This section is from the book "Dreams And The Unconscious: An Introduction To The Study Of Psycho-Analysis", by Charles Wilfred Valentine. Also available from Amazon: Dreams and the Unconscious: An Introduction to the Study of Psycho-Ananlysis.
Repression and Control.
In the investigation of cases by psycho-analysis, there is a further danger of the importance of sex being exaggerated as a cause of neurosis, if the patient has the slightest idea that the physician suspects that sex may be the cause, or if he knows the physician holds Freudian views. For it is a well-known psychological fact that when a word is presented to the mind the line of thought is partially determined by the ideas in the mind at the moment, and not merely by the stimulus word, or they may be suggested partly through the individual conducting the experiment without any desire on his part to do so. Thus, if a friend reads out the word "ball" to me, I am more likely to think of "dances," if I know he is a keen dancer, but I am more likely to think of "cricket" if I know he is a great cricketer. The idea of sex is still more likely to be reached, if, as Freud and some of his followers sometimes do, the physician is not content with the first association given by a word or by some symbol in a dream, but presses for the second, third and fourth associations.
Apart from questions of sex, it is clear that many strong impulses of the normal child in most families must be checked. The impulses to shout and run about and fight are reproved by adults, and hence must often be repressed for fear of punishment. We have said that non-deliberate repression is thought to be characteristic of quite young children, and in mere infants, up to three years, repression is probably almost entirely such. The method of trial and elimination of error is followed. After three or four years they become more capable of reflecting upon possible consequences, and of choosing a course of action accordingly, though such careful choice is still relatively rare. What is probably also rare is a deliberate attempt to stifle a recurrent desire. We come, perhaps, nearer to deliberate repression in the attitude to unpleasant memories, yet even here repression may be largely non-deliberate. A little child of four or five, if one reminds him of the naughtiness of a previous day, will sometimes act as though the remarks were not heard, turning the topic of conversation immediately. It is dangerous to judge from external behaviour, but the signs in these cases suggest an aversion from the unpleasant memory which acts in an automatic way» not that the memory is deliberately put away. When a parent is excessively severe the range of repressions in the child's mind is extended, and little scope may be left for the activity of any of the natural impulses of childhood. The severe father may thus acquire a complete domination over the child.
Discipline and Repression.
Later on, especially during adolescence, strong impulses from within impel the youth towards more independent action, and the assertion of his individuality. But the habit of repression set up by the father's severe discipline in early years may continue to dominate the youth's mind, and set up a conflict between his own impulses and the influence of the father. His own impulses are backed by the powerful instinct of self-assertion; hence, we may have a serious conflict between two powerful fundamental tendencies - that of self-assertion, and that of the fear of punishment or reproach.
Even when the father is not consciously thought of it is possible that his influence may continue to have a dominating effect upon the youth in spite of strong contrary impulses, in which case we may speak of a "father-complex." Jung gives cases in which the dominance of the father-complex was apparently the cause of the daughter's marriage being unhappy. There was contention between the father and husband, and a struggle took place in the daughter's mind between the father's continued and extremely powerful influence and the wife's natural impulse to yield to the influence of her husband. In one case the daughter could not understand why her husband would not obey her father. The latter's authority was never called in question by her. Yet the unreasonableness of the situation did not strike her. Undoubtedly a similar conflict may be due to entirely conscious appreciation of the claims of a father on the one hand, and of a husband on the other; the peculiarity of this and some other cases seemed to lie in the excessive and continued deference to the father's wishes.*
The Father-Complex.
This case was, of course, an abnormal one, the woman being distinctly a neurotic. But careful observation and inquiry among normal individuals, who examine their own character and the history of its development, suggests that a father (or mother) complex may have a profound and unsuspected influence on later life. Where this is a good influence the fact is not to be regretted, except in those exceptional cases in which the individual never develops any genuine strength of character, through constant dependence upon the parent, or upon the memory of a dead parent.
* See C. G. Jung, Analytical Psychology, p. 166.
To suggest that because we have many cases in which a parent retains a harmful and almost paralysing dominance over the youth, we must therefore give young people all the rope they ask for, is completely unjustifiable on the evidence before us. We must recall again that the patients of the psycho-analyists are usually neurotic. We know that in many cases there may be great severity on the part of parents without any apparent nervous weakness in the child afterwards. The history of Puritanism could probably supply thousands of such cases; though, in the possibly numerous cases in which ill-effects have ensued from extreme severity, the cause of those ill-effects will not have been recognised.
Furthermore, the physical and mental health of the child is not the sole aim we must keep in view. It may be that it would be worth while to sacrifice this to some extent if necessary for the sake of moral training and a conformity to what is found needful for the well-being of society as a whole.
 
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