Quick Quiz: Psychoanalytic Terminology

Smile, you're learning about psychoanalysis!

How well are you versed in psychoanalytic lingo? Are you ready to face question about the topic on the social work licensing exam? Well, try filling in the blanks below. You'll be still readier afterwards. Text is drawn from this Wikipedia page (the title of which is one of the answers--don't peek!).

Freud's psychic structures:

________ is the unconscious reservoir of the libido, the psychic energy that fuels instincts and psychic processes. It is a selfish, childish, pleasure-oriented part of the personality with no ability to delay gratification.

________ contains internalized societal and parental standards of "good" and "bad", "right" and "wrong" behavior. They include conscious appreciations of rules and regulations as well as those incorporated unconsciously.

________ acts as a moderator between the pleasure sought by the above two, seeking compromises to pacify both. It can be viewed as the individual's "sense of time and place".


Examples of _________________ (title of Wiki page):

_________: when a feeling is hidden and forced from the consciousness to the unconscious because it is seen as socially unacceptable.

_________: falling back into an early state of mental/physical development seen as "less demanding and safer".

_________: possessing a feeling that is deigned as socially unacceptable and instead of facing it, that feeling or "unconscious urge" is seen in the actions of other people.

_________: acting the opposite way that the unconscious instructs a person to behave, "often exaggerated and obsessive". For example, if a wife is infatuated with a man who is not her husband, reaction formation may cause her to – rather than cheat – become obsessed with showing her husband signs of love and affection.

_________: seen as the most acceptable of the mechanisms, an expression of anxiety in socially acceptable ways

_________: shifts sexual or aggressive impulses to a more acceptable or less threatening target; redirecting emotion to a safer outlet; separation of emotion from its real object and redirection of the intense emotion toward someone or something that is less offensive or threatening in order to avoid dealing directly with what is frightening or threatening. For example, a mother may yell at her child because she is angry with her husband.

_________:  Temporary drastic modification of one's personal identity or character to avoid emotional distress; separation or postponement of a feeling that normally would accompany a situation or thought.

_________: A form of isolation; concentrating on the intellectual components of a situation so as to distance oneself from the associated anxiety-provoking emotions; separation of emotion from ideas; thinking about wishes in formal, affectively bland terms and not acting on them; avoiding unacceptable emotions by focusing on the intellectual aspects (isolation, rationalization, ritual, undoing, compensation, and magical thinking).

Okay, that's enough for one post. How'd you do?

There're more of these on the Wiki page.

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Good luck on the exam!