Psychoanalytical Theories Since the 1950s

The great age of personality theories and theories of learning is passed. Though no major theories, as such, have emerged to replace them, there has been considerable movement away from the classical beliefs in more recent years (Oppenheimer, 1984). Psychology has split into several fields of specialization, including social psychology, clinical psychology, developmental psychology, and psychoanalytical psychology. Psychoanalytical theories remain a major point of reference in testing, pathology, and laboratory research, either in efforts to apply them to other fields or to refute them.

Psychoanalysis does not deal with symptoms, but with the unconscious of a subject as a whole, whose psychical apparatus is composed of forces in conflict. Psychoanalytical theory implies a particular technique and attitude which stem from a precise scientific model of nature and empiricism. The exercise consists of discovering a cause and decoding an original unconscious message that is expressed in a distorted state. However, psychological experiments that have attempted to confirm these theories have failed

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he system of which the individual is a part. The notion of intrapsychical conflict does not exist in this new approach. It is not necessary to understand, because understanding does not elicit change. The new methods are active, entailing suggestion and order. Looking within the different psychologies, it is the interaction between theory and clinical practice that induces changes, and the goal of any therapy is to induce change. The active techniques that promote change - catharsis, systemic therapies, etc. - differ from psychoanalytical techniques, which seek to make change possible and to free the subject from his bonds without imposing conditioning of any sort. Some models focus on conflict, others on certain aspects of pathology or the development of personality. From a psychoanalytical standpoint, distinctions are drawn in terms of a given pathology, making it possible to obtain indications for treatment, but they are drawn with respect to the different models that give rise to the different types of intervention. There appears to be a trend towards an integration of the various theories, each of which represents one aspect of the human being. In the "age of theory" certain principles were put forth to explain hu
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Some common words found in the essay are:
, Jung Adler, Doubleday Oppenheimer, Cole Hunt, UNESCO Courier, oppenheimer 1984, hunt 1993, References Burger, human behavior, burger 1997, age theory, demise age theory, social cognitive, psychological research, demise age, 1993 641, clinical psychology, hunt 1993 641,
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