Ch 4: The Freudian Approach: Relevant Research

Why do some adults continue to rely on immature defense mechanisms like denial despite their ineffectiveness? - Defensive Style

- According to Freud, adult defenses are related to early childhood experiences. - One team of investigators tested this notion > The researchers began by measuring the amount of stress experienced by a group of 3-year-olds. > They then waited 20 years before contacting the participants again and examining the kinds of defense mechanisms used by the now 23-year-old adults. > As expected, the men who as adults frequently relied on denial were the participants who had experienced the highest levels of stress in their early childhood. > The researchers reasoned that the men had relied heavily on the age-appropriate defense mechanism of denial when they were young. > Because denial helped these boys deal with their psychological distress, they continued to rely on this defense mechanism as adults. > investigators find that using immature defenses is often associated with problems in psychological functioning - One team of researchers found that adults who commonly rely on immature and ineffective defenses like denial have more problems with hostility, depression, and alcohol abuse than adults who use more effective defense mechanisms

Freud's Theory of Humor: aggression

- According to Freud, aggressive jokes allow the expression of impulses ordinarily held in check. - Although we may have unconscious urges to attack certain people or groups of people, our egos and superegos are generally effective in preventing outward acts of violence. > But an insulting joke allows us to express these same aggressive desires in a socially appropriate manner.

Developmental Differences & Defense Mechanisms: Denial and young children

- Adults have an arsenal of defenses they can use to ward off anxiety, but that is not the case for children - Preschool children who experience a threat to their well-being may have no way to deal with their emotional reactions other than to simply deny the events ever took place. - Denial consists of disavowing certain facts, from failure to see reality to distorting one's memory ("No, that's not what happened"), thereby reducing the anxiety associated with a traumatic event. - Several studies find that young children rely heavily on denial - When one team of researchers asked kindergarteners if they had ever felt like a sad and crying boy in a drawing, few of the children acknowledged ever feeling sad

Hypnosis procedure

- Although considerable dis- agreement remains over the nature of hypnosis, most researchers agree that hypnosis includes an induction procedure in which people are told they are going to be hypnotized, followed by suggestions to perform certain tasks. - These tasks range from the simple ones used in hypnosis research, such as dropping your arm, to the entertaining performances of stage hypnosis participants, such as yelling like Tarzan or trotting up and down the aisles warning that the British are coming.

modern hypnosis and application

- Although modern hypnosis has existed in some form for more than 200 years, it remains an intriguing and often misunderstood phenomenon. - Hypnosis also has a number of potentially useful applications. > Many people have dental work performed under hypnosis without the aid of painkillers. > Police investigators sometimes use hypnosis to help witnesses remember crime details. > psychotherapists from many different perspectives find hypnosis a useful tool when dealing with a wide variety of client problems, especially chronic pain - Despite these many uses, psychologists still quarrel about just what they are dealing with.

Sociocognitive Theories of Hypnosis cont...

- Argued that the psychoanalytic position sometimes becomes circular - Countered unusual behavior under hypnosis with demonstrations of the same phenomena without hypnosis - Challenged the accuracy of the participants' descriptions - Were skeptical of participants' reports concerning posthypnotic amnesia

Freud's Theory of Humor: catharsis

- Catharsis: Reduction of pent up tension by reaction of any means > Is a reason for laughter on jokes - People derive pleasure from many jokes because they reduce tension and anxiety

Sociocognitive Theories of Hypnosis

- Challenged the notion that hypnosis involved a state of consciousness different than being awake - Concepts of expectancy, motivation, and concentration are used to account for hypnotic phenomena - Sociocognitive theorists: > Criticized hidden observer demonstrations

Identification defense mechanism: experiment

- College students in one study were given some threatening information about their masculinity and femininity - The researcher reasoned that gender-related behavior is a particularly important aspect of identity for young men and women. > In other words, it is important for most men entering adulthood to think of themselves as masculine, and for women to believe they are feminine. - Information that threatens this part of the self-concept is potentially quite anxiety provoking. - The investigator predicted that students would deal with this anxiety by using the defense mechanism identification. - People who use identification associate themselves with powerful and successful individuals. > For example, a young man might think about his association with a military leader or successful athlete. - By unconsciously identifying with powerful others, we are said to fend off feelings of inadequacy and helplessness. > Moreover, psychoanalysts argue that identification plays a particularly important role in the development of gender identity. - Young men are said to identify with their fathers, whereas young women identify with their mothers as they develop gender- related characteristics. > Thus, when one's masculinity or femininity is threatened, the ego is likely to turn to identification to defend against the resulting anxiety. - To test this prediction: 1) the investigator analyzed participants' stories for three TAT cards. 2) The students then completed a short personality test that presumably measured their masculinity and femininity. 3) Shortly thereafter the students were given bogus feedback on the test. > Half the men were told they had scored high in masculinity; however, the other half were told they scored high in femininity. > Similarly, half the women were told they were feminine and half that they were masculine. 4) The students were then asked to provide three more stories from another set of TAT cards. - men receiving the bogus feedback had a particularly strong emotional reaction. - As predicted, they reacted to the threatening information by resorting to more identification. - The use of identification was particularly strong for men who considered themselves highly masculine. > In other words, to ward off this overt challenge to their sense of masculinity, the men unconsciously identified with powerful others, presumably masculine men. - That the students became defensive in this study was illustrated well by the reaction of one male participant. > When asked how he felt after being told he was feminine, he replied, "I didn't feel angry." Of course, no one had suggested that he was.

Freud's Theory of Humor

- Concerned with tendentious jokes > Provide insight into the unconscious of the joke teller and the person who laughs > Identified jokes dealing with hostility and sex - Aggressive jokes allow the expression of impulses ordinarily held in check - Laughter after a hostile or sexual joke is rarely justified by the humor content of the joke

Dream Content Research

- Consistent with Freud's intuition, investigators find the content of our dreams is not random. - Although there may be no apparent explanation for some of the bizarre material that makes its way into our nighttime productions, there is evidence that dream content is often influenced by the fears, problems, and issues that capture our thoughts before we go to bed - One team of researchers compared the dreams of Palestinian children who lived under two very different circumstances > Children living in the Gaza Strip during the time of the study had experienced years of violence and ever-present danger. > In contrast, Palestinian children living in the Galilee area of Israel had a relatively peaceful existence. > Dream reports revealed that the children living under constant stress had more dreams than the other children. > Moreover, the stressed children's dreams included many more threatening events than the children who lived in a less stressful world. > Clearly, the stressed children's dreams at night reflected the fears they faced during the day.

Defensive Style: adaptive vs. maladaptive

- Defense mechanism being adaptive or maladaptive depends on a function of: > How often the person relies on it > How old that person is - Anna Freud suggested that defense mechanisms are maladaptive when used past an appropriate age - Explains how people react to common sources of stress

Defensive style and stress

- Defensive style may also have implications for how people react to common sources of stress. - Researchers in one study examined the use of defense mechanisms by parents during a particularly stress-filled time in their lives: the months immediately before the birth of their first child and the first year of the child's life > The demands of a newborn, coupled with the financial and personal burdens that come with parenthood, can be a major source of stress and anxiety. > New parents who fail to deal with these stressors often experience a decline in general satisfaction with their relationship. > Consistent with these observations, the investigators found that parents who typically relied on immature defense mechanisms such as denial and projection were less happy with their partners as they faced the anxieties of parenting. > On the other hand, mothers and fathers who relied on more mature defense mechanisms, such as sublimation, remained satisfied with their relationship despite the challenges and anxieties the baby brought into their live

Identifying and Measuring Defense Mechanisms

- Done by investigators through: > Interpreting responses to Rorschach inkblots or to stories > Using responses to Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) picture cards - Researchers developed coding systems to convert responses into scores indicating: > Extent to which test takers use various defense mechanisms

Freud's theory of humor: Interpreting the Findings

- Drawing unequivocal conclusions from research is often difficult, but as you may have noticed by now, interpreting studies that test Freudian ideas is particularly challenging. - On the plus side, researchers have uncovered considerable evidence in support of Freud's theory of humor. > People often find jokes and cartoons funnier when they contain sexual and aggressive themes. > We also appear to enjoy hostile humor more when it is aimed at someone we dislike. > Hostile humor may reduce tension, although this does not necessarily reduce hostility, and jokes are funnier when the listener's tension level is built up before the punch line. - Less direct tests of Freud's theory also suggest that laughter serves important psychological functions. > For example, several studies find evidence to support the widely held belief that laughter is an effective means to combat daily tension and stressful events Some psychologists have even incorpo- rated humor into their therapy procedures (McGuire, 1999). - On the other hand, alternative explanations are often possible for many of these findings > for example, researchers find that humor often is the result of incongruity; that is, we find a situation funny when what happens is inconsistent with what we expect. > When applied to sexual and aggressive humor, it's possible that people find these kinds of jokes funny because sex and aggression are out of place in the joke setting. (Imagine a movie scene in which two sophisticated women bump into each other at a department store. Imagine further that they either get into a physical fight or say something with sexual connotations. We may find this situation funny for the reasons outlined by Freud. But it might also bring a laugh because we do not expect sophisticated women to act this way in this setting.)

Dream Interpretation: Freud

- Dream contains images or evokes emotions that people feel must mean something - Traditional Freudian therapist suggests that objects and people in a dream are symbols > Sexual symbols

What did REM sleep research reveal about the relationship between dreaming and mental health? - rebound effect

- Early researchers maintained that REM sleep, and therefore dreaming, was necessary for psychological health and that depriving someone of REM sleep might create serious psychological disturbances. - Subsequent research has challenged this conclusion, but dreaming does seem to have some psychological benefits. > Emotional disorders are often associated with sleep difficulties and reduced REM sleep > In addition, individuals deprived of REM sleep have more difficulty with stressful tasks - Participants in one study were shown a film about autopsy procedures before and after a night's sleep > The film, depicting a physician performing an autopsy in gruesome detail, was selected for the study because it invariably created high levels of anxiety in viewers. > Participants deprived of REM sleep had a difficult time coping with their anxiety. > Participants allowed to dream between showings of the film were significantly less disturbed by the film the second time they saw it. > Finally, researchers find that people deprived of REM sleep one night typically respond by increasing their amount of REM sleep the next night > This rebound effect suggests that REM sleep serves some important function.

catharsis: Freud's Theory of Humor

- Freud also noticed that the laughter following a hostile or sexual joke is rarely justified by the humor content of the joke. > If you stop to consider the next sexually oriented joke you hear, you'll probably notice that the joke often contains very little humor. - Freud explained our reaction in terms of tension reduction, or catharsis. - Descriptions of aggressive or sexual behavior create tension. - The punch line allows a release of that tension. - We get pleasure from many jokes not because they are clever or witty but because they reduce tension and anxiety. - "Strictly speaking, we do not know what we are laughing at," Freud explained. "The technique of such jokes is often quite wretched, but they have immense success in provoking laughter"

Function of Dreams: Freud

- Freud maintained that unconscious impulses cannot be suppressed forever; therefore, one of the major functions of dreams is to allow the symbolic expression of these impulses. - Dreams provide a safe and healthy outlet for expressing unconscious conflicts, but researchers had to wait for technology to catch up with theory before they could investigate this aspect of Freud's theory.

recurrent dreams

- From a psychoanalytic perspective, the dream reappears night after night because the conflict expressed in the dream is important yet remains unresolved. - Consistent with this interpretation, researchers find most recurrent dreams include threatening images, usually situations in which the dreamer is in danger - The psychoanalytic interpretation also helps to explain why recurrent dreamers are more likely to suffer from anxiety and generally poor adjustment during waking hours than people not experiencing recurrent dreams - The unconscious conflict surfaces in the dream at night but is expressed in the form of anxiety during the day; however, it is also possible that the cause-and-effect arrow runs in the opposite direction. > The anxiety some people experience during the day might lead to recurring dreams at night. - One study compared the number of recurrent dreams students experienced during exam weeks versus weeks without exams > Students who experienced recurrent dreams had considerably more of these dreams during exam weeks than when they were under less stress.

Reducing Aggression With Hostile Humor

- Hostile humor has tension reducing capabilities > Caution should be exercised on using appropriate kind of humor when dealing with angry audience

Different Views on Hypnosis: Psychoanalytic Theorists

- Hypnosis taps an aspect of the human mind that is otherwise difficult to reach - Participants experience an altered state of consciousness, like sleeping

Research on Freud's Theory of Humor: hypotheses derived from Freud

- Hypotheses derived from Freud's theory of humor have been supported in empirical studies - Men and women in a study were presented with a series of hostile jokes and cartoons > Consistent with Freud's observations, both enjoyed humor aimed at the opposite sex

Several other hypotheses derived from Freud's theory of humor also have been supported in empirical studies.

- If hostile humor allows us to satisfy aggressive impulses, we should find a joke funnier when it pokes fun at a person or group we don't like. > Several investigations find support for this prediction - Men and women in one study were presented with a series of hostile jokes and cartoons > Some of the material ridiculed men, whereas other jokes and cartoons made fun of women. > Consistent with Freud's observations, men found humor that targeted women funnier than humor that aimed at men, whereas the women enjoyed humor that put down men more than humor that made fun of women.

The Meaning of Dream Content

- If you were to describe one of your dreams to a traditional Freudian therapist, you would likely be told that the objects and people in your dreams are symbols, which in the Freudian tradition usually means sexual symbols. - Later psychoanalytic theorists argued that dreams represent unconscious preoccupations (Hall, 1953). > That is, the unresolved conflicts we struggle with beneath our awareness surface during sleeping hours.

Hypnotic Responsiveness: important variables

- Important variables affecting hypnotic responsiveness: > Attitude > Motivation > Expectancy

Freud's Theory of Humor

- In his 1905 book Jokes and Their Relation to the Unconscious, Freud presented an extensive analysis of humor. - Although he recognized "innocent" jokes, such as puns and clever insights, Freud was more concerned with tendentious jokes: the ones that provide insight into the unconscious of the joke teller as well as the person who laughs. > Predictably, Freud saw two kinds of tendentious jokes, those dealing with hostility and those dealing with sex.

REM sleep: Function of Dreams

- In the 1950s researchers discovered that mammals experience two distinctly different kinds of sleep - Each night we alternate between periods of REM and non-REM sleep. - The acronym REM derives from the phrase "rapid eye movement"; this period is usually accompanied by rapidly moving eyes underneath closed lids. - REM sleep is sometimes called paradoxical sleep because, although our muscles are especially relaxed during this time, our brain activity is similar to that of the waking state. - Most adults spend 11⁄2 to 2 hours a night in REM sleep, spread over several periods. - The significance of this discovery for personality researchers is that REM sleep is filled with dreams, whereas non-REM sleep has significantly fewer dreams. > thus the discovery of REM sleep created new opportunities for dream researchers. - Researchers could look at the effects of depriving people of REM sleep, they could correlate psychological variables with the length and amount of REM sleep, and they could wake people during REM sleep to capture dreams that might be lost by morning

Defensive Style

- Individual patterns > Relying on some defense mechanisms more than others > Rationalizing away the misdeeds and mistakes > Displacing anger and projecting own suspicions and fears onto others - Tells about a person's general well-being

Hypnosis

- Induction procedure in which people are told about being hypnotized and are suggested to perform certain tasks > Tasks range from simple ones used in hypnosis research to entertaining performances of stage hypnosis

Level of Tension and Funniness

- More tension people experience before a punch line, the funnier they'll find the joke - Pleasure derived from the release of tension leads to the enjoyment of the joke

Dream Interpretation

- Notion that dreams contain hidden psychological meaning > Individual's dreams provide clues about what's in individual's unconscious - Used by therapists from different perspectives as a therapeutic tool - Questions addressed in the research: > What do people dream about? > Why do people dream?

Recurrent dream: Dream Interpretation

- Occurs because conflict expressed in the dream is important yet remains unresolved - Occurs due to the anxiety people experience during the day

Developmental Differences: Defense Mechanisms cont...

- Older children turn to projection to alleviate their anxieties and inward fears > Projection: Protects from threatening anxiety by attributing unacceptable thoughts and feelings to others - Use of defense mechanisms other than denial and projection indicates emotional maturity

Dream Interpretation: Interpreting the Evidence

- On one hand, researchers have produced a number of findings consistent with Freud's speculations. - The content of our dreams is not random, and dreaming appears to serve some positive psychological functions. > However, in almost all cases, psychologists can account for the findings without relying on Freudian concepts. > Moreover, researchers have also uncovered results that are difficult to explain within Freudian theory > For example, why do newborn babies experience as much as 8 hours of REM sleep per day? What unconscious conflicts are they working out? > For that matter, REM sleep has been found in nearly all mammals and possibly even in human fetuses - In short, the search for definitive answers to some of the questions Freud raised continues.

Interpreting the Findings on Freud's Theory of Humor

- People find jokes and cartoons funnier when they contain sexual and aggressive themes - People appear to enjoy hostile humor more when it is aimed at someone they dislike - Hostile humor may reduce tension - Jokes are funnier when the listener's tension level is built up before the punch line

Applications of Hypnosis

- Performing dental work without the aid of painkillers - Used by police investigators to help witnesses remember crime details - Psychotherapists use it for dealing with a wide variety of client problems

Hypnotic Responsiveness predictability

- Predicted by an individual's ability to become immersed in a role - Absorption: > Personality trait that predicts hypnotic responsiveness > High scores indicate ability to become: > Highly involved in sensory and imaginative experiences > More responsive to hypnotic suggestions

Neodissociation Theory

- Psychoanalytic view on hypnosis - Deeply hypnotized people experience a division of their conscious mind > Hypnotized part enters a type of altered state > Another part remains aware of what is going on during the hypnotic session (acts as a hidden observer)

Identifying & Measuring Defense Mechanisms

- Psychologists investigating defense mechanisms face the same set of problems that confront other researchers studying psychoanalytic concepts. - Because these processes operate at a level below consciousness, we cannot simply ask people to describe their defense mechanisms. > Rather, investigators must rely on less direct methods to determine when and how often research participants use the various mechanisms identified by psychoanalysts

REM Sleep

- Refers to rapid eye movement - Called paradoxical sleep - Muscles are relaxed but brain activity will be similar to that of waking state - Filled with dreams - Research indicates that People deprived of REM sleep one night respond by increasing their amount of REM sleep the next night

Different Views on Hypnosis: Cognitive and Social Theorists

- Reject the notion that hypnotized people operate under an altered state of awareness - Assert that things people do under hypnosis can be explained in terms of basic psychological processes

Developmental Differences: Defense Mechanisms

- Research indicates that young children rely on denial > Denial consists of disavowing certain facts, from failure to see reality to distorting one's memory > Reduces anxiety associated with a traumatic event - Mature children find denial of facts and feelings to be ineffective

Research on Freud's Theory of Humor: aggressive & sexual themes

- Research suggests that people find aggressive and sexual themes funny > Participants rate cartoons containing aggression or sex as funnier than other cartoons

Research on Freud's Theory of Humor

- Researchers asked highschool students to come up with a funny caption for a neutral picture: > the students' responses were filled with aggressive and sexual themes. > Interestingly, the students made almost no references to sex or aggression when asked what they might say if actually in the situation depicted in the picture. - Was Freud correct when he said that people find aggressive and sexual themes funny? > Several investigations support this observation - Participants in these studies typically rate cartoons containing aggression or sex as funnier than cartoons without these themes. > Common observations point to the same conclusion: examples of pain and suffering permeate many sources of humor. > And it's a rare situation comedy that goes more than a few minutes these days without a reference to sex.

Defensive Style

- Researchers have found that each of us tends to rely on some defense mechanisms more than others - Psychologists sometimes refer to these individual patterns as our defensive style. - Because some defense mechanisms are more effective than others, identifying a person's defensive style may tell us something about his or her general well-being. - Freud often pointed to defense mechanisms to explain neurotic behavior; however, it is not clear whether he thought the use of defense mechanisms was necessarily pathological. - Later psychoanalytic writers have argued that on occasion defense mechanisms can be normal and even adaptive > For example, sublimation— turning the unconscious impulse into a socially acceptable action—can serve the dual function of relieving anxiety and improving a person's life situation.

Interpreting the Evidence: Dream Interpretation

- Researchers produced a number of findings consistent with Freud's speculations > Content of our dreams is not random > Dreaming serves positive psychological functions - Researchers uncovered the results that are difficult to explain within Freudian theory

Freud's Theory of Humor: sex

- Similar to the idea behind aggressive jokes, we can discuss taboo sexual topics through the socially appropriate outlet of sexual humor. - Open discussions of sex are inappropriate in many social settings, yet jokes about sex are often not only tolerated but encouraged and rewarded. - One team of researchers found that sexual jokes provided adolescent girls with an easy way to introduce otherwise embarrassing topics into their lunchtime conversations

Level of Tension and Funniness: Freud's theory of humor

- Skilled joke tellers elaborate on the details. They allow the tension level to build gradually as they set up the punch line. > According to Freud, this long buildup creates greater tension and thus a louder and longer laugh when the punch line finally arrives. - Freud said that the more tension people experience before a punch line, the funnier they'll find the joke. > If that is the case, then a nervous and slightly frightened person is more likely to enjoy a joke than someone who is calm and therefore tensionless. - The prediction was tested in a study in which people were asked to work with a laboratory rat > Participants in the low-tension condition were asked to hold the rat for 5 seconds and they were told, "These rats are bred to be docile and easy to handle, and I don't think you will have any trouble." > In the moderate-tension condition, people were asked to take a small sample of the rat's blood and they were told the task was easier than it looked. > Participants in the high-tension group were given a bottle and syringe and asked to take two cubic centimeters of blood from the rat and the experimenter emphasized how difficult the task was and warned that the rat might bite. > The punch line occurred when participants reached into the cage and discovered a toy rat. > Consistent with Freud's theory, participants in the high- tension group thought the situation was funnier than participants in the other conditions > The pleasure they derived from the release of tension apparently led to their enjoyment of the joke.

Dreams and unconscious conflict

- Some research suggests that issues we are not consciously aware of make their presence known in our dreams. - Consider a series of investigations comparing how often male and female characters appear in dreams. > The answer will depend in part on your own gender. > Several investigations find that women typically have an equal number of male and female characters in their dreams; however, despite stereotypes about men dreaming only of beautiful women, in truth men are much more likely to dream about male characters > this difference is found at all ages and in nearly every culture. > The combined findings of all these studies suggest that males make up about 50% of the characters in women's dreams, but about 65% of the characters in men's dreams. > One explanation for this relates back to the Oedipus complex and its female counterpart, the Electra complex > According to Freudian theory, men never completely overcome their conflict with their fathers and because some of these feelings are displaced onto other males, men typically experience more conflict with the men they encounter than do women. > If men are preoccupied with this conflict at an unconscious level, as a psychoanalytic psychologist might guess, then this preoccupation should surface in the form of male characters in their dreams. > we can't say that the universal prevalence of male characters in men's dreams proves this part of Freud's theory correct; nonetheless, we can say that the findings from these studies are at least consistent with predictions from Freud's theory.

various procedures to record and interpret the content of our dreams developed by research

- Sometimes sleepers are awakened when physiological measures indicate they are probably dreaming. - Other investigators rely on participants to record their dreams first thing in the morning in diaries they keep next to their beds. - Still others simply ask participants to describe a recent dream or a recurrent dream.

Dream Interpretation: Freud

- The notion that dreams contain hidden psychological meaning was promoted and popularized by Freud. - Freud interpreted his patients' dreams in an effort to understand their unconscious conflicts and desires. - Today, therapists from many different perspectives use dream interpretation as one of their therapeutic tools.

Research that finds at least partial support for Freud's notion that dreams provide an outlet for suppressed thoughts.

- Trauma victims who avoid thinking about their experience during the day often have dreams about the traumatic event at night - Participants in one study were asked before sleep to deliberately repress thoughts about someone they knew while engaging in a stream- of-consciousness writing exercise > That night, those participants had more dreams about the person they had tried not to think about than did participants allowed to write about the person they knew.

Defense Mechanisms

- Unconscious efforts to conceal painful thoughts > Repression: Cornerstone of psychoanalysis - Based on psychoanalytic approach: > Ego consists of tools to fend off anxiety and guilt - Regularly employed in life without awareness

Hypnotic Responsiveness

- Varies amongst indiviudals - Achieved by: > Defining the situation as hypnosis > Securing cooperation and establishing trust before beginning - Freud observed that: > Hypnotizing neurotics is difficult > Insane are completely resistant to hypnosis

Reducing Aggression with Hostile Humor: Freud's theory of humor

- We've often heard that humor can turn away anger. - Suppose you were confronted with an angry person and wanted to defuse the situation with a joke; what kind would you tell: one with obvious hostile content or an innocent, nonhostile joke? > Common sense tells you to try the nonhostile joke, but Freud made the opposite prediction. - Freud said that hostile humor provides an outlet for aggressive feelings. > If that is the case, hostile humor might do the trick better than nonhostile humor. > Several investigations find support for Freud's prediction. - Participants in one study were insulted by the investigator and then read a series of either hostile or nonhostile jokes > When later asked what they thought about the insulting investigator, the participants who read the hostile jokes were less angry than those who read the nonhostile jokes. - Angry participants in another study read cartoons that expressed hostility toward women > Later these participants were given the opportunity to administer electric shocks to a woman under the guise of a learning experiment. > These participants gave less intense and shorter shocks than angry participants who had not seen the cartoons. - other investigations find the relationship between humor and aggression is not that simple. > Angry participants in one study were exposed to a hostile comedy routine and became more hostile toward a person who had insulted them > In another investigation, angry participants allowed to shock an unseen victim gave more electric shocks after reading hostile cartoons than those who read nonhostile cartoons > In short, hostile humor sometimes reduces aggressiveness, yet other times increases it. - Why? Quite possibly, as Freud speculated, hostile humor defuses aggressive tendencies in some situations, but hostile humor has the potential to do more than reduce tension. > For example, people often imitate aggressive models. > Thus the aggression described in hostile jokes or shown in cartoons might be imitated by an angry reader. - In short, although Freud may be correct about the tension- reducing capabilities of hostile humor, we should be cautious about using that kind of humor when dealing with an angry audience.

Defensive Style: adaptive vs. maladaptive

- Whether a defense mechanism is adaptive or maladaptive may be a function of how often the person relies on it and how old that person is. - Anna Freud (1965) suggested that defense mechanisms are maladaptive when used past an appropriate age. > Five-year-olds may deny they did something unpleasant and still continue to function well, but adults who use the same defense strategy will probably find it more and more difficult to interact with others or to make sense of their own behavior.

Freud & defense mechanisms

- among the discoveries Freud encountered when he first began to peek under the surface of human consciousness were the curious ways his patients dealt with emotional pain. - As early as 1894, Freud wrote about his patients' unconscious efforts to conceal painful thoughts and described many of their neurotic symptoms as manifestations of defense mechanisms. - Freud eventually identified the defense mechanism repression as the cornerstone of psychoanalysis; however, it was left to some of Freud's followers to fully develop the notion of defense mechanisms and to explore their psychological origins and function. - In particular, Freud's daughter Anna identified 10 defense mechanisms depicted either directly or vaguely in her father's writings. She also described five additional mechanisms on her own, and subsequent psychoanalytic writers have added to the list. > Thus, within the psychoanalytic approach, the ego has many tools at its disposal to fend off anxiety and guilt.

Developmental Differences & Defense Mechanisms: projection & older children

- as children mature, they find that outright denial of facts and feelings is increasingly ineffective. - By the time they enter the middle elementary school years, children understand that refusing to admit a fact does not make it go away. - Unfortunately, the anxieties that brought about the use of denial do not disappear with this insight. > Rather, the child comes to rely on more sophisticated methods of defense. - In particular, older children often turn to projection to alleviate their anxieties and inward fears. - Projection protects us from threatening anxiety by attributing unacceptable thoughts and feelings to someone else. > In a sense, we move the anxiety-provoking material outside of ourselves. > We recognize selfish behavior and sinister motives in others, but not in ourselves. - Researchers in one study gathered TAT stories from children at several different times between the ages of 61⁄2 and 91⁄2 - the children's use of denial and projection perfectly fit the expectations of the investigators. - The children used increasingly less denial as they moved through these years but came to use projection more. - projection also has its limitations. - One study found that 9- to 11- year-old girls with few friends were quick to use both denial ("They're not really ignoring me") and projection ("Those girls are just mean") when faced with social rejection > By failing to acknowledge the reasons classmates rejected them, the girls most likely had a difficult time making the adjustments necessary to gain social approval. > Thus, as they move into young adulthood, most men and women come to rely on more sophisticated defense mechanisms - the use of defense mechanisms other than denial and projection is sometimes used as an indicator of emotional maturity - The tools used by the ego may change as we move through the childhood years and into adulthood, but the need to protect ourselves from unacceptable levels of anxiety remains.

Identifying & Measuring Defense Mechanisms: Projective Tests

- many of researchers turn to projective tests to identify defense mechanisms -Some investigators measure defense mechanisms by interpreting responses to Rorschach inkblots or to stories - Others use responses to Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) picture cards - Researchers have developed detailed coding systems to turn responses into scores indicating the extent to which test takers use various defense mechanisms - The more frequently test takers make these kinds of statements, the more they are assumed to use defense mechanisms when dealing with the anxiety they face in their own lives.

Freud and Dream Symbols

- most provocative aspect of Freud's dream interpretation theory: seemingly innocent objects and actions are symbolic representations of sexuality and sexual activity - According to some psychoanalytic researchers, people who are anxious about sexual matters are unable to express their sexual desires directly. > Instead, these individuals are left to express their sexual feelings through dream symbols. - To test this hypothesis, one team of researchers asked participants to keep diaries of their dreams and their daily level of anxiety for 10 days > Consistent with the psychoanalytic position, the higher the participants' anxiety level, the more often classic Freudian sexual symbols appeared in their dreams. - Was Freud correct about dream symbols: although researchers sometimes find results that support psychoanalytic theory, direct and convincing tests of the notion that dream images are sexual symbols remain elusive. - Most dream researchers agree that the content of our dreams is not random. > But determining why some images appear in our dreams more often than others remains a challenge.

4 areas of research relevant to Freud's theory.

1) dream interpretation 2) defense mechanisms 3) humor. 4) hypnosis.

Function of Dreams

Allow the symbolic expression of unconscious impulses Provide a safe and healthy outlet for expressing unconscious conflicts

Hypnosis: Sociocognitive Theories of Hypnosis

Although psychoanalytic accounts of hypnosis were once widely accepted among psychologists, some researchers began to challenge the notion that hypnosis involved a state of consciousness different than being awake (Barber, 1969). They pointed out there is nothing a person can do under hypnosis that cannot be done without hypnosis. For example, people who are relaxed but not hypnotized, and who are asked to imagine a weight pulling their arms down, will experience the same increased heaviness in their arms as hypnotized individuals. But how do these psychologists explain some of the unusual things people do when hypnotized? Most use concepts such as expectancy, motivation, and concentration to account for hypnotic phenomena (Barber, 1999; Wagstaff, David, Kirsch, & Lynn, 2010). To illustrate the point, I sometimes ask a few students in my class to stand up and spin like a top. In every case the students comply. When I ask why they are doing this, they say it is because I asked them to. None have ever said it was because they were hypnotized. Yet most people who see hypnosis participants stand and spin like tops at the hypno- tist's request say the people act that way because they are hypnotized. What is the difference between these two situations? Does the hypnotist use certain magical words that suddenly transform people into a trance? Sociocognitive theorists argue that hypnotized and nonhypnotized people stand up and spin for the same reason: They think they are supposed to. These theorists are also critical of "hidden observer" demonstrations (Green, Page, Handley, & Rasekhy, 2005; Spanos & Katsanis, 1989). They argue that the highly responsive people in these experiments are told their hidden observer is supposed to feel pain, and they consequently report the pain they expect. When researchers told participants in one study that their hidden observer would experience less pain, the hidden observers indeed reported less, not more, pain (Spanos & Hewitt, 1980). Sociocognitive theorists also argue that the psychoanalytic position some- times can become circular. That is, if we ask why hypnosis participants run around making chicken noises, we are told it is because they are hypnotized. But if we ask how we can tell the participants are hypnotized, we are shown how they run around making chicken noises. The concept becomes inargu- able and therefore useless in explaining the effect.

Hypnosis: Psychoanalytically Influenced Theories

Freud saw hypnosis as a passkey to a highly hypnotizable patient's uncon- scious mind. Somehow the barrier to the unconscious is weakened during hypnosis, allowing easier access to crucial unconscious material. Many psy- choanalytic therapists still use hypnosis this way (Baker & Nash, 2008; Eisen, 2010; Lankton & Matthews, 2010). One account of hypnosis with a psychoanalytic flavor is called neodissociation theory (Hilgard, 1994; Sadler & Woody, 2010). According to this explanation, deeply hypnotized people experience a division of their conscious. One part of their conscious—the hypnotized part—enters a type of altered state. But another part remains aware of what is going on during the hypnotic session. This second part is said to act as a "hidden observer" monitoring the situation. The hypnotized part of the conscious is unaware of the observer part. Highly responsive participants in one study were hypnotized and told they would not experience pain (Hilgard, 1977). Their arms were then lowered into ice water for up to 45 seconds. Like any of us, when not hypnotized, these people reported severe pain almost as soon as their arms touched the water. However, when hypnotized, they appeared to withstand the icy water with little evidence of suffering. But this ability to withstand pain under hypnosis has been demonstrated before. The new twist the investigator added was asking participants to report their experiences through automatic writing or automatic talking. The hand not immersed in the ice water was placed under a covered box where the participant used either a pencil or a keypad to write with. The researcher found that hypnotized participants could keep one arm in the cold water while writing with the other arm that the experi- ence is quite painful. Advocates of neodissociation theory argue that the part of the participant's conscious that was in the altered state was able to deny the pain and keep the arm submerged in the water. However, the hidden observer part—presumably the part of consciousness that controls the auto- matic writing—was aware of the pain and could report it.

Hypnotic Responsiveness

Not everyone responds the same to a hypnotist's suggestions. Some people sing like an opera star, stick their arms in ice water, or report seeing objects that aren't really there. Others begrudgingly close their eyes but fail to react to any of the hypnotist's requests. Most people fall somewhere in between. One of the first things students ask me after a hypnosis demonstration is why some people are so responsive and others are not. What makes a good hypnotist? What kind of person makes the best participant? Despite stage hypnotists' claims to be the best at their trade, research shows hypnotic responsiveness is largely a participant variable. The difference between hypnotists for the most part lies in showmanship (Meeker & Barber, 1971). Highly responsive people respond to anyone they perceive to be a legitimate hypnotist. In fact, to standardize procedures, many researchers put hypnotic induction procedures on tape. Research assistants play the tape for participants with no apparent loss in responsiveness. Beginning hypnotists are sometimes disappointed when people fail to respond to their suggestions, wondering what they did wrong. Had they given intelligence tests, they prob- ably would not blame themselves for a test taker who did poorly. But so many performers have promoted the idea of good and bad hypnotists that it is a difficult concept to shake. Nonetheless, there are a few techniques hypnotists can use to increase responsiveness, especially among people who are a bit skeptical at the beginning of the experience (Lynn et al., 1991). People are more responsive to hypnotic suggestions when the situation is defined as hypnosis and when their cooperation is secured and trust established before beginning. But most hypnotists use these techniques routinely and still find large differences in responsiveness.

PPT

PPT

Interpreting the Findings on Freud's Theory of Humor: laughter

Research indicates that laughter is an effective means to combat daily tension and stressful events

Research & Hypnotic Responsiveness

Researchers find that hypnotic responsiveness is in fact a fairly stable individual difference. People who are highly responsive to one hypnotist's suggestions will probably be responsive to another hypnotist. Moreover, how responsive you are to hypnotic suggestions today is an excellent predictor of how responsive you will be years from now (Spanos, Liddy, Baxter, & Burgess, 1994). One team of researchers found an impressive correlation of .71 between hypnotic responsiveness scores taken 25 years apart (Piccione, Hilgard, & Zimbardo, 1989). The question thus becomes: What kind of person makes the most responsive participant? For decades, investigators looked for personality trait measures that could predict hypnotic responsiveness. Researchers speculated that the most responsive participants might score high on measures of sensation seeking, imagination, or intelligence and low on measures of dogmatism, indepen- dence, extraversion, and so on. Unfortunately, few correlations between per- sonality scores and hypnotic responsiveness were found, and replications were seldom reported (Green, 2004; Kirsch & Council, 1992; Laurence, Beaulieu-Prevost, & du Chene, 2008). Short of hypnotizing the person, no measure was discovered that reliably predicted responsiveness to hypnosis. Even Freud could not tell beforehand which patients would be highly respon- sive. He only observed that "neurotics can only be hypnotized with great dif- ficulty, and the insane are completely resistant" (1905/1960, pp. 294-295). However, later research identified a few personality variables other than neurosis and insanity that predict hypnotic responsiveness. These studies suc- ceeded where earlier efforts had failed because investigators measured traits that more directly relate to the hypnotic experience. For example, a person's ability to become immersed in a role predicts hypnotic responsiveness (Sarbin & Coe, 1972). This may be why drama students are more responsive to hypnotic suggestions than other students (Coe & Sarbin, 1991). Recently, investigators have identified differences between highly responsive participants and poor responders when examining brain activity (Gruzelier, 2006; Oakley, 2008). Thus, some day it may be possible to predict how responsive you will be to hypnosis by examining electroencephalograph and fMRI data. But the most successful efforts to date to predict hypnotic responsiveness from personality traits come from work on a trait called absorption. People who score high on measures of absorption have the ability to become highly involved in sensory and imaginative experiences. They are open to new experiences and are prone to fantasies and daydreams (Roche & McConkey, 1990; Tellegen & Atkinson, 1974). Numerous studies find that people who score high on measures of absorption are more responsive to hypnotic sugges- tions than those who score low (Glisky, Tataryn, Tobias, Kihlstrom, & McConkey, 1991; Nadon, Hoyt, Register, & Kihlstrom, 1991). Thus, if you are the kind of person who gets involved in a good book or a movie and blocks out all experiences around you, you probably can be responsive to hypnotic suggestions. Beyond this, three important variables affect hypnotic responsiveness: attitude, motivation, and expectancy (Barber, 1999). People with a positive attitude toward hypnosis are more responsive than are those who view hypnosis with suspicion and mistrust. Participants taught to develop positive attitudes and to change their expectancies from passively receiving suggestions to actively taking part in the experience often become more responsive to suggestions (Gorassini, Sowerby, Creighton, & Fry, 1991; Gorassini & Spanos, 1986). In addition, the more motivated people are to experience hypnosis, the more responsive they will be. Finally, what people expect to happen during the hypnotic experience affects their responsiveness (Benham, Woody, Wilson, & Nash, 2006; Fassler, Lynn, & Knox, 2008). Participants told in one study that responding to suggestions was difficult were not as responsive as those told it was easy (Barber & Calverley, 1964). Similarly, students who first watched a highly responsive participant were more responsive to hypnotic suggestions than those who watched a nonresponsive model (Klinger, 1970). In short, people tend to act under hypnosis the way they think they are supposed to act. This is why people who expect to see bizarre behavior at a hypnosis show often act bizarrely when they are brought up on stage and hypnotized.

TEXTBOOK

TEXTBOOK

Two predictions from Freud's theory are particularly intriguing because at first glance they appear to defy common sense.

These have to do with the effect of hostile humor and how anxiety affects how funny we find a joke.

Hypnosis Research

What Is Hypnosis? There is no shortage of theories about the nature of hypnosis. Psychologists sometimes organize the various explanations for hypnosis along a continuum based on the extent to which the theory reflects psychoanalytic thinking (Kirsch & Lynn, 1995). At one end of this continuum we find psychologists who describe hypnosis in a manner similar to the way Freud did. They believe hypnosis taps an aspect of the human mind that is otherwise difficult to reach. These theorists sometimes say that hypnotic participants fall into a trance or that they experience an altered state of consciousness, like sleeping. At the other end of the continuum we find theorists who emphasize the role of cognitive and social processes. These psychologists reject the notion that hypnotized people operate under an altered state of awareness. They skepti- cally maintain there is nothing mysterious about hypnotic phenomena—that all the amazing things people do under hypnosis can be explained in terms of basic psychological processes applicable to hypnotized and nonhypnotized people. A great deal of research has been directed at determining which of these descriptions of hypnosis is correct. However, it may also be the case that both descriptions of hypnosis are partially correct and that each explains different aspects of the hypnotic experience (Kihlstrom, 1998, 2005; Spiegel, 2005).

Sociocognitive Theories of Hypnosis vs. Psychoanalytically Influenced Theories

bate between psychoanalytic theorist and sociocognitive theorists continues (Kallio & Revonsuo, 2003; Kirsch, 2005; Lynn, Kirsch, Knox, Fassler, & Lilienfeld, 2007; Raz, Kirsch, Pollard, & Nitkin-Kaner, 2006). Nonetheless, in recent years there has been a growing consensus among researchers that the hypnotic trance notion alone does a poor job of explaining why hypnosis participants act the way they do (Kirsch, 2000; Kirsch & Lynn, 1998). Although psychoanalytic theorists point to unusual behavior under hypnosis, such as pain analgesia, deafness, and age regression, sociocognitive theorists counter with demonstrations of the same phenomena without hypnosis. In some cases, sociocognitive theorists challenge the accuracy of the participants' descriptions. For example, people who claim to go back to an earlier age typ- ically do a poor job of re-creating what they were really like at that time (Nash, 1987). Sociocognitive theorists also are skeptical of participants' reports con- cerning posthypnotic amnesia. Hypnosis participants are often told they will not remember what has happened during hypnosis until the hypnotist tells them to. Indeed, many of these people recall little or nothing of the experi- ence until given permission. Posthypnotic amnesia has not escaped the atten- tion of novelists and scriptwriters, whose characters sometimes engage in all manner of heinous acts while seemingly under the control of an evil hypno- tist. Although there is no evidence that hypnosis can be used this way, some people do claim to forget what they did when hypnotized. Why? Psychoanalytically oriented theorists explain that the experience either has been repressed out of consciousness or has been recorded in a part of the mind not accessible to consciousness. The information is said to remain inac- cessible until the ego allows it to enter awareness. However, sociocognitive theorists argue that hypnosis participants expect not to recall what happens to them and therefore make no effort to remember (Coe, 1989; Sarbin & Coe, 1979; Spanos, Radtke, & Dubreuil, 1982). These researchers argue that under the right circumstances people can be persuaded to make that effort. For example, how long would posthypnotic amnesia continue if participants were offered $1,000 to describe what happened while they were hypnotized? A team of researchers found a less expensive way to test this possibility (Howard & Coe, 1980; Schuyler & Coe, 1981). Some highly hypnotizable people were connected to a machine with a lot of lights and gauges and told the instrument could tell when they were lying. The experimenter explained that the machine "is very sensitive and functions in the same manner as a lie detector. It can tell if you are withholding information." In truth, the machine had no such capabilities, but the participants believed that it did. Although they were told under hypnosis they would remember nothing, when it came time to report what they could remember about the hypnotic experience, par- ticipants in the "lie detector" condition remembered significantly more than people in a control condition. Apparently, they believed they would be caught for saying they could not remember when they really could. Although these studies challenge the psychoanalytically influenced theo- ries of hypnosis, they do not dispute the usefulness of hypnosis or the honesty of the participants. Responsive participants are not intentionally deceiving the hypnotist. Rather, they are responding to normal social-psychological influ- ences. Just as you act the way you believe a student is supposed to act when in school, hypnosis participants behave the way they believe people are sup- posed to when under hypnosis. It also is safe to speculate that the debate between psychoanalytic and sociocognitive theorists will not go away any time soon. For example, recent advances in technology provide researchers with new opportunities to examine the neurological changes that accompany hypnosis. Not surprisingly, proponents of the psychoanalytic view have interpreted findings from these studies as evidence for a hypnotic trance, whereas psychologists who advocate a sociocognitive interpretation see the data in ways that support their position

Men's Use of Identification as a Function of Feedback

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FIGURE 4.1 Men's Use of Identification as a Function of Feedback

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FIGURE 4.2 Use of Defenses as a Function of Age

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FIGURE 4.3 Perceived Funniness as a Function of Tension

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TABLE 4.1 Percentage of Male Dream Characters for Men and Women

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Figure 4.3 - Perceived Funniness as a Function of Tension

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