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Person

Sigmund Freud

Also known as Sigismund Schlomo Freud, Freud

Austrian neurologist who founded psychoanalysis and the "talking cure".

At a glance

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Why it matters

Key facts

Born
6 May 1856, Freiberg in Moravia, Austrian Empire (now Příbor, Czech Republic)1
Died
23 Sep 1939, Hampstead, London1
Known for
Psychoanalysis; id, ego and superego; repression; defence mechanisms; the Oedipus complex1
Trained as
Physician, MD from the University of Vienna in 18811
Key technique
Free association, which replaced hypnosis in his practice1
Exile
Left Vienna for London in June 1938 after the Nazi annexation of Austria1

Main ideas

  1. The unconscious1

    Much of mental life is unconscious; repression keeps unwanted, anxiety-inducing thoughts out of awareness.

  2. Id, ego and superego1

    The id seeks pleasure, the superego moralises, and the ego balances the two, using defences when threatened.

  3. Dreams as disguised wishes1

    Dreams turn repressed wishes into disguised images; free association to the dream reveals its hidden content.

  4. The talking cure1

    Patients talking freely about their difficulties became the format all later psychotherapies followed.

  5. Transference1

    Feelings patients develop toward the analyst repeat earlier relationships and can be analysed.

Criticism

  1. Falsifiability1

    Karl Popper called his theories unfalsifiable; Adolf Grünbaum argued many are testable.

  2. Pseudoscience charge1

    Critics such as Frederick Crews and Richard Webster deny psychoanalysis scientific merit.

  3. Partial support1

    A 1977 review by Fisher and Greenberg found empirical support for some of his concepts and not others.

  4. Declining in psychiatry1

    Psychoanalysis lost ground in American psychiatry from 1965 on, yet Freud was ranked the third most cited psychologist of the 20th century.

Books to start with

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  1. Studies on Hysteria1

    With Josef Breuer; the case histories behind the talking cure.

  2. The Interpretation of Dreams1

    Dreams as wish-fulfilment and his first model of the mind.

  3. The Psychopathology of Everyday Life1

    Slips and forgetting as signs of unconscious processes.

  4. Introductory Lectures on Psycho-Analysis1

    His own overview for a general audience, given 1915–17.

Connections

Related

Writes

Sources

  1. Sigmund Freud (Wikipedia) (opens en.wikipedia.org)

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