Introduction
Psychodynamic family system is an all-inclusive model that pulls various psychological theories together. The theories are based on human interaction that drives the unconscious influence of character and personality (Oxford, 1992). It focuses on early childhood experiences that shape human personalities. It asserts that inheritance is not the only determinant of personality.
Instead, it suggests that caretakers play a crucial role in modeling a child’s behavior. This paper will focus on the psychological theories that are based on human interaction. The theories include development of gender roles, psychoanalysis, attachment, development of morals, aggression, personality and object relation theory.
Choice
In addition, there have been raising behaviors resulting from my past experiences. For example, some homosexuals adopt their behaviors unconsciously during childhood. In USA, a homosexual gave life testimony in church. In her testimony, she was raised by a house girl in the city of Chicago. The house girl would induce her into performing sex at the age of 11 years.
He, therefore, acquired a sexual phobia that eliminated sexual urge for women. Therefore, he chose to adopt homosexuality. He said that he is aroused sexually by men and lacks sexual attraction to the opposite sex. This implies that the man shaped his behavior unconsciously. As a result, I consider the model as being a crucial point for psychological departure making. This makes it worthy to study and analyze.
Gender Role Development
Psychodynamic family model forms the basis of developing the roles of gender. In many communities, a female child imitates and tends to copy the actions of their mothers (Amadiume, 1987). On the other hand, the male children adopt the daily chores of their fathers. For example, an African woman has been related to cooking, washing utensils and fetching firewood.
This has been the history of an African woman for a very long period of time. The maintenance of the sequence is because the new female generations adopt the roles of their coinciding gender. This has unconsciously shaped the role of women. On the other hand, an African man is associated with taking care of cattle, keeping security and providing for the family.
The new generations of males adopt and copy the male gender. In fact, you will find children playing games that incorporate gender roles. In the games, each gender is given the roles that coincide with their gender. This implies that the young children acquire their roles unconsciously from their caretakers. Therefore, psychodynamic family models determine the culture of the roles based on gender.
Moral Development
Morals refer to the right and wrong considerations of a community. Morals are classified into good and bad morals. Development of morals depends on the past experiences in childhood. They are induced into the children by the people who nurture them. The induction of morals is done consciously or unconsciously. However, the unconscious induction is more effective than the conscious.
For example, a child tends to use the language that their caretakers use. If the caretaker abuses them, the child absorbs the language unconsciously and uses it. On the other hand, a caretaker who uses polite language passes the behavior to the child unconsciously.
Similarly, a family that is less concerned with religion induces their children into paganism. On the other hand, families that emphasize on religion pass the religious spirit to their children unconsciously. It is observed that most priests and preachers come from prayerful families. Therefore, psychodynamic model is a major pillar of moral development.
Personality development
Personality defines the character, behaviors and perceptions that a person has in life. We mentioned that personality depends on both inheritance and experience. However, childhood experience with caretakers is the major determinant of the child’s personality.
For example, we may seek to analyze the development of introverts and extroverts. Introverts are the people who are laid back. They are less talkative and keep much to themselves. They are secretive and less outgoing.
For the introvert, they adopt this personality because they were brought up by parents or caretakers who keep to themselves. As a result, they absorbed the same behavior leading to introversion. On the other hand, extroverts are talkative, outgoing, open hearted, happy, and welcoming.
Researchers suggest that they adopt the personalities by emulating the behavior of the people around them. As a result, they are induced into being extroverts. This implies that psychodynamic model is a basis of personality development.
Aggression
Aggression is a crucial factor on psychology. The level of aggression relates to the past experience of a person. Caretakers induce children into low or high aggression depending on how they train them during childhood. A child who stays in the house sitting will result to low aggression. It retards aggression on terms of physical and mental aggression.
On the contrary, the caretakers who engage to their simple tasks and activities help them to acquire a high aggressive state. It sharpens their mind and invigorates their physical performance. In fact, researchers suggest that the difference in educational ability can be traced back to their childhood.
Children that are exposed to activities during their childhood accelerate the rate of mental and physical growth resulting to higher performance. On the other hand, lack of activities slows the rate of growth hence physically retarded.
Attachment
Attachment in psychology is a crucial component of human interaction and relationship (Goldenberg & Goldenberg, (2008). It refers to the social bond that exists between two people. In attachment, the parties have an emotion that continuously bind them together (Holmes, 1993). During childhood, the infant have a strong attachment to their caretakers.
The attachments that exist are based on the benefits that an infant get from the caretaker. The benefit may be protection, provision of food among others. However, this attachment affects the children socialization in future. For example, male child who has been nurtured by a single mother has a strong attachment to women.
Most of them have a tendency to become womanizers. This behavior is traced back to his early childhood. Surprisingly, a female child that is brought up by their father may tend to have great attraction to men. Therefore, attachment during childhood is a factor of psychodynamic models of families.
Object Relation Theory
Object relations theory is another factor of psychodynamic analysis. In the theory, research suggests that infants’ experiences transform into objects that affect them in their future. The objects might exist as father, mother or body parts. These objects influence their behaviors in the rest of their lives.
Although later experiences try reshaping the future, the objects exert a lot of influence to the victims retarding the change in personality. These objects, also, bring about dependency or independence in future. Therefore, object relation theory is a component of psychodynamic model.
Dream Analysis
Dream analysis is the interpretation of dream that a patient experience. Dream interpretation is based on dreamer’s perception rather than the interpreter’s understanding.
The perception of dreams by the dreamer reveals some infant experience. It, also, helps to understand the psychological status of the patient. It reveals the challenges that they have helping in diagnosis. Therefore, it is a component of psychodynamic model.
Psychoanalysis
Sigmund Freud postulated a theory of mind that have proven prudent in real life situations. Although this theory has undergone sequences of modification, some of its aspects remained to dominate theoretical history. In fact, psychodynamics have retrieved developmental aspects from this theory. This theory proposed issues that are relevant to the current family situations.
Apparently, it evaluate home in a broad perspective that includes social, political, philosophical, literal and artistic dimensions. It has contributed to the crucial knowledge that a family must obtain when living in a distinguished cultural environment.
Early life of children is surrounded by many factors that tend to shape the nature of a person’s psychology. For instance, we would expect psychological differences from people arising from different family backgrounds.
A child growing without a father could be potentially distinct in terms of behavior from another child who has both parents. Also, there are critical implications that could remain in the mind of a child who was abused sexually during her young life.
Psychoanalysis lays down the basis to overcome these unconscious situations and enable a victim to regain consciousness. When a person overcomes the unconsciousness, s/he could be able to shape his/ her life against the initially void relations. Factually, everyone possesses some effects that arise from this unconsciousness which could be eradicated by psychoanalysis.
The patients and the guardians undergo a period of extensive counseling and guidance. These sessions take fifty minutes and include verbal and non-verbal communication. The technique has been applied widely in developing psychodynamic understanding.
Conclusion
There are various strengths that are admirable in the model. It emphasizes on the effect of infant caretakers. It asserts that the infant experiences have great influence on future personality. Therefore, it urges the caretakers to engage in behaviors that shape the infant future personalities. As a result, it eliminates the difficulties that may affect the child.
However, the model has weaknesses that are not likeable. It analyses personality and behavioral development on the basis of past experience. It does not include the effect of inheritance. Based on inheritance, the model should show the effect of the infant experience on the inherited traits.
It, also, suppress the effect of experiences that the children get in their middle age. In a bid to help the needs of families, the model should incorporate the three factors during analysis. The change in analysis will help to make a wholesome analysis for psychological issues.
References
Amadiume, I. (1987). Male daughters, female husbands: gender and sex in an African society. London: Zed Books.
Goldenberg, I., & Goldenberg, H. (2008). Family therapy: an overview (7th ed.). Belmont, CA: Thomson Brooks/Cole.
Holmes, J. (1993). John Bowlby and attachment theory. London: Routledge.
Oxford, J. (1992). Community psychology: theory and practice. Chichester: Wiley.