Theories Of Personality Object Relations Theory

ORT differ from Freud in 3 ways:

Father of object relations

Psychic representations of unconscious id instincts; unconscious images of good and bad

Infants introject and having a life of their own within the child’s fantasy world

Way of dealing with both internal and external objects; represent normal social growth and development

Keep good and bad breast separate; fear persecutory breast and keep ideal breast in protection again persecutors

When external objects viewed as a whole and that good and bad can exist in the same person; feel anxiety over losing loved object and guilt for wanting to destroy

Resolved when infants fantasize that they have made up for their previous transgressions against their mother and realize that their mother will not abandom them

Protect ego against anxiety aroused by their own destructive fantasies

Fantasy of taking into one’s own body the images that one has of an external object such as the mother’s breast

Infants introject good objects to protect against anxiety and also bad objects to gain control of them

The fantasy that one’s own feelings and impulses actually reside in another person; alleviate unbearable anxiety

Keeping apart incompatible impulses; bad me and good me; enable ppl to see both positive and negative aspects of themselves

Infants split off unacceptable parts of themselves, project into another object and finally introject them in an altered form.

Person introjects external objects and organize them into a psychologically meaningful framework

Unorganized at birth but strong enough to feel anxiety , use defense mechanisms, form early object relations in both phantasy and reality; reaches maturity earlier than freud

Emerges much earlier than Freud and much harsher and cruel; grows along oedipus complex and emerges as a realistic guilt after resolved

Klein oedipus complex stems from:

Develop positive relationship with father (or both) and fantasizes that father will fill her with babies

Primarily concerned with the psychological birth of the individual

Child becomes an individual separate from his or her primary caregiver which leads to a sense of identity

Stage of psych birth: satisfy needs within the all-powerful protective orbit of their mother’s care; objectless stage

Stage of psych birth: infants behave as if they and their mother were an omnipotent, symbiotic unit

Stage of psych birth: becoming psychologically separated from their mothers and achieving individuation

Bodily breaking away from mother-infantic symbiotic relationship

Desire to bring mother and themselves back together both physically and psychologically

Must develop a constant inner representation of their mother so that they can tolerate being physically away from her

Kohut | Evolves from a vague and undifferentiated image to a clear and precise sense of individual identity

Kohut | The core of human personality

Kohut | Referred to as selfobjects by infants

Kohut | 2 basic narcissistic needs

Kohut Established when infant relates to a mirroring self object who reflects approval of behavior; “if others see me as perfect, i an perfect”

Kohut | Someone else is perfect; “you are perfect, i am a part of u”

Children who experience a healthy relationship with mom develop an integrated ego, a punitive superego, a stable self-concept, and satisfying interpersonal relations

Attachments formed during childhood have an important impact on adulthood

3 stages of sepanx

a technique for measuring the type of attachment style that exists between caregiver and infant

Goal of kleinian therapy