Salient features of psychoanalytic theory of psychology

 INTRODUCTION

Psychoanalytic theory is the theory of personal organization and the dynamics of personality development that guides psychoanalysis, which is a method for treating psychopathology.  The psychoanalytic theory was firstly laid by an Austrian neurologist, Sigmund Freud,  in the 1800s, who is also known as the father of modern psychology.  However, this theory came to in full prominence in the last third of the 20th century as a part of the clinical treatment for psychological disorder after 1960s, long after Sigmund Freud death in 1939.

    Psychoanalytic means, analysis related to human psyche and it is defined as, "a therapeutic method, originated by Sigmund Freud, for treating mental disorder by investigating the interaction of conscious and unconscious elements in the patient's mind and bringing up the repressed fears and conflicts into the conscious mind, using techniques such as dream interpretation and free association."

    Through the scope of psychoanalytic lens, humans are described as having sexual and aggressive drives.  And, humans behavior is controlled by the irrational forces and the unconscious mind.

    The psychoanalytic theory began when Freud got a chance to treat a patient named Anna o, she was having both physiological and psychological problems, she was having the fear of drinking.  Freud thought to hypnotize her to know the roots of her problem.  And while observing on her Freud found that childhood experiences, feelings and thoughts plays a major role in one's personality and behavior,  These, thoughts, feelings, experiences can be forgotten with time, but unconsciously it remain in a person's mind and shapes their personality, behavior and thoughts.

 SALIENT FEATURES OF PSYCHOANALYTIC THEORY 

According to Freud's psychoanalytic theory the mind can be divided into three different levels; the conscious mind, the pre-conscious mind and the unconscious mind.

THE CONSCIOUS MIND, includes everything that we are aware of.  This is the aspect of our mental processing that we can think and talk about rationally.  A part of this also includes the memory, well memory is not always in the conscious mind, whereas the conscious mind can retrieve any information from the memory any time, and that will be in our awareness.

THE PRE-CONSCIOUS MIND, is the part where memory lies, we cannot be aware of the memories at a given time but can easily access them through the conscious mind.

THE UNCONSCIOUS MIND, the level of mind is a reservoir of feelings and thoughts, memories and past experiences that are outside of our conscious awareness.  Most of the unconscious contents are unpleasant and unacceptable, such as pain, anxiety or conflict.