Question

I need a good introduction to my paper on Freuds Psychoanylic theory and a good thesis statement

Answer 1

• Freud's levels of consciousness mapping the human behaviors and actions.

INTRODUCTION

Sigmund Freud is regarded as one of the greatest minds of the 19th and 20th centuries. He revolutionized the ideas on how the human mind works. Freud began the discipline of Psychoanalysis, which is still associated with him.Freud is the most important and influential psychiatrist and cultural philosopher in the field of psychology. He is regarded as the father of psychoanalysis.Freud developed many founding ideas in the field of psychoanalysis, including the interpretation of dreams, repression mechanism functions in the human mind, rationalizing and projecting of subconscious thoughts or desires, and the power of the unconscious to discover past psychological disorders. Freud's most important contribution was his theory, that unconscious motives control behaviour.He described both conscious and unconscious minds. The conscious mind contains those thoughts, ideas, desires, etc. that we are aware about.The unconscious mind contains ideas, moods, thoughts and images ithat are hidden. He also talked about sub-conscious which contains thoughts that are hidden but can be brought to the surface when recalled. He gave an Ice-berg/topographical model to explain these 3 levels.

According to Freud,the unconscious contains all sorts of significant and disturbing material which we need to keep out of awareness because they are too threatening to acknowledge fully.The unconscious mind contains the biologically based instincts called eros and thanatos for the primitive urges for sex and aggression. Freud explained our primitive urges often do not reach consciousness because they are unacceptable to our rational, conscious selves because of which we experience anxiety. To overcome this anxiety, people develop a range of defence mechanisms to avoid knowing what their unconscious motives and feelings are.The focus of psychoanalysis is to reveal the use of such defence mechanisms and thus make the unconscious mind conscious.Freud explained that the influences of the unconscious reveal themselves in a variety of ways, including dreams, and in slips of the tongue,also known as 'Freudian slips'.

Freud classified mental activity to exist at three levels: the Id, the Ego, and the Superego. The Id is the focal point of our primitive instincts; it caters to the imnediate gratification of our desires and pleasures. A newborn infant is the personification of the Id. The Ego develops out of the Id as the child grows. It is based on the reality principle. The Ego recognizes the existence of a world beyond, and acts as censor to the Id, checking the desires for immediate gratification, and recognizing the larger picture. The third state is the Super-Ego,which is the moral-arm. It is often called our conscience, and it tells us when our thoughts are right or wrong.