Psychodynamic Model - Healthy Personality

The following explanations serve as an indispensable foundation for understanding the individual psychodynamic disorder models. Please read this page first before exploring the specific disorder models.

The Three Agencies of the Psyche

SUPEREGO

Conscience, norms, imagos - shaped by parents and environment. Partly conscious, partly unconscious.

EGO

The personality itself. Partly conscious, partly unconscious.

ID

The drives and impulses of a person. Entirely unconscious.

The Three Basic Drives

Drive	Function
Hunger	Food intake
Thirst	Fluid intake
Sleep	Regeneration

Vital

Every drive or impulse is charged with energy. Since there is no dormant energy, it has the urge to be released - and must be restrained or regulated by the EGO. The EGO acts as a buffer zone between the ID and SUPEREGO. Any unsatisfied drive can lead to death.

The Six Impulses

Impulses are those forces that drive us to do something specific:

Self-preservation instinct

The fundamental drive for survival

Sexual drive

Reproduction and sexuality

Nurturing instinct

Care for offspring

Power drive

Striving for influence and control

Desire for dominance

Striving for supremacy

Greed

Striving for possessions

The EGO Functions

The EGO has three main tasks:

1. Establishing relationships with the external world (through the Self), with the ID and with the SUPEREGO
2. Managing the demands and dangers of these reality factors
3. Mediating between the external world and the ID, the external world and the SUPEREGO, the SUPEREGO and the ID

Conscious EGO Functions

• Perception and memory
• Thinking
• Planning
• Learning

Unconscious EGO Functions

• Defense against the ID (ID impulses, drives, urges)
• Defense against the SUPEREGO
• Coping with the external world (EGO drives)

The EGO as a Complex Unit

Imagine the EGO as a complex, coherent unit - the personality. This EGO develops slowly over the years, and it naturally needs a chance to do so. This chance is provided by mother, father, caregivers and social environment.

What Happens Without the Chance to Develop?

If the EGO does not get the chance to develop, only fragments (broken pieces) can form, which are disconnected and do not create a complex unit.

The Spirit Level Analogy

Imagine (for a healthy person) a complete, whole spirit level that is perfectly balanced:

• The EGO would be exactly horizontal
• The Self is defined through the EGO
• If the EGO is balanced, the Self is also balanced
• If the EGO tips, the Self tips too

EGO Consciousness

The EGO develops in stages - from the first awareness of the EGO or of being a subject in the 2nd year of life through to approximately the 12th year (beginning of adolescence). It is strongly connected with moral judgment (conscience).

EGO consciousness includes:

• Activity consciousness - What am I doing?
• Unity consciousness - Unity of the EGO as opposed to splitting
• Identity consciousness - Who or what am I?
• Diversity consciousness - Distinction between sensation and object

The 16 Defense Mechanisms of the EGO

Over time, humans develop defense mechanisms that protect the EGO. They sit between the ID and SUPEREGO as a buffer zone.

According to Freud

The excessive use of the same defense mechanisms constitutes neurosis. Neurotics expend a large portion of their energy redirecting unacceptable parts of their psyche - leaving little energy for a productive life.

Primitive Defenses

1. Splitting Early stage of defense mechanisms (baby to 4 years). Can only divide into good and bad. Applied as long as no complete EGO is available. (Borderline disorder, but also partners, narcissists)

2. Projection Transferring disapproval of one’s own inadequacies or immoral desires onto other people. (Borderline disorder, but also partners, narcissists)

3. Regression Retreat to an earlier developmental stage with primitive reactions and a low level of aspiration. (Borderline disorder and narcissists)

Intermediate Defenses

4. Compensation Concealing a weakness by overemphasizing a character trait. Frustration in one area is compensated by excessive gratification in another. (Very popular with narcissists)

5. Denial Protection from unpleasant reality by refusing to accept it. (Dependent personality, not strongly pronounced in borderline)

6. Displacement Discharging accumulated hostile feelings onto objects that are less dangerous than the original triggers. (Borderline, also histrionic)

7. Emotional isolation Avoiding traumatic experiences by retreating into passivity. (Abuse, trauma)

8. Fantasy Satisfying frustrated desires through imaginary fulfillment (e.g., daydreams). (Ex-partners of a borderline relationship, but also people with borderline themselves)

Mature Defenses

9. Identification Increasing self-esteem through identification with another person or institution. (People with borderline in idealization phases, narcissists)

10. Introjection Incorporating external values into the EGO structure so that the person no longer has to experience them as an external threat. (Borderline, narcissist, dependent personality)

11. Isolation Separating emotional reactions from anxiety-laden situations. Separating incompatible strivings through strict cognitive compartmentalization. (Narcissist)

12. Rationalization Attempting to convince oneself that one’s behavior is rationally justified. (Dependent disorder)

13. Reaction formation Avoiding anxiety-laden situations by overemphasizing opposite behaviors. (Dependent and avoidant personality)

14. Repression Preventing unwanted impulses from entering consciousness.

15. Sublimation Satisfying unfulfilled desires through socially acceptable substitute actions. (Dependent personality)

16. Undoing Seeking atonement for immoral desires and actions. (Borderline in devaluation, partners during separation)

EGO Anachoresis and EGO Mythisierung

A special form of EGO defense to relieve unbearable guilt feelings, which can result in certain schizophrenic symptoms:

• EGO Anachoresis: The EGO no longer experiences itself as the actor or initiator, but as being determined by foreign powers
• EGO Mythification: Relief from guilt through identification with an archetypal mythical figure

EGO Strength

The EGO, together with its defense mechanisms, contains EGO strength - the degree to which the EGO has the drives (ID) under control.

EGO strength refers to:

• Degree of integration, stability and flexibility of the person (EGO defense and its composition, anxiety tolerance, impulse control, thought organization and capacity for sublimation)
• Degree of proximity to reality and drive satisfaction in social relationships
• Degree of symptomatic expressions of intrapersonal dysfunctions

EGO Disorder

The EGO disorder (as in borderline personality disorder) refers to a disturbance of EGO functions where the synthesis between ID and SUPEREGO and the boundary with the external world are disrupted.

The Self in Detail

The Four Components of the Self

1. Self-image - How do I see myself? (through the social self, the presumed external image)
2. Self-awareness - Who am I?
3. Self-esteem - What am I worth to myself and others?
4. Social self - Comparison with the external image (How do others see me?)

This complex of the Self (correlate) is compared with Pillar III of the SUPEREGO: the ego ideal and ideal self.

The Ego Discrepancy

The ego discrepancy is the difference between the Self and the ego ideal/ideal self:

• The greater the ego discrepancy, the lower the self-esteem
• The striving to reduce the ego discrepancy means self-actualization
• The ego discrepancy is often the starting point of neurotic tensions

Narcissistic Imbalance

The smaller the ego discrepancy, but the more pathological (overvalued, unrealistic) the ego ideal is - the more disturbed introspection and self-knowledge become - the more inflated the self-esteem becomes (grandiose self-concept). We can also say: the more narcissistic the person presents.

Self-Image and External Image

The self-image (self-concept) contains the cognitions and feelings one has about oneself. It arises from:

• Self-observation of one’s own experiences and actions
• Various forms of evaluation by others (praise, blame, appreciation, devaluation)

The presumed external image (“this is how the other sees me”) is a constituting part of the external image. In one’s own external image, a very dangerous element is added: the presumed other’s self-image - we believe we know what the other person thinks and feels.

Self-Esteem and Inferiority

Self-esteem is a disposition of the Self through which a person experiences themselves as a bearer of value. Its negation is the sense of inferiority.

Influence on Mental Suffering

The sense of inferiority has significant influence on the development of psychological suffering (neuroses, depression). Depending on EGO stability, various factors can contribute:

• Endogenous factors (from within): e.g., physical limitations
• Exogenous factors (from outside): overly strict/lenient upbringing, relationship catastrophes, unemployment

Self-Confidence and Self-Assurance

Self-assurance is the ability to react to defined micro-social conflicts without anxiety and with adequate behavior. It is also referred to as social competence.

Actively Standing Up for Needs

It is necessary for the person to allow themselves to have their own needs and to actively stand up for them without impairing others. Active here does not mean (as in borderline disorder): overstepping boundaries, manipulating, making unreasonable demands or taking what one wants.

Self-confidence is a strong sense of personal power (not omnipotence), of being able to cope with possible difficulties. In the case of naive, exaggerated sense of personal power (narcissism), self-confidence rests on an overlooking of real obstacles.

Self-Observation and Self-Knowledge

Self-observation (introspection) refers to the conscious attention directed at mental states and processes. Together with self-knowledge, it is the foundation of behavioral change.

Dangers of self-observation:

• Risk of self-deception
• Difficulty of simultaneously experiencing and observing
• Every observation changes what is being observed

Self-knowledge refers to the turning of cognition toward one’s own EGO - the examination of the Self for its characteristics (one’s own being, behavior, dispositions, abilities, attitudes and motivations).

The ID

The ID lies in the unconscious and contains the drives and impulses. These are enormous energies that make us do what we do (want to) or should.

Pleasure Principle

The ID strives for the immediate and complete discharge of its drive energies - very clearly visible in borderline personality disorder through its immediate drive gratification.

The SUPEREGO

The SUPEREGO consists of three pillars:

Pillar I: Conscience

• Mature conscience - fully developed moral judgment
• Oedipal conscience - shaped by parental imagos and role models
• Archaic conscience - primordial, irreducible

Pillar II: Ego Ideal

• Ego ideal and ideal objects - who I want to be, role models
• Role models - later caregivers
• Parental imago - the primal image of parents

Pillar III: Ideal Self

• Ideal self - the ideal self-image
• Grandiose fantasies - shaped by parental imagos and role models
• Archaic grandiose self - early omnipotence fantasies

Functions of the SUPEREGO

The SUPEREGO is the highest of the three psychic agencies, as it demands unconditional fulfillment from the EGO. It consists of internalized norms and values and has assumed the function of a judge and guardian:

• Establishing a value system (duties, demands, commandments, prohibitions)
• Aligning behavior according to this value system
• Eliminating non-conforming behaviors through self-criticism and drive restriction

The Internalized Objects

The internalized objects (internalized parental images) are significantly involved in the development of the SUPEREGO:

1. Primary caregivers (parental imago) - Mother and father merge into one image
2. Secondary caregivers (role models: grandparents, aunts, uncles)
3. The totality of both

These building blocks are no longer changeable and are referred to as internalized objects. Here lies the “original software” of the human being.

Lack of Good Objects

If there is a lack of “good internalized objects,” the conscience is formed too rigidly, or the grandiose fantasies are shaped too unrealistically - with later dysfunctions in the psychological domain as a consequence.

Development of the SUPEREGO

The SUPEREGO begins to develop in rudimentary form during the:

• Oral phase (0 - 1.6 years)
• Anal phase (1.7 - 3 years)
• Early genital phase (3.1 - 6 years) - becomes an autonomous functional system through introjection of social commandments and prohibitions

The Three Operating Principles

ID: Pleasure Principle

Strives for the immediate and complete discharge of drive energies and maximum pleasure.

EGO: Reality Principle

Transforms the drive impulses originating from the ID into ethical and social demands. Protects the individual from conflicts with reality.

SUPEREGO: Morality Principle

Acts according to moral and ethical norms (commandments and prohibitions). Demands unconditional fulfillment from the EGO.

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Further Reading

This basic model is the foundation for understanding all disorder-specific models:

• Psychodynamic Model - Borderline
• Psychodynamic Model - Narcissism
• Psychodynamic Model - Dependent Personality
• Psychodynamic Model - ADHD
• Psychodynamic Model - Depression
• After a Borderline Relationship