Sigmund Freud's Influence On Psychosexual Development

Freud was born in Austria by Jewish parents who raised him in a traditional Jewish manner. The knowledge and experiences Freud encountered throughout his life influenced his work; especially his childhood was influential on the theory of psychosexual development. Freud’s childhood and relationship to his parents as well as religious background was contributing factors in the development of the psychoanalysis theory. Further, being raised in a Jewish family had an impact throughout his entire life, as the anti-Semitism became more dominant throughout the 20th century as the Nazis oppressed and persecuted Jews. Freud’s theories are still used in the 21st century and several psychological approaches and theories sprung from Freud’s theories. …show more content…
Freud’s relationship to his father led to one of his psychoanalytic theories including his relationship to his mother, Amalia Nathansohn Freud, and the Oedipus complex. Freud’s relationship to his mother and the feelings he developed due to his childhood, inspired him to the idea behind the Oedipus complex as a part of the psychoanalytic approach. While Freud was developing the psychosexual stages along side the psychoanalysis, Freud was inspired by the feelings he encountered as a child toward his mother and the jealousy of his father, which is implied in the Oedipus complex. Freud’s psychoanalytic approach was inspired by his relationship to his parents as well as the story about Oedipus, which was a part of his structure of personality. Freud divided the personality into three categories: the id, the ego, and the superego. The id is the part of the personality with the impulses and drives as well as instincts and is ruled by the pleasure principle. The ego is the part of the personality that is the executer and tries to mediate between the desires of the id and reality. The ego is ruled by the reality principle. Lastly, the superego is concerned with the morality of the personality and works in contradiction to the id. In the story about Oedipus, Oedipus unconsciously identifies with his mother and the id wants the mother but is controlled by the ego that knows better than to start a fight with the father who is a stronger figure. Further, the Oedipus complex is applied to the psychoanalytic theory through the psychosexual stages, which has five stages: oral stage, anal stage, phallic stage, latency stage, and genital stage. The Oedipus complex, which according to Freud is a universal concept for human beings, occurs during the phallic stage. The