Sigmund Freud's Psychosexual Development

miamicubajam

After reading the post below about paci's, I thought this might be an interesting topic to cover. I am a huge psychology freak since I did major in child psychology years ago. Even though this is simply a theory, what are your feelings about it all. Do you feel that these steps play a major role in your childs development? Do you feel that this is all a crock? Can you see where the aftermath effects might be true? Whats your biggest fear?

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My personal response: I think baby phases are fine in moderation. It's important to know when and how to gear your child away from something, before it becomes a need. I honestly believe that Freud gets for his research.

MellyMelB

My knowledge of Freud's theories is limited. Can you explain it a little to me so that I can discuss?

karenlisa714

Same here!

britishbride05

While I think Freud's theories have a strong argument towards them, I don't know about it creating any sort of oral fixation later in life.  I mean, lots of children use pacifiers and have for generations in one way or another and I don't think that has bred a bunch of people who want nothing more than to stick objects in their mouth :-D (both in the sexual way and the non-sexual way.)  But, hey, I LOVE kissing!  So maybe I had failed attempts with the pacifier as a baby?  Who knows :-D 

But do you think that a person's view of their own body and sexuality can really have a foundation on experiences when they were 6 months old?  I guess that's something I always found hard to grasp.

miamicubajam

Here we go ladies. Just something to kind of narrow down the subject.

https://psychology.about.com/od/theoriesofpersonality/ss/psychosexualdev.htm

I actually have really great text books that break down sigmund freud's theories, detail by detail and cover a lot more info. I guess what I'm fascinated about, is the fact that a child slowly develops in stages during their 9 month course in the belly. Once they are born, their brains and interactions with the world play a big roll on how the child continues to develop. If a stage is skipped in their child development stage, basically Freud sees it as consequences waiting to happen in that childs future. I guess you can kind of compare it to Karma. What goes around, comes around. In this case its what doesnt happen now, will eventually happen later. Ex. Any newborn is automatically "programmed" (and I use this word loosely) to immediately have instincts to suck. Before a child even opens its eyes, a mom could place her breast to the child and the baby will immediately know what to do. It's not a learned behavior, it's a natural instinct. If a child is deprived of paci's, bottles, nipples, etc. later in life the child would make up for the loss of their oral stage. Might end up overeating, smoking, drinking, biting nails, etc. Looking to gratify their oral fixation.

*Note: This is simply an example and a theory. Nothing to be taken personal.

miamicubajam

Here are the stages:  

Age	Name	Pleasure source	Conflict
0-2	Oral	Mouth: sucking, biting, swallowing	Weaning away from mother's breast
2-4	Anal	Anus: defecating or retaining faeces	Toilet training
4-5	Phallic	Genitals	Oedipus (boys), Electra (girls)
6-puberty	Latency	Sexual urges sublimated into sports and hobbies. Same-sex friends also help avoid sexual feelings.
puberty onward	Genital	Physical sexual changes reawaken repressed needs. Direct sexual feelings towards others lead to sexual gratification.	Social rules

wrenr

I think Freud was a bit too obsessed with the way sex affected development. Check out Piaget's or Erikson's (studied under Anna Freud) theories of development. I can really see the way they work as I watch Maia growing.

miamicubajam

I guess what I find interesting about Freud is that his theory describes what would happen long term if a child was to skip a step in their psychosexual development phase. Can be far out there at times but very true in many instances. Makes you think why young children find fascination in seeing eachothers privates. They like to compare or some can't keep their hands off of it. It's recognizing the differences between sex and physical understanding of their makeup. Though I am glad you brought up Piaget and Erikson. Also great philosophers but Piaget's theory is logical & cognitive development and Erikson is psychosocial development. Definitely great things for other moms to read into as well. Thanks