School: Vocational Training Development Institute

Name: Wavel Walker

Course: Developmental Psychology for Educators

I.D. Number: 1500195912

Date: March 7, 2019

Lecturer: Mrs. Linda Williams

Choose ONE (1) proponent, research the details of that proponent's contribution to the field of

psychology.

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 Sigmund Freud

Choice of contributor and reason for choice

I chose Sigmund Freud because he was the scientist who developed the psycho-analytic theory of

personality development; He argued that personality is formed through conflicts among three

fundamental structures of the human mind which are the id, ego, and superego. His primary

assumption is that the unconscious mind governs human behavior much more that people

believed. He teaches you about the human mind and its development in the different stages

which is very important for me so I can better understand the persons that I am operating among

and those that I will eventually teach.

Critical Analysis of contributor’s contribution to psychology

A critical analysis of Sigmund Freud theory is that human personality is the enduring and a very

unique gathering of characteristics and therapeutic techniques that can or may change due to

different situations. His theory and methods were designed to treat mental illness and explain

human behavior. This impacted positively on human lives because our society benefits from its

treatment and raise awareness of some related health issues. One subfield is clinical psychology

which deals with the diagnosis and treatment of abnormal human beings behavior or

psychological disorder, this will help persons to achieve the happiness they crave for. The core

idea at the center of psycho-analysis is the belief that all people possess unconscious memories,

thoughts, feelings, and desires. By bringing the content of the unconscious into conscious

awareness, people are then able to experience cleansing and gain insight into their current state

of mind. Through this process, people are then able to find relief from psychological

disturbances and distress.

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 Contributors influence on psychology

Sigmund Freud has been viewed with much skepticism in old and modern societies alike, he

created the assumption that that human beings have an unconscious mind and one’s behavioral

pattern throughout life is determined by his/ her childhood experiences. His interest was to

support the theory surrounding the structure of the mind, defense mechanism and psychosexual

development while influencing the human behavior.

A majority of Freud’s patients were Caucasian, females or persons of high socio-economic status

and some were also mentally disturbed. Ironically, women were looked down upon as

subordinate by Freud and the society and this could be seen when one of Freud’s patients was

willing to exchange his daughter to the husband of his lover so that he could acquire his lover.

Their lives were centered in the household, to which a majority of the family structures

accounted for within that time period which we consider to be the nuclear family.

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As it relates to the Jamaican perspective, there are many aspects of the Sigmund theories which

deem it not suitable within our country. For one, it did not take into account the diversity of race,

ethnicity and socio-economic and cultural backgrounds which the Jamaican population fosters.

Freud dealt with Caucasian patients; the Jamaican perspective would not be able to account for

potential ethnic and racial diversity and would not be able to attribute a positive or negative

correlation with ethnicity or race with behavior which is seen as a limitation in Freud’s theory.

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 Sigmund Freud’s contribution to Jamaica

As it relates to the Jamaican perspective, the country is from diverse classes, the majority of the

individuals in Jamaica belong to the middle- class and this contrasts with the upper-class patients

to which Freud analyzed, his research did not involve the lower class people. The middle class

and lower class experience more struggles regarding financial stability which deem it not

suitable within our country.

Freud in his experience was dealing with upper-class individuals who do not experience the

world like the lower class; this is another limitation of the theory as it fails to appreciate behavior

as a result of living in the lower income society. Not to mention family structures and religious

beliefs and societal norms.

The family structure of the Jamaican population varies from nuclear to single parent and our

religious beliefs, although the majority of our country is Christian, the population would not

readily accept Freud’s psychosexual development. For a theory to be tested for relevance, be it in

a specific geographical area or era, it has to be deemed replicable as well as take into

consideration socio-cultural influences, race, ethnicity, socio-economic backgrounds and other

factors which are seemingly discounted by Freud.

However, according to Freud’s theory that authoritarian parenting was associated with weakened

psychological and behavioral adjustment, such that some Jamaican adolescents who reported

their parents as more controlling also reported a greater risk of anger depression, suicide

ideation, and conduct problems. He further iterated that gender moderated the effect of

authoritarian parenting on conduct problems, with the association being significantly greater for

boys than for girls. Additionally, adolescents' agreement with parents' style of parenting

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moderated the association between authoritarian parenting and adolescents' psychological

distress, such that when adolescents disagreed with their parents' parenting behaviors,

adolescents were more likely to exhibit psychosocial problems. This explained the two different

groups which are the conscious and unconscious, the ID, the EGO and the super EGO explains

the aggression that is displayed in our society and how to deal with them, Sigmund Freud give

psychologists in Jamaica the opportunity to impact positively on controlling the behavior of our

children and young adults, this we hope will improve the social issues we are presently

experiencing in our society and better understand what to expect from them and how to

appreciate and care for them.

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 Reference

Daley A. Is Social Learning or Psychoanalytic Theory more applicable to the Jamaican

Society? ( 2019) Retrieved from https:// thecaribbeancurrent.com