Introduction
Freud’s tripartite personality theory distinguishes between the three elements of the personality that become more integrated with time. The Id serves as the personality’s primary and primitive part responsible for chaotic/unstable desires and the happiness principle, and the Ego, as a rational part, supports the Id in adjusting to reality (Zhao & Wang, 2019). The Superego, being the moral compass, controls the Ego in implementing social morals. Their progression throughout life involves the three elements’ sequential development in childhood and continuous interaction later to ensure socially and morally adequate behaviors.
Progression throughout the Lifespan
The structures are unequal in complexity, which has implications for progression throughout the lifespan. The distribution of power changes depending on a life stage, with the primitive Id’s superiority at birth and during early infancy (Zhao & Wang, 2019). Under the Id’s influence, infants tend to be guided by simplistic desires, including pain avoidance and pleasure maximization. The rational Ego connects the Id to reality and is supposed to develop in early infancy (Zhao & Wang, 2019). The Ego’s emergence can promote the child’s social adaptation processes by exerting at least some control over behaviors, and its role can be expected to grow as the child improves self-control skills. As the most complex part separated from the Ego, the Superego is supposed to develop between preschool age and middle childhood (Zhao & Wang, 2019). The acquisition of social morality, which can often stem from morality-related education received from caregivers, permeates this stage. The three parts continue to coexist during the next life stages, with the Superego’s attempts to suppress the Id. The Ego’s success in mediating between the two predicts the adult person’s ability to adapt to the environment.
Conclusion
To sum up, the three personality elements develop sequentially in childhood and keep interacting during the next life stages to ensure self-control and adaptability. The ability to demonstrate socially appropriate and morally right behaviors seems to improve with age and can show declines in senescence. Viewing the personality and development concepts through the psychoanalytic lens results in a rather deterministic approach to the human psyche’s functioning and progression during one’s lifetime.
Reference
Zhao, G., & Wang, Y. (2019). Analysis on Paul’s personality development from Freud’s personality structure theory. Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research, 342, 77-80. Web.