The Edexcel Specification expects you to understand Freud's theories as an alternative to the biological theory of aggression. Parts of this page that are essential for that are marked with the red Freud icon; a faint pink Freud means it's less essential
The Specification also expects you to understand Freud's theories as an alternative to the biological explanation of individual differences. Parts of this page that are essential for that are marked with the green Freud icon
The Specification also expects you to understand Freud's theories as an alternative to the biological explanation of development. Parts of this page that are essential for that are marked with the blue Freud icon

FREUD'S PSYCHODYNAMIC THEORY
SECRETS OF THE UNCONSCIOUS MIND

Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) was one of the most influential psychologists who ever lived. Even though most psychologists today would reject the precise details of his theories, his ideas have had a huge impact on therapy, literature and popular culture (especially film).

Freud was a doctor in the Austrian city of Vienna. He noticed that many of his patients came to him with strange symptoms with no obvious physical cause. Freud speculated that there was an underlying mental cause for their health problems. In particular, Freud noticed that his patients seem to have deep personal unhappiness that they found it difficult to talk about and that their problems stemmed back to events in their childhoods.

This led Freud to develop a psychodynamic theory of the mind. Psychodynamic means "mind energy" or perhaps "mind in conflict". It is based on the idea that, in every person, different parts of the mind (psyche) are in conflict with each other, wanting different things.

Freud developed a complex (and sometimes contradictory) set of theories over his lifetime, which attempt to explain health and happiness, dreams, art and religion, law and war and, of course, aggression.
Take a spelling tip. It's F-R-E-U-D. With the -UD at the end and the FRE- at the beginning.

It's not "Frued" - "frued" isn't a word but, if it was, "to frue" would mean "to spell a foreign-sounding name incorrectly, as in "I totally frued up Banjura's name in the exam"
This theory is significant for students in other ways:
  • It shows how scientific research proceeds. Freud is regarded today as quite un-scientific but he attempted to examine mental processes in a detached, objective way. Many of the topics he explored (like sexuality) were quite taboo, but Freud tried to examine them without making any moral judgment about right or wrong.
  • It illustrates features of the Biological Approach, since it is based on biological instincts, but also the Cognitive Approach, since it deals with memory.
  • It ties in to your Key Question in Biological Psychology, since it helps explain aggression, development and individual differences.
8-minute video (part 1 of 3) which gives a good summary of Freud's career and his key ideas

THE ICEBERG MODEL OF THE PSYCHE

Freud (see how I spelt that?) came up with a brand new way of looking at the human mind or psyche. Instead of the normal idea that our mind is just the collection of all our thoughts, memories and feelings, Freud suggested the psyche is divided into different parts.

These three parts develop over the first 5 years of life, which is why, for Freud, early childhood is the most important stage in human life; it is the stage when our psyche forms and it shapes everything we think and do for the rest of our lives.
The conscious mind is that part of the mind we are aware of. It can be compared to the part of an iceberg that is above the water. It contains the thoughts we are currently thinking at any given moment. It makes up a small part of the whole psyche. There's much more to the mind than just the conscious mind.

The pre-conscious mind is the part of the mind we are occasionally aware of. It can be compared to the part of the iceberg that is below the water-line but still visible. It contains remembered dreams, feelings that haven't been put into words and memories that can be recalled into the conscious mind without help.
The unconscious mind is the rest of the psyche that we are totally unaware of. It can be compared to the bulk of the iceberg that is out of sight under the water. It contains instincts and desires, fears, motives, most of our dreams and memories that have been repressed because they are too painful.
Icebergs are much larger than they appear, because most of their bulk is out of sight, under water.
The crucial thing to know about the unconscious mind is that (according to Freud) it is completely inaccessible to the conscious mind. You cannot "look inside yourself" and understand your own unconscious thoughts.  Freud created a technique called psychoanalysis to help his patients understand their unconscious minds with the help of a trained psychoanalyst. He believed that psychoanalysis could enable people to overcome problems rooted in the unconscious.
It's the UNconscious mind.

Not the subconscious.

That's how you tell psychologists from people who don't know what they're talking about. Psychologists discussing Freud say "unconscious mind". So should you!
The unconscious mind is a mystery, but there are sometimes clues about what it contains:
  • Dreams may contain unconscious wishes or fears. However, these unconscious thoughts always turn up in disguised or symbolic form. Dreams have to be interpreted by a trained psychoanalyst.
  • "Slips of the tongue" (or parapraxes) may reveal our unconscious wishes, because we accidentally say what we really (unconsciously) mean rather than what we intended (consciously) to say. These are often called "Freudian slips". A trained psychoanalyst will notice these and help the patient interpret them.
Ross' classic parapraxis in "Friends"
My favourite joke from the sitcom "Frasier"

THREE PARTS OF THE PSYCHE

Freud also analysed how different parts of the mind are in conflict with each other.

The id

The id is the most basic part of the psyche. The id is the part that develops first in babies. It consists of urges and desires. The id isn't rational or reflective: it is made up entirely of feelings. The id exists entirely in the unconscious mind.
It's "id" and it rhymes with "lid" and "bid".

The id is not ID as in "an ID card". The id has got nothing to do with ID in the sense of identity. In fact, most of us are pretty similar in terms of what our id wants: food, drink, sex, sleep, fun.
The id is based on "the pleasure principle". It doesn't understand logic or time or the outside world. It wants what it wants and it wants it NOW. If the id is denied its pleasure, it becomes frustrated.
The id is not evil. Most of the things the id wants are good and necessary: if we didn't eat or sleep we would die; without sex, the species would die out. The problem comes from the id's inability to restrict itself, put things off or acknowledge other people. The id lives entirely for the moment and is completely selfish.
The id resembles the function of the limbic system in the human brain: this is the brain's "emotion centre" and the source of our appetites, fear and aggression.
The ego

The ego is the second part of the psyche that develops in toddlers. It is the thinking, decision-making part of the mind. The ego exists within the conscious mind. It is based on "the reality principle" because it understands the outside world, the consequences of actions and the passage of time.

The ego has no desires of its own. It's job is to find a way to grant the desires that come from the id. It can do this because it understands the real world and can formulate plans.
The ego resembles the function of the pre-frontal cortex in the human brain: this is the brain's "decision-making centre" which handles messages from the limbic system and decides how to act on them.
The ego has a powerful bargaining chip for dealing with the id. This is deferred gratification. Deferred gratification involves putting off pleasure until later, or enjoying a smaller pleasure in the short term for the sake of a larger pleasure later on. The ego persuades the id to desire something less pleasant (like doing the dishes) while promising something more pleasant later (like eating pizza). In a way, the ego "tricks" the id into doing chores with the promise of fun later.

However, the ego has no conscience, no sense of right and wrong. It understands punishment and will try to avoid that but it feels no guilt.
The super-ego

The final part of the psyche to develop is the super-ego which forms between the ages of 4 and 6. The super-ego straddles the conscious and the unconscious mind: we're partly aware of it, partly not. It is based on "the morality principle" and acts as "the voice of conscience". It tells the ego whether its thoughts are morally acceptable or not.

When the super-ego objects to the ego's thoughts, it generates guilt and shame. The ego finds these feelings unbearable, so it will usually come up with thoughts and plans that do not offend the super-ego. This can be difficult, because the id is continually generating needs and desires which the super-ego forbids.
It's your super-ego getting you out of bed in the morning
You often see these cartoons where the id looks like a devil and the super-ego looks like an angel. This is mistaken. The id isn't evil; it is your desire and your motivation to do things. The super-ego isn't "good" either. It is your wish to punish yourself, your feelings of unworthiness and failure. Having a powerful super-ego doesn't make you a good person. In fact, Freud suggests that criminals have powerful super-egos; they are so desperate to be punished, they commit crimes in order to receive the punishment they crave.
The super-ego makes us feel guilty. However, it also wants us to be punished. If someone misbehaves and is repeatedly punished for it (detentions from teachers, getting beaten up by larger opponents), then this might be the super-ego at work.

Your Key Question for the Learning Approach investigates anorexia. From a psychodynamic perspective, anorexia might be caused by an over-developed super-ego which makes the sufferer see themselves as fat and view healthy desires from the id like eating as shameful and wrong.
Don't go into the exam and write about "the super eagle"!

DEFENCE MECHANISMS

The ego is caught in the middle of a conflict between the demands of the id and the restrictions of the ego. It solves this setting up defence mechanisms to protect itself. These mechanisms either restrict the id's demands or else transform them so that they no longer offend the super-ego.

The ego also has to deal with the real world and all its problems. Defence mechanisms can also block out parts of reality that the ego finds overwhelming or which offend the super-ego or frighten the id.
There are lots of defence mechanisms, but here are five that are quite common and easy to understand:
  • Repression: the id's demands can be repressed back into the unconscious mind. With this defence mechanism, a person will not even realise what their id is wanting from them
  • Denial: the id's feelings and urges are acted upon, but the conscious mind refuses to admit what they are; an example might be someone who doesn't realise how unpleasant they are being
  • Projection: the id's feelings are denied and the super-ego's hostility is directed towards other people who seem to be acting on those same feelings; this involves being very judgmental about other people doing the things you secretly want to do
  • Displacement: the id's urges are acted upon, but they are directed at a different target; this causes people to blame others or "over-compensate" for their problems
  • Sublimation: the id's urges are acted upon, but are transformed into something socially acceptable, such as dance, art or work; the sublimated behaviour may not resemble the original unconscious desire but the connection might come out in Freudian slips
Andrea Cairella's interpretation of defence mechanisms shows how Freud's ideas have crossed over into the Cognitive Approach (and, of course, California!). Notice she uses the word "subconscious" rather than unconscious and she asks viewers at the end to identify their own defence mechanisms.
The idea of defence mechanisms is also popular in Cognitive Psychology and forms the basis of a lot of counseling. Unlike Freud's view, counseling works on the assumption that people can stop using unhealthy defence mechanisms if they really want to. Freud's view is that these things are much too deeply embedded in the psyche for that, which is why psychoanalysis tries to go back to your childhood to sort out why these defence mechanisms appeared in the first place.
Freud's ideas about defence mechanisms led him to a very surprising theory indeed - the Oedipus Complex.

The Oedipus (prounced EE-di-PUSS) Complex is a psychological crisis that children are supposed to go through at around the age of 5 when their super-ego forms. This crisis is caused by the fact that every child sexually desires its opposite sex parent, but feels guilt about this and grows to fear and hate its same-sex parent as a result.
That's right. Read that sentence again. Told you it was a surprising theory!
Children are supposed to repress these feelings (which is why you don't remember them) and use a defence mechanism called identification to imitate the same-sex parent that they hate and fear. This, Freud claims, is where we get our gender identity and personality from.

Freud has some evidence for the Oedipus Complex: a famous case study of a 5-year-old boy called "Little Hans".
The Edexcel Specification doesn't require you to know about the Oedipus Complex or the Little Hans case study - however, it is FASCINATING and FAMOUS and you could certainly use it to write about development, personality and aggression.

EVALUATING PSYCHODYNAMIC THEORY
AO3

Credibility

Freud's theories of personality were hard for people to accept back in the early 20th century - but then again, so were Einstein's theories of relativity! The mere fact that theories are odd or shocking doesn't mean they're automatically wrong or ridiculous.
Freud and Einstein met once, in 1927, but they also exchanged letters about world peace.
Freud based his theories on psychoanalysing his patients. He also carried out a case study on one child (Little Hans). Finally, he psychoanalysed himself, studying his own dreams and childhood memories.

Freud conducted these case studies in a spirit of scientific detachment. He was studying troubling ideas about sex, incest, abuse and shame. Many of his insights went completely against the Christian values of his time and his own Jewish family background. However, he insisted on being non-judgmental about what he discovered. He created his own scientific terminology (libido, id, ego, defence mechanism)  rather than using the biased terminology of ordinary language (lust, sin, self-control, etc).
Freud's idea of the instinctive id and the rational ego links in with the neuroscience of the brain.

The limbic system is the brain's "emotion centre" and the pre-frontal cortex handles rational decision-making, just like the id and the ego.

There is also a link between the right hemisphere and the unconscious mind. The right hemisphere is linked to emotional intelligence and procedural memories (how to do things). Divino & Moore (2010) explain how the growing influence of the left hemisphere might link to Freud's idea of the growth of the ego in children:
Only the right hemisphere is fully functional at birth; it remains dominant for the first 2 to 3 years of life, thus, infants develop patterns of emotional communication prior to developing left-hemisphere-based verbal skills when that hemisphere becomes fully functional around the 3rd year - Cynthia Devino & Mary Sue Moore (2010)
Crucial memories from early childhood may be stored in the right hemisphere but cannot be "put into words" by the left hemisphere, even though they still affect our emotions. This ties in very closely with Freud's idea of the unconscious mind influencing the conscious mind.
Objections

Despite his attempts to be scientific, Freud's theories are usually criticised for not being scientific enough.

Freud depends on case studies and gathering qualitative data. There is very little quantitative data in any of his research. This makes his findings hard to analyse and dependent upon his own interpretation. Other psychologists have offered very different interpretations of what was wrong with Freud's patients. They may have had biological problems (like Charles Whitman's brain tumour which might have caused him to go on his murdering spree) or their behaviour might have been learned from role models or conditioning. Little Hans' phobia of horses could be explained using classical conditioning - the way Watson & Rayner created Little Albert's fear of white rats.

Because Freud knew his patients, some critics argue he could never be truly objective about them. Nor could he be objective when it came to psychoanalysing himself.
A deeper objection to Freud's ideas comes from the scientist Karl Popper. Popper argued that true scientific theories are falsifiable. This means you can state what circumstances would prove the theory false. It is very difficult to falsify Freud's ideas but the unconscious mind is completely inaccessible. This means there's no way of proving that it doesn't exist or that some behaviour isn't caused by it. Popper argues that theories which cannot be disproved - not because of a lack of evidence but because of how vague they are - are not really scientific theories at all.
You can see this in Freud's own dealings with his critics. When people objected to his ideas, he often pointed out that they were only resisting what he was saying because of their defence mechanisms! In effect, anyone who criticises Freud's ideas is really suffering from projection - they know Freud is right on an unconscious level, but they can't handle it, so they become aggressive towards his ideas.

Accusing your critics of being psychologically incapable of admitting you're right is great fun, but it's not very scientific. Real science should involve allowing other scientists to peer review your research and criticise it. Freud did not tend to do this. Instead he organised an "Inner Circle" of followers who had to be loyal to him and his ideas.
Freud's "Inner Circle" of friends and followers.
Differences
The biological/evolutionary view of aggression supports the nativist (nature) view of human behaviour while the Learning Approach supports the empiricist (nurture) view. In contrast, the psychodynamic view supports nature and nurture.

According to Freud, we are born with a psyche that has certain in-built drives and desires. Later in his career, Freud defined these as eros and thanatos. This makes certain parts of our personality - like aggression - part of our nature.

However, Freud also argues that we are shaped by our childhood experiences, especially our relationship with our parents. This nurture decides which defence mechanisms we adopt and they go on to decide our personality and how we display aggression towards other people and ourselves.

Some biological psychologists also support nature and nurture. They would say that genes only give us predispositions but that experiences later in life decide whether we act on those predispositions or whether they stay hidden inside us.

A big difference is the scientific status of the approaches. Freud tried to be objective, but his theory depends very heavily on case studies, qualitative data and his own interpretations. The biological/evolutionary approach also uses case studies (such as Phineas Gage and Charles Whitman) but it uses other more objective methods too, such as twin studies and adoption studies. Since the 1990s, it has also used brain imaging techniques which provide detailed, quantitative data about the structure of the brain.

Another difference is the use of animal studies. Ethology is a part of the biological approach that studies animals to learn about humans. The psychodynamic approach rejects this; although he focuses on instinct, Freud claims to study what makes us distinctively human, not what we share with other animals.
Applications

The main application of Freud's theories is the therapy called psychoanalysis.

Psychoanalysis can help treat emotional problems by exploring their unconscious causes. The psychoanalyst helps the client explore their own dreams and childhood memories and work out what they mean. Hopefully, the client will learn about the defence mechanisms they are using and the unresolved conflicts going on in their unconscious. They may come to self-knowledge.
This 1960s comic gives you an idea of how psychoanalysis used to be seen as scientific and exciting. Shame it only ran to 4 issues. Can you work out what happens from the covers?
A client will normally visit a psychoanalyst once a week and the session will last for about an hour. In stereotypes, the client lies on a couch and talks while, out of sight, the psychoanalyst takes notes. In real therapy, client and psychoanalyst normally sit on chairs facing each other.

Psychoanalysis requires trust and intimacy. That might take months to build up and a course of psychoanalysis could take years. If the psychoanalyst is a qualified doctor (most are), then those sessions can be very expensive. However, a less-expensive version of psychoanalysis is group therapy, in which the psychoanalyst helps a group of clients share their problems, analyse each other and help each other understand their unconscious problems.

A recent study by Jonathan Shedler (2010) drew together research into the effectiveness of psychoanalysis from all over the world. He concluded that, despite its lack of scientific support, psychoanalysis has about the same outcomes as other therapies like Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) which are more scientifically-based.
Psychoanalysis is not a miracle cure, but it aims to make the client's emotions seem less confusing and frightening, producing a greater sense of acceptance and more self-control. Freud summed it up like this:
much will be gained if we succeed in transforming your hysterical misery into common unhappiness. With a mental life that has been restored to health, you will be better armed against that unhappiness - Sigmund Freud (1895)
The main criticism of psychoanalysis is that it is time-consuming, expensive and not at all certain to work. Since it is not scientifically-based, it is difficult to measure how effective it is and whether or not it is working for any particular client.

However, supporters claim psychoanalysis brings lasting peace of mind and helps people live better and more productive lives.
For many people, psychodynamic therapy may foster inner resources and capacities that allow richer, freer, and more fulfilling lives - Jonathan Shedler (2010)