The fact people sometimes repress specific information cannot be denied, as was well articulated by Sigmund Freud. However, psychologists tend to have different opinions on what makes people repress info. Some scholars argue that repression occurs because of cognitive, emotional motives and social motives. Sigmund Freud argued that psychological repression happens because there are external forces that prevented people from actively moving memories from the unconscious mind to the conscious mind (Boag, 2007). The approach given by Freud is different from that taken by Jennifer Freyd who argued that people repression memories for social reasons. Most of the people, according to Freyd, suppression certain memories because they want to maintain social relationships. This paper seeks to discuss the concept of repression from the perspectives of Sigmund Freud and Jennifer Freyd.
Freud 's central idea of repression is the fact that people may find it hard to awaken memories, even by powerful external summons. The argument by Freud was that people have an internal mechanism for resisting the revival of memories. Feud further argued that repression does not mean that someone deletes information from their memory. Instead, according to Freud, a memory trace is always kept in one's unconscious mind, and it might take the intervention of an external to bring such memory to the conscious mind, albeit with psychical consequences.
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The need to shield one' self from danger is, perhaps, Freud's conception of why people go through repression. According to Freud, most people who repress their memories do so because of the need to protect their egos. In other words, repression is considered the default mechanism by which the go fends off danger. Jennifer Freyd offers a different explanation on the motive for memory repression. According to Freyd, repression occurs because of people's desire to maintain meaningful relationships (Green, 2018). A typical example given by Freyd is the case of adultery where those wronged my lack knowledge of the adultery, even when such information of infidelity is in the public domain. This is what Freyd refers to as "betrayal blindness, " a mechanism used to forestall a crisis to protect a relationship.
Social factors form the bulk of Freyd's argument on the issue of repression. People consider their relationships more important and hence should not be jeopardized by access to certain information. In her example, Freyd points out the relationship that exists between any government and its citizens (Freyd, DePrince & Gleaves, 2007). Since the citizens depend on governments for protection and security, they may choose to remain blind to the betrayals of their government.
Sigmund Freud talks about the idea of psychic pain and how people go miles to protect themselves from such pains. In other words, Freud argued that psychological repression of memories is like a defence strategy. Subconsciously, repression occurs when people's ego feels threatened. Freyd disagrees with Freud's position on the need shield oneself from pain. In her argument, Freyd posits that pain is necessary to influence behaviour and hence the lack of pain can be a dangerous thing. Instead of avoiding pain, Freyd insists that repression is more about protecting relationships.
Pain necessitates withdrawal or confrontation, especially when betrayal is experienced. According to Freyd, certain pains can be ignored if there is something bigger at stake. Using the analogy of the physical pain, Freyd says that serious injuries may be ignored when one has an urgent need for mobility. In such situation, the processes that often lead to the feeling of pain and suppression of one's ability to move must be ignored to survive. In her argument, such subconscious decisions happen, not because of the need to avoid pain, but because of the primordial survival instincts.
The level of memory loss, according to Freud, vary from a temporary abolition of uncomfortable thoughts to complete amnesia. In the high-level amnesia, the events leading to the discomfort and anxiety are buried in the unconscious mind (Green, 2018). However, Freud further argued that repressed memories are not lost permanently. Instead, such memories tend to accumulate in the unconscious mind from where they can be retrieved, primarily by external factors. According to Freud, the access to repressed memories can sometimes lead to dysfunctional behaviour and anxiety, especially when the memory is that of a traumatic event.
The repressed memories may occur to people through subconscious minds, a phenomenon known as "Freudian slips." For example, people who have been exposed to the traumatic experience in the past may not have the recollection of the traumatic experience but will be traumatized when exposed to such as experience. An example given by Freud is that of a child who has experience of being abused by a parent in the past (Boag, 2007). Such a child may not have the recollection of the experience but will find problem forming relationships in the future. Similarly, women who experience pain during childbirth may continue having children despite the trauma experienced in the past. The argument given by Freud is that repressed ideas tend to creep in occasionally when an individual is exposed to a similar experience that traumatized them in the past.
Sigmund Freud divides an individual's psyche into three major components: the id, the ego, and the super-ego. According to him, the balance that exists between the three elements is responsible for the repression and retrieval of specific memories. The superego, according to Freud, is a key component of the repression processes. It is meant to keep off offending information away from the conscious mind. From a Freudian perspective, repression is meant to take care of instinctive wishes whose satisfaction may lead to danger. Through the action of a superego, one is able to keep away the information that may bring about the danger to an individual. Unlike the Freudian approach, Freyd does not consider repression to be a function of the id, ego and the superego (Green, 2018). Instead, she considers repression to be an unconscious decision made by individuals to turn a blind eye to something because they want to keep a social relationship.
The Freudian approach to repression divided the process into two stages, the primary stage and the later stage. The primal scene is the stage where an individual, usually a child, is exposed to traumatic experiences. At this stage, the child is considered to be psychologically vulnerable, despite having the abilities to anticipate consequences of action. In the later stages, however, an individual makes unconscious decisions based on what he or she was exposed to as a child, during the primal stage. At this later stage, according to Freudian psychology, repression serves to protect individuals against instinctual demands (Freyd, DePrince & Gleaves, 2007). What is clear from the Freudian description of repression is that he not only considered the traumatic memories, but he also included issues such as instinctive impulses. Unlike Freud, Freyd did not break her concept of repression into stages. Instead, she considers repression to be an ongoing process that occurs when someone needs to protect certain social interests such as an essential relationship.
Repression is an adaptive process that depends on the degree of trauma or level of betrayal an individual is exposed to. According to Freyd, the ability to process and remember events depends on the degree to which an individual is exposed to such events. The argument given by Freyd relies heavily on the Betrayal Trauma Theory which predicted a relationship between the level of exposure to a traumatizing event or betrayal and the repression processes. In situations where the abuse or betrayal is too much, full consciousness of such events may motivate an individual to either withdraw from or confront the perpetrators of such atrocities. The problem, according to Freyd, is that such actions like confrontation may jeopardize a significant relationship (Boag, 2007). In Freudian psychology, however, little emphasis is placed on the adaptive nature of repression. Instead, Freud posited that repression occurs at an early age, but the memories will always remain to influence the individual's behaviour, even as an adult.
While Freudian psychology places more emphasis on the amount of damage a memory may have on an individual, Freyd argues regarding the damage that such memories would have on an individual's social support systems (Green, 2018). A good example of this difference is the case of sexual abuse of a child by a caregiver. From Freudian psychology, the focus is not on whether the child reports the matter or not, but what such exposures would do to the child's future behaviour. According to Sigmund Freud, a child who has gone through the experience of sexual abuse from a caregiver may have difficulty forming relationships when they grow up. From Freudian psychology, however, the emphasis is on whether a kid exposed to a sexual abuse report the matter or not. According to Freyd, a child abused by a caregiver is less likely to report the issue compared to a child abused by a non-caregiver (Freyd, DePrince & Gleaves, 2007). This further demonstrates Freyd's point that memories are mainly repressed or retrieved based on the potential impact on an individual's social relationship. The argument given by Freyd is consistent with the tenets of Betrayal Trauma Theory. According to theory, there is utility in remaining unaware of betrayals when the victim depends on the perpetrator for survival. In case of the child and the abusive caregiver, the child's survival interests are best served when he or she keeps quiet and tries to forget the abuse.
Despite the many differences between Freudian and Freudian concepts of repression, the two have converging opinions when it comes to certain aspects of the idea. For instance, restraint is considered an unconscious process that happens without active input. In other words, no individual makes the conscious decision to repress certain aspects of their memory. Irrespective of the motive, which is defensive ego technique for Freud, and protection of social relationship for Freyd, the two psychologists agree that the decision to repress specific uncomfortable memories of the past happens unconsciously.
The concept of the location of suppressed memories is another crucial point of convergence between Sigmund Freud and Jennifer Freyd. Both theorists agree that suppressed memories are always kept in the inaccessible part of the subconscious mind (Boag, 2007). The idea, according to both Freud and Freyd, is to make sure that an individual does not have easy access to such information that would make them comfortable.
Conclusion
Repression is the process of placing unforgettable experiences in the relatively inaccessible areas of the subconscious mind. According to theorists, repression is an unconscious process that happens because of different motives. For instance, Sigmund Freud argues that restraint is the ego defence mechanism against past traumatic experiences. However, Jennifer Freyd disagrees with this position by suggesting a new motive for repression. According to Freyd, repression occurs for people to protect social relations, institutions and support systems that they depend on. Despite the clear differences, both Sigmund Freud and Jennifer Freyd converge on the fact that repression is an unconscious process that happens without an individual's active input.
References
Boag, S. (2007). Freudian Repression, The Common View, and Pathological Science. Review of General Psychology. 10(1): 74-86.
Green, C. (2018). The Origin and Development of Psychoanalysis. Sigmund Freud (1910). Classics in the History of Psychology. American Journal of Psychology, 21. 181-218
Freyd, J., DePrince, A., & Gleaves, D. (2007). The State of Betrayal Trauma Theory. Reply to McNally-Conceptual Issues and Future Directions. Psychology Press .
