Freud believed that the unconscious continues to influence behavior even though we are unaware of these underlying influences.
Everything above the water representsconsciousawareness while everything below the water represents theunconscious.
Consider how an iceberg would look if you could see it in its entirety.
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Only a small part of the iceberg is actually visible above the water.
The things that represent our conscious awareness are really just “the tip of the iceberg.”
The rest of the information outside of conscious awareness lies below the surface.
While this information might not be accessible consciously, it still has a hold on our current behavior.
Freud also believed that all of our basic instincts and urges were also contained in the unconscious mind.
Thelife and death instincts, for example, were found in the unconscious.
The life instincts, sometimes known as the sexual instincts, are those that are related to survival.
The death instincts include such things as thoughts ofaggression, trauma, and danger.
Such urges are kept out of consciousness because our conscious minds often view them as unacceptable or irrational.
More recently, researchers have explored different techniques to help see how unconscious influences impact behaviors.
Dream Interpretation
Freud also suggested that dreams were another route to the unconscious.
Freud also believed that dreams were a form of wish fulfillment.
Because these unconscious urges could not be expressed in waking life, he believed they find expression in dreams.
Potential Pitfalls
The very idea that the unconscious exists has been controversial.
A number of researchers have criticized the notion and questioned if there actually is an unconscious mind at all.
According to this approach, there are many cognitive functions that take place outside of our conscious awareness.
The Swiss psychiatristCarl Jungalso believed that the unconscious played an important role in shaping personality.
The collective unconscious was said to contain inherited ancestral memories common to all of humankind.
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