Freud's theory of psychosexual development and childhood fixation

Freud’s Theory of Psychological Development Freud’s theory of infant sexuality postulates that all human beings go through five distinct developmental stages: that of the oral, anal, phallic, latency, and genital phases (McLeod, 2019). During the oral phase, the infant experiences pleasure by putting objects in his or her mouth (McLeod, 2019). Then, the infant moves to the anal stage, where the focus is on holding and withholding defecation (McLeod, 2019). After this, the infant becomes aware of his or her gender identity during the genital phase. This is also the most controversial stage, in that Freud posited the Oedipus complex defined male development, in which the young boy simultaneously desires his mother and wishes to destroy his father. The girl, angered that she lacks a penis, becomes possesses by the Electra complex and feels rage at her mother. The boy resolves the Oedipus complex by identifying with the father and marrying a mother substitute, while the girl resolves the Electra complex by taking on the maternal role and becoming desirable to a substitute father figure (McLeod, 2019). The latency phase of childhood is when children engage in social development, rather than focusing on sexual development. Finally, the genital stage manifests full, adult sexuality (McLeod, 2019).
Over the course of development, the child learns to subsume the desire of the id for food and sexual gratification via the ego, which directs the gratification of the child into constructive channels to fulfill his or her wishes. The superego enables the child to sublimate pleasure in the interests of societal dictates (McLeod, 2019). Freud theorized that a disruption in appropriate fulfillment of these different stages resulted in the individual becoming ineffectively stuck in that phase and fixations, resulting in mental health difficulties (McLeod, 2019). But even during the normal phase of development, there is a series of substitutions and sublimation of the individual’s desires. Freud’s theory has increasingly fallen out of favor, given its emphasis on heterosexual marriage as the only successful resolution of these conflicts and his lack of scientific proof for his suppositions, in contrast to neurobiology (McLeod, 2019). It is still useful for nurses to understand his theory because of its place in history. Synthesizing Freud Freud initially trained as a neurologist. His first, most famous cases focused on the phenomenon of hysteria, such as that of Anna O, who experienced paralysis and hallucinations (Kihlstrom, 2015). The most common method of treatment of hysteria at the time was hypnosis. Freud built upon the earlier work of practitioners such as Jean-Marie Charcot and introduced a new, alternative technique to hypnosis known as free association, in which the subject would remain conscious but recall, based on the promptings of the therapist, dreams, memories, and other associations to understand the triggering incidents which provoked the behaviors (Kihlstrom, 2015).
As noted by McVean (2017), Freud’s treatment of hysteria, a condition officially removed from viable diagnoses from the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders in 1980, has been controversial for many years. First and foremost, given the dubious status of the cases on which Freud based his theory, his research has been called into question as lacking a scientific basis. Freud postulated that a failure to resolve the Electra complex was the root of most hysteria cases, all of which were diagnosed in women—in fact, before Freud, hysteria was viewed as a gynecological condition (McVean, 2017).
Freud has also been criticized for later diagnosing women who reported sexual abuse as merely expressing sublimated fantasies about their accusers, rather than actual facts. The psychology of women, because of the so-called incomplete body of women, was seen as inherently faulty, thus explaining women’s greater likelihood of experiencing psychological difficulties. Men were also viewed as more moral than women. “Women were viewed as forever feeling morally inferior to men, who were said to have more developed superegos than women. This, according to Freud, was a problem that could never be resolved” (Yadav, 2018, par.3). Freud has been criticized for his negative influence on how sexual abuse victims are discredited even today, as well as his failure to take into consideration the need for scientific understanding of the neurobiology of mental illness.
Although Freud did not have the research tools we have today, even in his own era he was criticized for using anecdotal evidence to construct his theories. His theories were also defended in a tautological fashion—for example, when a female theorist criticized penis envy, Freud diagnosed her criticism as an expression of her own sexual frustrations, rather than a legitimate topic of discussion (Yadav, 2018). Freudian psychoanalysis is still practiced today, but it has largely fallen out of favor. Conclusion Today, Freud is more apt to be studied in critical theory and literature classes than in nursing.