The Oedipus Complex: one of the most controversial concepts in Freud’s theory
The Oedipus Complex is a term that Sigmund Freud used in his Theory of Stages of Psychosexual Development to describe the feeling of a child’s desire for his mother and hatred for his father This hatred is due to the fact that the child perceives that his father is a competitor for the mother’s affection, and expresses his feelings in the form of anger, tantrums, and disobedient behavior.
Freud first proposed the Oedipus Complex in 1899 in his book Dream interpretationbut he did not begin to use it formally until 1910. The name was born after being inspired by Oedipus, a character from Greek mythology who accidentally killed his father.
Sigmund Freud’s Psychosexual Theory
At the time in which Freud lived there was a strong repression of sexual desires. The Austrian psychoanalyst understood that there was a relationship between neurosis and sexual repression. Therefore, it was possible to understand the nature and variety of the disease by knowing the patient’s sexual history.
Freud considered that Children are born with a sexual desire that they must satisfy, and that there are a series of stages, during which the child seeks pleasure through different objects. This is what led him to the most controversial part of his theory: the theory of psychosexual development.
Phallic stage and Oedipus complex
According to Freud, there are several stages of the infant’s psychosexual development, and the Oedipus Complex occurs during phallic stage : important moment for the development of sexual identity.
This phase takes place from the age of three and extends until the age of six. The genitals They are the object of pleasure, and interest in sexual differences and genitals appears, so it is of utmost importance not to repress this desire and the correct management of this stage, since it could obstruct the capacity for research, knowledge and general learning of the child.
Freud states that male children experience sexual desires towards their mothers and see their fathers as rivals, so they fear being castrated, a process that results in the Oedipus Complex. Later, children identify with their fathers and repress their feelings towards their mothers to leave this phase behind. The correct assimilation of this stage results in the maturity of sexual identity.
The concept of the Oedipus Complex only refers to male children, since in girls it is called Electra Complex .
Overcoming the Oedipus Complex
For the correct development towards an adult with a healthy identity, the child must identify with the same sex as his or her parent Freud suggests that while IT wants to eliminate the father, the EGO He knows that his father is much stronger. The child then experiences what is known as castration anxiety, fear of emasculation. As the boy becomes aware of the physical differences between men and women, he assumes that in women the penis has been removed, so his father can castrate him as punishment for lusting after his mother. he.
There is much criticism that Freud has received for the concept of the Oedipus Complex, even from within the world of psychoanalysis itself.
