Freud's Psychoanalytic Theory: Drives, Conditioning, Cognitivism

Freud's Economic Theory of Psychoanalysis

Freud's economic theory of psychoanalysis posits that psychic energy increases, decreases, moves, or is released and distributed throughout the human psyche, activating its different processes.

Freud's Drive Theory of Psychoanalysis

Freud used the term "drive" to refer to instinctual impulses. These drives are characterized by:

• Source: A bodily organ that produces a drive through an active process. Different sources give rise to different impulses. (Unintegrated impulses manifest in adult subjects as perversions).
• Drive Peremptory: An energetic and motor factor of variable intensity that pushes the body toward satisfaction, which the subject cannot avoid. Its character is psychological rather than biological.
• The End: Satisfaction, in the sense of achieving the removal of excitation. There are also drives that are inhibited before reaching their intended goal.
• The Object: That by which the drive achieves its purpose of satisfaction. The object is not fixed to the drives.

Freud's Classification of Drives

• Self-Preservation Instincts: These are the instincts of restraint.
• Sexual Instincts: These originate in erogenous zones and seek satisfaction, which is linked to images and fantasies.

Freud's Second Theory of Instincts

• Life Instincts: The principle of linking elements and subjects.
• Death Instincts: The principle of nirvana. They tend to disengage and lead the living to an inorganic state, reducing all stress to zero. They tend toward the destruction of the subject, both internally and externally, and manifest as aggressive impulses.

Fundamentals of Scientific Inquiry

Scientific disciplines share these fundamental principles:

1. They deal with phenomena occurring in the physical world.
2. They share some common assumptions:
   • Determinism: Order and natural phenomena are related.
   • Limited Relationships: Not all phenomena are related to everything. There are a limited number of factors at play.
3. They have general objectives:
   • Descriptive Objective: A prerequisite to research.
   • Explanatory Objective: To establish functional relationships between phenomena and state laws.
4. They use the same method to achieve the proposed objectives.

Characteristics of Phenomena Studied by Science

An important feature of the phenomena studied by science is that they must be reproducible; that is, they can be repeated and yield the same results as long as the conditions remain the same.

Key Aspects of Scientific Inquiry

• Observation and Data Collection: Definition, measurement, and recording.
• Control: Problem-solving.
• Use of Operational Definitions: Measurement and the use of equipment and techniques.

Classical Conditioning

Classical conditioning involves changing behavior in response to a situation. It is a combination of two factors: stimulus and response.

Operant Conditioning

Operant conditioning occurs when a subject performs an activity to get something in return. The subject is more likely to repeat behaviors that are reinforced (reinforcement is what is offered to the subject to encourage the desired behavior). These behaviors are actions on the environment to obtain rewards or incentives or to remove aversive stimuli.

Challenges Faced by Behaviorism

Behaviorism is a school of psychology that focuses on the science of human behavior. The problem with behaviorism is its inability to explain basic human processes such as language and memory.

Cognitive Psychology and the Cognitivist Hypothesis

Cognitive psychology deals with the study of mental processes involved in knowledge (perception, memory, learning, etc.). It emerged as a reaction to behaviorism. Cognitive psychology utilizes mental processes to explain human behavior. The cognitivist hypothesis implies a form of cognition that is sequential and localized.

Problems Faced by Dualism

Dualism faces a significant challenge in explaining the interaction between the mind (soul) and the body (physical). The assertion that the nature of the mind is different from the physical nature makes it difficult to account for mental states.