Phallic stage: Difference between revisions
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{{Psychoanalysis |Concepts}} |
{{Short description|Freudian psychosexual development}}{{Psychoanalysis |Concepts}} |
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[[Image:Sigmund Freud, by Max Halberstadt (cropped).jpg|thumb|150px|right| The psychoanalyst [[Sigmund Freud]] (ca. 1921)]] |
[[Image:Sigmund Freud, by Max Halberstadt (cropped).jpg|thumb|150px|right| The psychoanalyst [[Sigmund Freud]] (ca. 1921)]] |
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In [[Sigmund Freud|Freudian]] [[psychoanalysis]], the '''phallic stage''' is the third stage of [[psychosexual development]], spanning the ages of three to six years, wherein the infant's [[libido]] (desire) centers upon |
In [[Sigmund Freud|Freudian]] [[psychoanalysis]], the '''phallic stage''' is the third stage of [[psychosexual development]], spanning the ages of three to six years, wherein the infant's [[libido]] (desire) centers upon their genitalia as the [[erogenous zone]]. When children become aware of their bodies, the bodies of other children, and the bodies of their parents, they gratify physical curiosity by undressing and exploring each other and their genitals, the center of the phallic stage, in the course of which they learn the [[Human anatomy|physical]] differences between the male and female sexes and their associated social roles, experiences which alter the psychologic dynamics of the parent and child relationship.<ref>"Sigmund Freud 1856–1939" entry (2000) ''Encyclopaedia of German Literature'' Routledge:London Retrieved 2 September 2009: http://www.credoreference.com.library.capella.edu/entry/routgermanlit/sigmund_freud_1856_1939</ref> The phallic stage is the third of five Freudian psychosexual development stages: (i) the [[Oral stage|oral]], (ii) the [[Anal stage|anal]], (iii) the phallic, (iv) the [[Latency stage|latent]], and (v) the [[Genital stage|genital]]. |
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==The Oedipus complex== |
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In the |
In the phallic stage of [[psychosexual development]], a boy's decisive experience is the [[Oedipus complex]] describing his son–father competition for sexual possession of his mother. This [[Complex (psychology)|psychological complex]] indirectly derives its name from the Greek mythologic character [[Oedipus]], who unwittingly killed his father and sexually possessed his mother. Initially, [[Sigmund Freud|Freud]] applied the Oedipus complex to the development of boys and girls alike; he then developed the female aspect of phallic-stage psychosexual development as the feminine Oedipus attitude and the negative Oedipus complex.<ref>{{cite book |last=Freud|first=Sigmund |author-link=Sigmund Freud|title=On Sexuality |year=1956 |publisher=Penguin Books Ltd }}</ref> His student–collaborator [[Carl Jung]] proposed the "[[Electra complex]]", derived from Greek mythologic character [[Electra]], who plotted matricidal revenge against her mother for the murder of her father, to describe a girl's psychosexual competition with her mother for possession of her father.<ref>"Sigmund Freud 1856–1939" entry (2000) ''Encyclopaedia of German Literature'' Routledge:London Retrieved 2 September 2009: http://www.credoreference.com.library.capella.edu/entry/routgermanlit/sigmund_freud_1856_1939</ref> |
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=== Oedipus=== |
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[[File:Oedipus and the Sphinx MET DP-14201-023.jpg|thumb|right|150px|[[Oedipus complex]]: Oedipus and the [[Sphinx]], by [[Gustave Moreau]], 1864.]] |
[[File:Oedipus and the Sphinx MET DP-14201-023.jpg|thumb|right|150px|[[Oedipus complex]]: Oedipus and the [[Sphinx]], by [[Gustave Moreau]], 1864.]] |
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Despite mother being the parent who primarily gratifies the child's desires, the child begins forming a discrete sexual identity — "boy", "girl" — that alters the dynamics of the parent and child relationship; the parents become the focus of infantile [[Libido|libidinal]] energy. The boy focuses his libido (sexual desire) upon his mother, and focuses jealousy and emotional rivalry against his father — because it is he who sleeps with the mother. To facilitate uniting him with the mother, the boy's [[Id, ego and super-ego|id]] wants to kill his father (as did Oedipus), but the [[Id, ego and super-ego#Ego|ego]], pragmatically based upon the [[reality principle]], knows that his father is the stronger of the two males competing to psychosexually possess the one female. Nonetheless, the fearful boy remains ambivalent about his father's place in the family, which is manifested as [[castration anxiety|fear of castration]] by the physically greater father; the fear is an irrational, subconscious manifestation of the infantile |
Despite mother being the parent who primarily gratifies the child's desires, the child begins forming a discrete sexual identity — "boy", "girl" — that alters the dynamics of the parent and child relationship; the parents become the focus of infantile [[Libido|libidinal]] energy. The boy focuses his libido (sexual desire) upon his mother, and focuses jealousy and emotional rivalry against his father — because it is he who sleeps with the mother. To facilitate uniting him with the mother, the boy's [[Id, ego and super-ego|id]] wants to kill his father (as did Oedipus), but the [[Id, ego and super-ego#Ego|ego]], pragmatically based upon the [[reality principle]], knows that his father is the stronger of the two males competing to psychosexually possess the one female. Nonetheless, the fearful boy remains ambivalent about his father's place in the family, which is manifested as [[castration anxiety|fear of castration]] by the physically greater father; the fear is an irrational, subconscious manifestation of the infantile id.<ref>Bullock, A., Trombley, S. (1999) ''The New Fontana Dictionary of Modern Thought'' Harper Collins:London pp. 607, 705</ref> |
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| ⚫ | In developing a discrete psychosexual identity, boys develop [[castration anxiety]] and girls develop [[penis envy]] towards all males. The girl's envy is rooted in the biologic fact that, without a penis, she cannot sexually possess her mother as the infantile id demands. Resultantly, the girl redirects her [[libido|desire]] for sexual union upon father. She thus psychosexually progresses to [[heterosexual]] femininity (which culminates in bearing a child) derived from earlier, infantile desires; her child replaces the absent [[Human penis|penis]]. Moreover, after the phallic stage, the girl's psychosexual development includes transferring her primary erogenous zone from the infantile [[clitoris]] to the adult [[vagina]]. Freud thus considered a girl's Oedipal conflict to be more emotionally intense than that of a boy, resulting, potentially, in a woman of submissive, less confident personality.<ref>Bullock, A., Trombley, S. (1999) ''The New Fontana Dictionary of Modern Thought'' Harper Collins:London pp. 259, 705</ref> |
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===Electra=== |
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[[Image:1869 Frederic Leighton - Electra at the Tomb of Agamemnon.jpg|thumb|left |150px|[[Electra complex]]: Electra at the Tomb of [[Agamemnon]]'', by [[Frederic Leighton]], c.1869]] |
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| ⚫ | In developing a discrete psychosexual identity, boys develop [[castration anxiety]] and girls develop [[penis envy]] towards all males. The girl's envy is rooted in the biologic fact that, without a penis, she cannot sexually possess mother |
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==Defense mechanisms== |
==Defense mechanisms== |
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In both sexes, [[defense mechanism]]s provide transitory resolutions of the conflict between the drives of the Id and the drives of the Ego. The first defense mechanism is '''[[Psychological repression|repression]]''', the blocking of memories, emotional impulses, and ideas from the conscious mind; yet it does not resolve the [[ |
In both sexes, [[defense mechanism]]s provide transitory resolutions of the conflict between the drives of the Id and the drives of the Ego. The first defense mechanism is '''[[Psychological repression|repression]]''', the blocking of memories, emotional impulses, and ideas from the conscious mind; yet it does not resolve the [[id, ego and super-ego|id–ego conflict]]. The second defense mechanism is '''[[Identification (psychology)|identification]]''', by which the child incorporates, to his or her ego, the personality characteristics of the same-sex parent; in so adapting, the boy diminishes his [[castration anxiety]], because likeness to father protects him from father's wrath as a rival for mother; by so adapting, the girl facilitates identifying with mother, who understands that, in being females, neither of them possesses a penis, and thus are not antagonists.<ref>Bullock, A., Trombley, S. (1999) ''The New Fontana Dictionary of Modern Thought'' Harper Collins:London pp. 205, 107</ref> |
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==Unresolved fixation== |
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An unresolved fixation in the phallic stage could lead to egoism, low self esteem, flirtatious and promiscuous females, shyness, worthlessness and men that treat women with contempt. |
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Unresolved sexual competition for the opposite-sex parent might lead to a phallic-stage [[Fixation (psychology)|fixation]] conducive to a girl becoming a woman who continually strives to dominate men (viz. [[penis envy]]), either as an unusually [[Femme fatale|seductive woman]] (high self-esteem) or as an unusually submissive woman (low self-esteem). In a boy, a phallic-stage fixation might be conducive to becoming a vain, over-ambitious man. Therefore, the satisfactory parental handling and resolution of the [[Oedipus complex]] and the [[Electra complex]] are most important in developing the infantile [[super-ego]], because, by identifying with a parent, the child internalizes [[Morality]], thereby, he or she chooses to comply with societal rules, rather than having to comply reflexively, from fear of punishment. |
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==See also== |
==See also== |
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==External links== |
==External links== |
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* [http://www.victorianweb.org/science/freud/develop.html Freud's Psychosexual Stages]. |
* [http://www.victorianweb.org/science/freud/develop.html Freud's Psychosexual Stages]. |
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* {{cite book |last=Colman |first=Andrew M. |author-link=Andrew Colman |chapter=phallic stage (p. 566) |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zvlrBgAAQBAJ&dq=%22phallic+stage%22&pg=PA566 |title=A Dictionary of Psychology |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zvlrBgAAQBAJ |year=2015 |edition=4th |orig-date=2001 |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |isbn=978-0-19105784-7 }} |
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* {{cite web | |
* {{cite web |last=Felluga |first=Dino |title=Modules on Freud: On Psychosexual Development |url=https://www.cla.purdue.edu/english/theory/psychoanalysis/freud.html |series=Introductory Guide to Critical Theory |publisher=[[Purdue University College of Liberal Arts]] |location=[[West Lafayette]], [[Indiana]]}} |
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* {{cite book |editor-last=Nagera |editor-first=Humberto |chapter=Phallic erotism (pp. 56ff.) |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YrauAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA56 |title=Basic Psychoanalytic Concepts on the Libido Theory |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2BuvAwAAQBAJ |year=2014 |orig-date=1969 |publisher=[[Routledge]] |location=[[Abingdon-on-Thames]] |isbn=978-1-31767039-1 }} |
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Latest revision as of 11:13, 8 May 2024
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In Freudian psychoanalysis, the phallic stage is the third stage of psychosexual development, spanning the ages of three to six years, wherein the infant's libido (desire) centers upon their genitalia as the erogenous zone. When children become aware of their bodies, the bodies of other children, and the bodies of their parents, they gratify physical curiosity by undressing and exploring each other and their genitals, the center of the phallic stage, in the course of which they learn the physical differences between the male and female sexes and their associated social roles, experiences which alter the psychologic dynamics of the parent and child relationship.[1] The phallic stage is the third of five Freudian psychosexual development stages: (i) the oral, (ii) the anal, (iii) the phallic, (iv) the latent, and (v) the genital.
The Oedipus complex
[edit]In the phallic stage of psychosexual development, a boy's decisive experience is the Oedipus complex describing his son–father competition for sexual possession of his mother. This psychological complex indirectly derives its name from the Greek mythologic character Oedipus, who unwittingly killed his father and sexually possessed his mother. Initially, Freud applied the Oedipus complex to the development of boys and girls alike; he then developed the female aspect of phallic-stage psychosexual development as the feminine Oedipus attitude and the negative Oedipus complex.[2] His student–collaborator Carl Jung proposed the "Electra complex", derived from Greek mythologic character Electra, who plotted matricidal revenge against her mother for the murder of her father, to describe a girl's psychosexual competition with her mother for possession of her father.[3]
Despite mother being the parent who primarily gratifies the child's desires, the child begins forming a discrete sexual identity — "boy", "girl" — that alters the dynamics of the parent and child relationship; the parents become the focus of infantile libidinal energy. The boy focuses his libido (sexual desire) upon his mother, and focuses jealousy and emotional rivalry against his father — because it is he who sleeps with the mother. To facilitate uniting him with the mother, the boy's id wants to kill his father (as did Oedipus), but the ego, pragmatically based upon the reality principle, knows that his father is the stronger of the two males competing to psychosexually possess the one female. Nonetheless, the fearful boy remains ambivalent about his father's place in the family, which is manifested as fear of castration by the physically greater father; the fear is an irrational, subconscious manifestation of the infantile id.[4]
In developing a discrete psychosexual identity, boys develop castration anxiety and girls develop penis envy towards all males. The girl's envy is rooted in the biologic fact that, without a penis, she cannot sexually possess her mother as the infantile id demands. Resultantly, the girl redirects her desire for sexual union upon father. She thus psychosexually progresses to heterosexual femininity (which culminates in bearing a child) derived from earlier, infantile desires; her child replaces the absent penis. Moreover, after the phallic stage, the girl's psychosexual development includes transferring her primary erogenous zone from the infantile clitoris to the adult vagina. Freud thus considered a girl's Oedipal conflict to be more emotionally intense than that of a boy, resulting, potentially, in a woman of submissive, less confident personality.[5]
Defense mechanisms
[edit]In both sexes, defense mechanisms provide transitory resolutions of the conflict between the drives of the Id and the drives of the Ego. The first defense mechanism is repression, the blocking of memories, emotional impulses, and ideas from the conscious mind; yet it does not resolve the id–ego conflict. The second defense mechanism is identification, by which the child incorporates, to his or her ego, the personality characteristics of the same-sex parent; in so adapting, the boy diminishes his castration anxiety, because likeness to father protects him from father's wrath as a rival for mother; by so adapting, the girl facilitates identifying with mother, who understands that, in being females, neither of them possesses a penis, and thus are not antagonists.[6]
An unresolved fixation in the phallic stage could lead to egoism, low self esteem, flirtatious and promiscuous females, shyness, worthlessness and men that treat women with contempt.
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ "Sigmund Freud 1856–1939" entry (2000) Encyclopaedia of German Literature Routledge:London Retrieved 2 September 2009: http://www.credoreference.com.library.capella.edu/entry/routgermanlit/sigmund_freud_1856_1939
- ^ Freud, Sigmund (1956). On Sexuality. Penguin Books Ltd.
- ^ "Sigmund Freud 1856–1939" entry (2000) Encyclopaedia of German Literature Routledge:London Retrieved 2 September 2009: http://www.credoreference.com.library.capella.edu/entry/routgermanlit/sigmund_freud_1856_1939
- ^ Bullock, A., Trombley, S. (1999) The New Fontana Dictionary of Modern Thought Harper Collins:London pp. 607, 705
- ^ Bullock, A., Trombley, S. (1999) The New Fontana Dictionary of Modern Thought Harper Collins:London pp. 259, 705
- ^ Bullock, A., Trombley, S. (1999) The New Fontana Dictionary of Modern Thought Harper Collins:London pp. 205, 107
External links
[edit]- Freud's Psychosexual Stages.
- Colman, Andrew M. (2015) [2001]. "phallic stage (p. 566)". A Dictionary of Psychology (4th ed.). Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19105784-7.
- Felluga, Dino. "Modules on Freud: On Psychosexual Development". Introductory Guide to Critical Theory. West Lafayette, Indiana: Purdue University College of Liberal Arts.
- Nagera, Humberto, ed. (2014) [1969]. "Phallic erotism (pp. 56ff.)". Basic Psychoanalytic Concepts on the Libido Theory. Abingdon-on-Thames: Routledge. ISBN 978-1-31767039-1.
