Studies in detail

Aim

Is to understand Little Hans (5 yrs old) phobia of horses and to treat it.

Method  and case description

It was a case study of little Hans. The information used by Freud was from Hans’s father. 

At the age of 3 Little Hans had an interest in his widdler (penis). He dreamt about his widdler and wiping children’s bottom. When he was small he played with his widdler and his mother told him off for it.

Hans always wanted his father to go away on business and when they moved house his father was home more often and then he wanted his father dead because he was so attached to his mother.  He was also jealous of his sister and always afraid to go under the water while having his bath and when his mother bathed his sister he wished that his sister’s head would go under the water. Hans agreed this was true.

Hans said he was afraid of white horses because he thought they would bite him. He was also afraid of the harness around the horse’s mouth and the thing in their eyes. He had a girl’s father tell her not to put her hand in the horse or it would bite her. He also saw a horse fall while drawing a cart.

Sometimes, Little Hans would play at 'having children' with his mother, where she was the children's mother and he was the father, and that Little Hans' father was the grandfather.

He dreamt that a plumber removed his widdler and put in a bigger one. He also dreamt about two giraffes a big one that represented his father and a small one that represented his mother. He took away the small one, making the big one cry and then sat on the small one.

Results and case analysis

·         Hans fear of horses was the fear of his father

·         The black harness around the mouth of the horse was his father’s moustache.

·         Freud interpreted Hans dream about wiping his bottom as a fixation to the anal stage.

·         Hans’s dream of drowning was the wish for his sister to die.

·         Freud interpreted his wanting is father to go way and die was a result of Hans sexual feeling towards his mother (Oedipus complex).

·         Freud interpreted his dream of a plumber removing his widdler and replacing them with a new one was Hans’s identification with his father.

·         Freud interpreted his giraffe dream as Oedipus complex, removing his mother away from his father.

Conclusion

Freud concluded that Hans was going through a resolved Oedipus complex.

Evaluation

Strengths

·         The study has high ecological validity as the study was carried out in Hans’s natural environment.

·         The study is ethical as consent as given to Freud by Hans’s parents because he was not up to 16.

·         The data used for the study was a qualitative data making the results rich and in depth.

·         Supports Freud’s theory of psychosexual development.

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Weaknesses

·         The study lacked reliability as there was few control to the study.

·         The study cannot be replicated in other to test its reliability as the procedure was not fixed.

·         Because it was a case study the results cannot be generalised to others as people are different and unique.

·         The study could be bias as the data used by Freud was collected by Han’s father who may have altered it to suit Freud’s study.

·         The interpretation by Freud may be bias as other analysts could interpret it in a different way.