What Is Freudian Psychology?

Sigmund Freud is known as one of the most exploratory thinkers in the psychological field of study. He dedicated his entire medical career as a neurologist and psychologist to the study of the mind and psychological concepts. During his lifetime, he developed countless theories on the human mind and human behavior and their application within the field of psychology. Many of his ideas are still used in psychological study and practice today.

Unconscious Thought, Conscious Action

• Freud centered his psychological principles around the concept that the human mind is divided into two parts: the conscious and the unconscious. It was his belief that the unconscious mind controlled the outcome of the conscious mind. In other words, Freud believed your deepest desires, fears, wants and needs all developed in your unconscious mind. It was these unconscious thoughts and emotions that then produced your conscious actions. For example, if you unconsciously desire to be loved, then you make the conscious decision to seek love.

Model Personality

• According to Freud, your personality develops within the realm of the unconscious mind. If the unconscious mind generates your deepest thoughts and emotions, then there has to be some model that the mind used to determine what to think and feel. Therefore Freud concluded three stages of personality development existed: the id, the ego and the superego. The id is the phase you are in when you are born. At this stage, you understand only your most basic wants as an infant and develop simplistic ways to express them. The ego is the stage in which you begin to acquire a basic knowledge of the world around you. Finally, as you age, you enter the superego stage: the expansion of your mind in this phase is continual throughout your life.

Freud on Mental Health

• Armed with his theories on the levels of the mind and the stages of mental development, Freud approached psychoanalysis with the mindset that your behavior is learned, and that you are therefore only partially responsible for your thoughts and actions. He believed that every mental illness was the result of something you experienced that was absorbed into and expanded within your unconscious mind. As a result, Freud believed that to treat mental illness, all that was required was to be taught a different way of thinking or behaving. This concept continues to be both accepted and criticized within the psychological and psychiatric fields.

Other Psychological Theories

• Freudian psychology does not solely cover mental illness. Freud's range of interest when it came to the human mind spread to other psychological subjects as well, like sexuality, dreams and criminology. Just has he believed the unconscious mind was the root of mental illness, so too he was fascinated by the power the mind had in determining sexual orientation, or controlling your instinct of right and wrong.