential frustration (eroge nous zones), pleasure or both. Freud believed that life was built round tension and pleasure. Freud also believ ed that all tension was due to the build up of libido (sexual energy) and that a ll pleasure came from its discharge. In describing human personality development as psychosexual Freud meant to convey that what develops is the way in which se xual energy accumulates and is discharged as we mature biologically. (NB Freud u sed the term 'sexual' in a very general way to mean all pleasurable actions and thoughts). Freud stress that the first five years of life are crucial to the formation of a dult personality. The id must be controlled in order to satisfy social demands; this sets up a conflict between frustrated wishes and social norms. The ego and superego develop in order to exercise this control and direct the need for grati fication into socially acceptable channels. Gratification centers of different a reas of the body at different stages of growth, making the conflict at each stag e psychosexual. Stages of the psychosexual development Freud's model of psychosexual development Stage Age Range Erogenous zone Consequences of psychologic fixation Oral Birth1 year Mouth Orally aggressive: chewing gum and the ends of pencils, etc. Orally Passive: smoking, eating, kissing, oral sexual practices[4] Oral stage fixation might result in a passive, gullible, immature, manipulative personality. Anal 13 years Bowel and bladder elimination nized, or excessively neat Anal retentive: Obsessively orga

Anal expulsive: reckless, careless, defiant, disorganized, coprophiliac Phallic 36 years Genitalia Oedipus complex (in boys and girls); according to Sigmund Freud. Electra complex (in girls); according to Carl Jung. Latency 6puberty Dormant sexual feelings Sexual unfulfillment if fixation occurs in this stage. Genital Pubertydeath Sexual interests mature Frigidity, impotence, unsatisfac tory relationships

The Oral Stage Oral phase(0-1 year) The oral stage in psychology is the term used by Sigmund Freud to describe the c hild's development during the first eighteen months of life, in which an infant' s pleasure centers are in the mouth. This is the first of Freud's psychosexual s tages. This is the infant's first relationship with its mother; it is a nutritive one. The length of this stage depends on the society. In some societies it is common for a child to be nursed by its mother for several years, whereas in others the stage is much shorter. Suckling and eating, however, compose the earliest memori es for infants in every society. This stage holds special importance because som e, especially those in tribal societies commonly found in the Southwest Pacific and Africa, consider the stomach to be the seat of emotions. The oral stage begins at birth, when the oral cavity is the primary focus of lib idal energy. The child, of course, preoccupies himself with nursing, with the pl easure of sucking and accepting things into the mouth. The oral character who is frustrated at this stage, whose mother refused to nurse him on demand or who tr uncated nursing sessions early, is characterized by pessimism, envy, suspicion a nd sarcasm. The overindulged oral character, whose nursing urges were always and often excessively satisfied, is optimistic, gullible, and is full of admiration for others around him. The stage culminates in the primary conflict of weaning, which both deprives the child of the sensory pleasures of nursing and of the ps ychological pleasure of being cared for, mothered, and held. The stage lasts app roximately one and one-half years. The Anal Stage (1-3 years) Anal Stage (1-3 years) The libido now becomes focused on the anus and the child derives great pleasure from defecating. The child is now fully aware that they are a person in their o wn right and that their wishes can bring them into conflict with the demands of the outside world (i.e. their ego has developed). Freud believed that this type of conflict tends to come to a head in potty training, in which adults impose r estrictions on when and where the child can defecate. The nature of this first c onflict with authority can determine the child's future relationship with all fo rms of authority. Early or harsh potty training can lead to the child becoming an anal-retentive p ersonality who hates mess, is obsessively tidy, punctual and respectful of autho rity. They can be stubborn and tight-fisted with their cash and possessions. Thi s is all related to pleasure got from holding on to their faeces when toddlers, and their mum's then insisting that they get rid of it by placing them on the po tty until they perform! Not as daft as it sounds. The anal expulsive, on the oth er hand, underwent a liberal toilet-training regime during the anal stage. In ad ulthood the anal expulsive is the person who wants to share things with you. The y like giving things away. In essence they are 'sharing their s**t'! An anal-exp ulsive personality is also messy, disorganized and rebellious. The Phallic Stage(3 to 5 or 6 years) The phallic stage is the setting for the greatest, most crucial sexual conflict in Freud's model of development. In this stage, the child's erogenous zone is th e genital region. As the child becomes more interested in his genitals, and in t

he genitals of others, conflict arises. The conflict, labeled the Oedipus comple x (The Electra complex in women), involves the child's unconscious desire to pos sess the opposite-sexed parent and to eliminate the same-sexed one. In the young male, the Oedipus conflict stems from his natural love for his moth er, a love which becomes sexual as his libidal energy transfers from the anal re gion to his genitals. Unfortunately for the boy, his father stands in the way of this love. The boy therefore feels aggression and envy towards this rival, his father, and also feels fear that the father will strike back at him. As the boy has noticed that women, his mother in particular, have no penises, he is struck by a great fear that his father will remove his penis, too. The anxiety is aggra vated by the threats and discipline he incurs when caught masturbating by his pa rents. This castration anxiety outstrips his desire for his mother, so he repres ses the desire. Moreover, although the boy sees that though he cannot posses his mother, because his father does, he can posses her vicariously by identifying w ith his father and becoming as much like him as possible: this identification in doctrinates the boy into his appropriate sexual role in life. A lasting trace of the Oedipal conflict is the superego, the voice of the father within the boy. B y thus resolving his incestuous conundrum, the boy passes into the latency perio d, a period of libidal dormancy. On the Electra complex, Freud was more vague. The complex has its roots in the l ittle girl's discovery that she, along with her mother and all other women, lack the penis which her father and other men posses. Her love for her father then b ecomes both erotic and envious, as she yearns for a penis of her own. She comes to blame her mother for her perceived castration, and is struck by penis envy, t he apparent counterpart to the boy's castration anxiety. The resolution of the E lectra complex is far less clear-cut than the resolution of the Oedipus complex is in males; Freud stated that the resolution comes much later and is never trul y complete. Just as the boy learned his sexual role by identifying with his fath er, so the girl learns her role by identifying with her mother in an attempt to posses her father vicariously. At the eventual resolution of the conflict, the g irl passes into the latency period, though Freud implies that she always remains slightly fixated at the phallic stage. The girl resolves this by repressing her desire for her father and substituting the wish for a penis with the wish for a baby. The girl blames her mother for he r 'castrated state' and this creates great tension. The girl then represses her feelings (to remove the tension) and identifies with the mother to take on the f emale gender role. Fixation at the phallic stage develops a phallic character, who is reckless, res olute, self-assured, and narcissistic--excessively vain and proud. The failure t o resolve the conflict can also cause a person to be afraid or incapable of clos e love; Freud also postulated that fixation could be a root cause of homosexuali ty. Latency Period (puberty) The resolution of the phallic stage leads to the latency period, which is not a psychosexual stage of development, but a period in which the sexual drive lies d ormant. Freud saw latency as a period of unparalleled repression of sexual desir es and erogenous impulses. During the latency period, children pour this repress ed libidal energy into asexual pursuits such as school, athletics, and same-sex friendships. But soon puberty strikes, and the genitals once again become a cent ral focus of libidal energy. The Genital Stage (adult) 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 remai ns fixated, particularly on the phallic stage, his development will be troubled as he struggles with further repression and defenses.

The Role of Conflict Each of the psychosexual stages is associated with a particular conflict that mu st be resolved before the individual can successfully advance to the next stage. The resolution of each of these conflicts requires the expenditure of sexual en ergy and the more energy that is expended at a particular stage the more the imp ortant characteristics of that stage remain with the individual as he matures ps ychologically. To explain this Freud suggested the analogy of military troops on the march. As the troops advance they are met by opposition or conflict. If bthey are highly successful in winning the battle (resolving the conflict) then most of the troo ps (libido) will be able to move on to the" next battle (stage). But the greater the difficulty encountered of any particular point the greater the need for tro ops to remain behind to fight and thus the fewer that will be able to go on to t he next confrontation. Frustration, Overindulgence and Fixation Some people do not seem to be able to leave one stage and proceed on to the next . One reason for this may be that the needs of the developing individual at any particular stage may not have been adequately met in which case there is frustr ation. Or possibly the person's needs may have been so well satisfied that he i s reluctant to leave the psychological benefits of a particular stage in which t here is overindulgence. Both frustration and overindulgence (or any combination of the two) may lead to what psychoanalysts call fixation at a particular psychosexual stage. Fixation r efers to the theoretical notion that a portion of the individual's libido has be en permanently 'invested in a particular stage of his development. It is assumed that some libido is permanently invested in each psychosexual stage and thus ea ch person will behave in some ways that are characteristic of infancy, or early childhood. Evaluation of Freud's psychosexual development theory Four points: Difficult to test, but the evidence that has been gathered is not favourable The crucial events (e.g., how the libido is used) are unobservable, and there ar e no good means to measure them There is an awfully long time between the occurence of the causal stimulus and i ts presumed effect; relationships between early events and later traits tend to be weak and inconsistent This theory of development was conceived without studying children; rather, it w as developed from patients' recollections, dreams and free associations Criticism of Freud's theory of psychosexual development Feminist critique Freud's theories were decidedly andocentric, which is why he has received a grea t deal of criticism from feminists, as well as from gender theory practitioners. Freud had difficulty incorporating female desire into his theories. Freud attem pted to provide a theoretical explanation for feminine psychosexual development only rather late in his career. Freud personally confessed a lack of understandi ng of female sexuality and did not hold out hope that psychology would ever expl ain the phenomenon. Freud argued that young girls followed more or less the same psychosexual develo pment as boys. Whereas the boy would develop a castration conflict, the girl wou ld go on to develop penis envy, "the envy the female feels toward the male becau se the male possesses a penis." After this stage, the woman has an extra stage i n her development when the clitoris should wholly or in part hand over its sensi tivity and its importance to the vagina. The young girl must also at some point give up her first object-choice, the mother, in order to take the father as her new proper object-choice. Her eventual move into heterosexual femininity, which

culminates in giving birth, grows out of her earlier infantile desires, with her own child taking place of the penis in accordance with an ancient symbolic equi valence. Freud wrote: "girls feel deeply their lack of a sexual organ that is eq ual in value to the male one; they regard themselves on that account as inferior and this envy for the penis is the origin of a whole number of characteristic f eminine reactions."

McLeod, S. A. (2008). Simply Psychology; Psychosexual Development. Retrieved fro m http://www.simplypsychology.org/psychosexual.html Bullock, A., Trombley, S. (1999) The New Fontana Dictionary of Modern Thought Harper Collins:London pp. 643, 705 Myre, Sim (1974) Guide to Psychiatry, 3rd ed. Churchill Livingstone:Edinburgh and London, p. 396 Myre, Sim (1974) Guide to Psychiatry 3rd ed., Churchill Livingstone: Edinburgh and London pp. 35, 407 Leach, P. (1997) Your Baby and Child: From Birth to Age Five 5th edition. New Yo rk:Knopf p. 000 Murphy, Bruce (1996). Bent's Reader's Encyclopedia Fourth edition, HarperCollins Publishers:New York p. 310 Bell, Robert E. (1991) Women of Classical Mythology: A Biographical Dictionary Hornblower, S., Spawforth, A. (1998) The Oxford Companion to Classical Civilizat ion pp. 25455

freud on psychosexual development. AN ASSIGNMENT ON P: psychology PRESENTED TO DR. epenyoug (LECTURER) DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL SCIENCES VERITAS UNIVERSITY ABUJA (THE CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA) OBEHIE CAMPUS BY Chris-worlu igwugwum VUG/POL/11/323 15TH june, 2012

BY DONASCO CHRIS