Sigmund Freud 's Theory Of The Conscious And Unconscious Mind

Freud believed human behavior was not consciously controlled, and credited three parts in the mind to any psychological activity. These are called the unconscious, the preconscious and the conscious. Personality too was given three parts, the id, the super ego and the ego. Freud believed these parts in our mind have their individual parts to play in the way we go about life. He also stated the only way to work through conflicts that arise from our subconscious and unconscious mind is through dream analysis and psychoanalysis. Other key concepts in psychodynamic theory are the psychosexual stages of development, anxiety, defence mechanisms, and free association.

Sigmund Freud’s theory is said to have probed deeper into the human mind than the others that can before him. Part of his theory was about the mind. “On the surface is consciousness, which consists of those thoughts that are the focus of our attention now, and this is seen as the tip of the iceberg. The preconscious consists of all which can be retrieved from memory. The third and most significant region is the unconscious. Here lie the processes that are the real cause of most behavior.” (McLeod, S. A., 2013) He also later established the theory that psyche is composed of id, ego and surer ego. The id functions unconsciously in reaction to the pleasure principle or basic instincts. Ego grows form the id in early childhood, and helps to maintain good behavior. Lastly the superego also said to develop in childhood, is in charge of safeguarding that honorable standards are kept. In other words it encourages us to behave ourselves.

Freud’s interest in unconscious ideas was sparked in France after watching demonstrations by Jean-Martin Charcot and Hippolyte Bernheim. Charcot showed that hysterical conditions like “glove anesthesia” and blindness without a scientific cause could be cured (though often temporarily) through ideas and suggestions. The idea on the part of the patient that he cannot see or feel his hand or any other number of things can be reversed by the hypnotist’s command to do whatever he believes he cannot. His demonstrations showed that the afflicted were not suffering from a problem in the brain, but rather in the mind.

His theory suggests that unconscious forces act to determine personality and behavior. In which is a part of the a person’s personality where they 're unaware “conscious awareness”, such as infantile wishes, desires, demands, and needs that are hidden because of their disturbing nature. He states that “the unconscious is responsible for a good part of our everyday behavior” (Robert 13). Freud would argue that personality is formed during childhood and that everyone’s personality is among three necessary structures of the human mind: the id, ego, and superego. According to Freud, children go through five stages the oral stage (0 to 18 months), anal stage (18 months to 3 years), phallic stage (3 to 6 years), latency stage (6 to puberty), genital stage (puberty to

The first assumption of this approach is of the importance of the unconscious mind and motivation. Freud believed that much of what determines our behaviour is on a mental level that is hidden to us, and that there are three levels of consciousness:

Psychology, the science of the behaviour and the mind of a person, tries to give us a reason as to how someone thinks, works, or treats others. Sigmund Freud, a well-known psychologist during the early 20th century created his own interpretation as to how people think. Freud explains that the mind is separated into three different parts the Id, the Superego, and the Ego. The Id which controls the irrational and illogical part of our brain controls our unconscious thoughts, feelings and urges. The Superego which controls the moralistic, perfectionist part of our brain controls our preconscious thoughts. Finally, the Ego which controls the rational

Freud created the Psychodynamic Approach to explain behaviour. Within it, he describes that there are 3 components of the human mind: The conscious, Pre-conscious and Unconscious. The conscious is the part of the mind which is in our awareness; it contains behaviours and desires which we are aware of. The pre-conscious is the part of the mind between the conscious and unconscious, it contains items such as memories and desires which we are not currently thinking about but can easily bring to conscious awareness. Lastly is the unconscious. This part of the mind is

Freud believed that the human personality consisted of three interworking parts: the id, the ego, and the superego. The id, the largest part of the mind, is related to desires and impulses and is the main source of basic biological needs. The ego is related to reasoning and is the conscious, rational part of the personality; it monitors behavior in order to satisfy basic desires without suffering negative consequences (Boundless.com). The superego, or conscience, develops through interactions with others (mainly parents) who want the child to conform to the norms of society (Boundless.com). Freud believed that our adult lives were shaped by childhood experiences, meaning that if children did not receive the proper nurturing, that the child would be stuck in that stage or behaviors

The surface represents the consciousness. It comprises of the thought which would be at the centre of our consideration now and this is viewed as the tip of the iceberg. The most significant region is the unconsciousness. This is where the process that is generally the real reason of our general conduct. The unconscious mind acts as a storage of primitive wishes and motivation kept under control and arbitrated by the preconscious area. Sigmund Freud emphasized the significance of the unconscious mind, and an essential presumption of Freudian hypothesis which is the unconscious mind represents conduct to a more prominent degree than people had suspected. Certainly, the objective of psychoanalysis is to make the unconscious conscious. His psychoanalytic theory of personality challenges that human conduct is the after effect of the associations among three segment parts of the brain which are the Id, ego and superego. This “structural theory” of personality has a large significance on how disagreements among the parts of the mind shape behaviour and personality. These disagreements are mostly unconscious.

The concept of psychological evaluation covers a range of techniques and theories that have evolved and developed throughout history. Understanding and comparing different theories to explain behaviour is important to further understand the behaviours of humans, how these behaviours are explained by psychologists and how these theories have changed over time and compare to each other. Psychodynamic theory, developed first by Sigmund Freud, attempts to explain human behaviour in relation to subconscious processes outside of the individuals awareness, that have their origins in childhood experiences (Deal, Kathleen Holtz, Psychodynamic Theory, Advances in Social Work8.1 (2007): 184-195.). Freud developed Drive Theory, founded on the belief that

The definition of the unconscious mind as referred to by Sigmund Freud in his psychoanalytic theory of personality is understood to be a “reservoir of feelings, thoughts, urges and memories that are outside of our conscious awareness.” It is regarded that the majority of the unconscious is considered to be inappropriate by the conscious mind and as a result is repressed. It harbours feelings such as anger, panic, discord, painful memories or trauma. Freud believes that we are inherently influenced by our unconscious, it leaking into our behaviour and experiences although we are unaware of such an occurrence.

Psychologically, there are many ways to view the brain, such as Maslow’s theory. The theory that we have a hierarchy of needs to satisfy our unconscious desires. Then, there is Kohlberg’s theory that states that our desires of unconsciousness are based of levels of punishment that affect our actions the most. One theory in particular, Freud’s theory, is that there are three constructions in terms that define our mental life and affect our actions. Id, being the first construction, is fully unconscious and tries to manipulate to brain to do what it pleases while ignoring what society would think of it. The superego is the complete opposite of what the id is. The superego tries to make the brain do only what society sees fit. For example, if

Freud viewed the unconscious mind as the primary source of human behavior. Freud saw the conscious mind as only the “tip of the iceberg” of the mind, because people are not always conscious of every decision they decide to make. For example, you may consciously think ‘I’m thirsty.’ and drink water, but according to Freud, that only scratches the surface of the decisions we make. According to Freud, the unconscious mind contains “significant” and “disturbing” thoughts and experiences that we need to keep out of the conscious mind. Traumatic events would be one such example of a thought that needed to be kept out of the conscious mind, and therefore was

It is difficult to summarize psychodynamic theory without a brief discussion of Freud. Sigmund Freud is the father of psychoanalysis, the father of psychodynamic theory, and in effect the father of modern psychotherapy. Freud's notions retain quite a bit of popularity, especially his ideas that things are not what they seem on the surface. Because of his understanding of the mind and behavior, Freud considered that overt behaviors were not always self-explanatory (or perhaps "not often explanatory" would be the better term). Instead, these overt or manifest behaviors represent some hidden motive. Sigmund Freud was trained as a neurologist and specialized in the treatment of nervous disorders. His early training involved using hypnosis with the French neurologist Jean Charcot in the treatment of hysteria, the presentation of baffling physical symptoms (mostly in young women) that appeared to have no physical origin (Hall, Lindzey, & Campbell, 1998). Freud also partnered with the Viennese physician Josef Breuer who practiced a revolutionary "talking cure" to reduce patients' symptoms by talking with them about how they felt as well as using hypnosis to remove emotional barriers to their feelings. He eventually abandoned the use of hypnosis in favor of a process he termed "free association" in which he had patients talk about what was on their minds without censoring their train of thought. This led Freud to develop his theory of the human mind as a complex system that is

At the age of 40 in 1896, Sigmund Freud introduced the world to a new term- psychoanalysis (Gay 1). Psychoanalysis is a method of treating patients with different nervous problems by involving them in dialogues which provide the physician with insight into the individual’s psyche. These dialogues provided the basis for Freud’s psychoanalytic theory, which “attempts to explain personality, motivation, and psychological disorders by focusing on the influence of early childhood experiences, on unconscious motives and conflicts, and on the methods people use to cope with their sexual and aggressive urges” (Weiten 363). Part of this theory involves the structure of the mind. This is a concept that touches