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Sigmund Freud's Theories Of Personality

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Sigmund Freud has had the greatest impact on personality theory in Psychology. His theory of psychoanalysis made him a household name during the 20th century, and is still widely studied today. Freud’s theory was so influential that many personality theorists have shaped their own theories around his by either expanding upon elements of psychoanalysis, or refuting it in favor of their own ideas. One critic of Freud’s theory was Fulton J. Sheen, who argued that Freudian psychoanalysis was un-Christian and focused too deeply on the unconscious. In my opinion, the best way to provide a complete and accurate understanding of human personality is to pull from both the Freudian and Catholic-Christian perspectives. Freud formulated the basis of his psychoanalytic theory on his own experiences and dreams before constructing it through his work with clients. Freud likened the structure of human personality to an iceberg, with the conscious being visible above water, the preconscious just below the surface, and the unconscious deep below the water. This depiction is akin to the function of those three levels of personality. The conscious has the smallest capacity and contains all of the sensations and experiences that we are aware of or are thinking about at that moment. The next level, the preconscious, contains information that is just out of reach of the conscious, but can be easily retrieved and brought into conscious awareness. Freud considered the unconscious to be the most

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