Psychology I / Psychoanalysis
Practice question · Put in order

Order the Freudian sequence by which an unresolved conflict becomes a psychological symptom.

Hints
  1. The impulse and the anxiety it provokes come before any defense is deployed.
  2. A symptom is the END product of an unresolved, defended-against conflict.
Show the answer
  1. A forbidden sexual or aggressive impulse arises in the id.
  2. The ego experiences anxiety over the unacceptable impulse.
  3. A defense mechanism such as repression pushes it out of awareness.
  4. The conflict remains unresolved rather than being worked through.
  5. It resurfaces indirectly as a psychological symptom.
Why

A forbidden impulse triggers ego anxiety, a defense pushes it from awareness, and if the conflict stays unresolved it resurfaces as a symptom. In Freud's model, symptoms are indirect expressions of buried, unresolved conflict.

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