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Evaluate the Extent to Which Freud’s Theory of Psychosexual Development Can Help Us to Understand a Client’s Presenting Issue”

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Evaluate the Extent to Which Freud’s Theory of Psychosexual Development Can Help Us to Understand a Client’s Presenting Issue”
This essay will outline the main concepts that surround Freud’s theory of psychosexual development, showing how it can help us understand our clients presenting issues.
Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) was an Austrian physician. His most vital contribution to the study of psychology and human behaviour was his belief of the “dynamic unconscious”. This view was that the unconscious mind played an important role in determining how an individual behaved. Freud put forward the principle of multiple determinations, which suggests that every psychic event is determined by the simultaneous action of several others. He saw the unconscious mind as the actual source of mental energy, which determined behaviour. He based his belief on the results of trials with hypnosis. When he was able to produce and remove symptoms of hysteria in his entranced patients. Freud used the term ‘psychoanalysis’ to label his theories and techniques.
He was the first person in his field that began the use of non medical methods to deal with human conditions. It was during his neurological practice with hysterical patients that he first noticed that his patients were relieved from their symptoms by simply recollecting and talking about painful childhood experiences. Freud went on to spend much of his life developing an intricate and controversial theory on personality development.
Continuing this theory, it is thought that individual’s behaviour is the direct result of the influences of all past experience. These influences would have an even greater effect if they were from childhood. Freud believed that these first experiences formed solid foundations on which the developing client would structure the rest of their life. The adult personality was directly formed in childhood, according to the experience and treatment as a child. If the experiences in childhood were happy and balanced, then the child could develop into a normal, well balanced and adjusted adult.
Freud’s theory of infantile



References: and Bibliography Benson (1999) The Psychodynamic Perspective Psychology review, Vol Errington, M. and Murdin, L. in: Feltham, C. and Horton, I. (2006) The sage handbook of Counselling and Psychotherapy, London: Sage Publications. Fall, K., Miner Holden, J. & Marquis, A. (2004) Theoretical models of counselling and psychotherapy, USA: Brunner-Routledge. Freud, S. (1927) The Ego and The Id, London: Hogarth Press. Gross, R. (2005) Psychology. The science of mind and behaviour. London: Hodder Arnold. Flanagan (1994) Rubin & McNeil (1987) Psychology: Being Human, Harper & Row, New York

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