Psychodynamic approaches to career counselling

Carla Jacinto, Ruth Woo, Eddy Elmer
Simon Fraser University

September 2000

What does "psychodynamic" mean?

• very generally, "psychodynamic" refers to "the interaction of various conscious and unconscious mental or emotional processes, especially as they influence personality, behaviour, and attitudes"
• more specifically, refers to a broad range of personality development, psychological adjustment, and psychotherapy theories that emphasise unconscious processes and their conflicts
• conflicts can be those between unconscious processes or between unconscious and conscious processes (to be elaborated on in discussion of Freud's theory of personality development)
• earlier psychodynamic theories emphasised conflicts occurring during childhood and their impact on later adult development and adjustment
• later psychodynamic theories postulated that conflicts can also occur throughout the lifespan
• in terms of therapy, psychodynamic approaches are used more in psychotherapy than in counselling, and certainly more than in career counselling (recall the difference between psychotherapy and counselling)
• in psychodynamic psychotherapy, a key part of the process is to help patients and clients gain insight into these conflicts; when the conflicts are made available to the conscious, the patient/client will experience a "catharsis"---supposedly, the awareness of these conflicts will lessen the likelihood that the client/patient will, for instance, continue to employ the various defence mechanisms which are leading to emotional "disturbance"
• these theories are quite complex, but for our purposes, the above point are sufficient for a general historical framework for the career development and counselling theories presented in this chapter

Brief history, before any applications to career counselling

Sigmund Freud: emphasised psychosexual development and conflicts during early childhood; therapy is based on "psychoanalysis"

Carl Jung: felt Freud overemphasised sexual instincts as a determinant of behaviour; believed that individuals must realise their non-sexual potentials, or else emotional disturbance will occur; in his theory, addressed both a personal unconscious and a collective unconscious as determinants of behaviour

Alfred Adler: rejected Freud's emphasis on sexuality; believed that the primary motivation in human life is a sense of inferiority; overcompensation for these feelings of inferiority (i.e. excessive use of defence mechanisms), conscious or unconscious, lead to maladjustment; this inferiority develops as a result of such non-biological factors as interactions with others, feelings of belongingness, family positioning, and sense of social responsibility

Erich Fromm: emphasised impact of social conditioning on behaviour; saw humans more as a product of their culture and society than a product of their biology; applied psychoanalytic theory to social problems

Karen Horney: emotional problems are due to conflicts occurring in childhood and later difficulties with interpersonal relationships in adulthood; felt these conflicts occurred more as a result of social influences than simply instinctual biological drives

Erik Erikson: emphasised conflicts (or "crises) occurring throughout the lifespan; these conflicts occur at eight different stages of development, during which a particular crisis must be resolved successfully before the individual can progress to the next stage of development and resolve successfully the crisis occurring at such stage; improper resolution at one phase can lead to improper resolution at the next

Anna Freud: emphasised the role of the ego and defence mechanisms in personality development, adjustment, and therapy

Melanie Klein: applied psychoanalytic theory to treatment of children; used play therapy---how children play with toys reveals their infantile conflicts and anxieties; these conflicts and anxieties affect the development of ego and superego, and lead to emotional difficulties

R.D. Laing: applied psychoanalytic approaches to study of psychosis (e.g. schizophrenia); saw such disorders as a reaction against a modern society he saw as irrational and "dehumanising"

How are these approaches related to career counselling, if at all?

How do the psychodynamic approaches differ from all the other approaches learned thus far in the course?

1. None of these theories are explicitly career development theories; they are general theories of psychological development and adjustment, and have been adapted by various theorists to be used in a career context
2. Much more complex, multi-faceted; often more vague and subjective than the other theories
3. Try to take into account all aspects of an individual's personality development and adjustment to foster healthy career development and adjustment; i.e. do not rely simply on standardised tests of interests or abilities, fixed personality types c.f. Jung; often focus on relationships with others, concept of self identity, feelings of inferiority---things which may not necessarily be available to the conscious mind (hence the use of "insight")
4. Emphasise more heavily the history of early childhood and adulthood development
5. Emphasise more the role of the unconscious, especially in terms of unconscious needs and conflicts; emphasises "insight" (although the career counselling methods in this chapter are fairly directive, with the counsellor herself trying to provide the "insights")
6. Theories as applied to career counselling not as empirically-validated as other theories
7. Applications in psychotherapy have not as yet been extended too frequently to career counselling, and certainly have not been evaluated empirically as frequently as any of the other theories

Freud and psychoanalysis: The first psychodynamic approach

Brief summary of Freud's conceptualisation of personality

• 3 parts to personality:

1. id: associated explicitly with the unconscious; contains all of our innate biological urges, impulses, and drives; id functions primarily on the pleasure principle (i.e. always strives to satisfy its urges)
2. ego: starts developing from birth; tries to mediate between the id's demands and external restraints (e.g. modifies one's behaviour when one's id urge to be fed cannot be met)
3. superego: the internalisation of the social mores and norms of the environment outside the individual; the ego is constantly mediating between the id and this superego

• key point to remember re: Freud's thinking is that these three parts of the personality develop throughout each of his four psychosexual stages of development…
  

How the three parts of the personality evolve: Freud's four stages of psychosexual development

• the four stages are oral, anal, genital (during which Oedipus and Electra complexes occur), and latent; described in more detail in text
  

Applying a Freudian psychodynamic approach to career counselling: general

• some work has been done to illustrate the relationship between the degree to which needs are met during each of Freud's four stages and later career choice
  

Applying a Freudian psychodynamic approach to career counselling: Bordin's play theory

• some researchers looked at people in various occupations and found that those in different groups differed in terms of personality and early childhood experiences
• Bordin took data from these studies and postulated his own theory
• to Bordin, throughout our lives we all seek the enjoyment that comes from play; individuals try to choose careers which will provide this type of enjoyment
• opposite of play is compulsion: feeling compelled to take a certain job or enter a certain career because parents, teachers, or others wish the individual to do so
• these compulsions can last throughout adulthood
• these compulsions create a conflict between the need for enjoyment and the desires of authority figures, for instance
  

In counselling using play theory

• counsellor tries to demonstrate her appreciation of importance of play in career selection and adjustment by asking client to discuss those activities which give him pleasure
• oftentimes, those activities which give pleasure later in life are strongly related to activities which gave pleasure in childhood
• counsellor tries to help individual mediate between finding enjoyment in a given career and choosing a career that will allow the individual to fulfil his various responsibilities

Erik Erikson: Taking more of a lifespan psychodynamic approach

Erikson's disagreement with Freud

• Erikson: in general, most personality development occurs not just during childhood, but throughout the lifespan
• the achievement of sense of self-identity is an important determinant of personality development and behaviour; the degree of this achievement affects later functioning
• furthermore, individuals are motivated not simply by biological id impulses, but also by the need to realise their full talents, potentials, etc.; both biological drives and social issues must be handled
  

Erikson's eight stages of psychosocial development

• one's personality, in terms of attitudes towards self and others, is determined by the degree to which a crisis in each of Erikson's eight stages of development is successfully mediated
• the degree of successful resolution of the crisis in one stage affects the ability to resolve the crisis in the next stage
• resolution of a crisis is never complete, and issues related to its resolution may surface any time during the life course
• see text for details on the eight stages
  

Erikson's identity crisis stage and manifestations of conflict resolution/irresolution of all other stages

• for Erikson, most crucial stage of development is number 5, during which the crisis is that of Identity vs. Identity Confusion
• this is the transition from childhood to adulthood
• how an individual resolved the crises in the first four stages affects how the crises in this and subsequent stages will be resolved
• see chart in text illustrating how the crises in each of the other stages affects the crisis in stage five
  

Applying Erikson's theory to career counselling

• his theory has influenced more career theorists than any other
• in terms of all the psychodynamic theories, this one is the one most frequently applied to career development and adjustment
• in counselling, counsellor should keep the eight stages in mind and listen to the client's narrative for signs of unsuccessful resolution of particular stages, especially the fifth stage
• client and counsellor should work on achieving resolution where it is indicated
  

Alfred Adler: Inferiority as one of the primary motivations (aka "individual psychology")

Adler's disagreements with Freud over an individual's primary motivations in life

• generally, when people think of Adlerian psychology, they think of his ideas on the inferiority complex, which he sees as one of an individual's primary behavioural motivations; individuals develop inferiority complexes throughout childhood and later in life try to overcome them, often by "overcompensating" (e.g. over-reliance on defence mechanisms); such overcompensation is seen as the cause of emotional disturbance
• these feelings of inferiority can develop as a result of issues relating to four key areas, which generally are not discussed by Freud:

1. Basic Life Tasks: love, social relations, and work; Adler accepted Freud's ideas on the role of sexual drives, but also looked at love and the relations between the sexes (e.g. degree of equality); an individual is motivated not just by personal interests, but those of others; how individuals approach work in our specialised economy and how that attitude affects career choice is also important to consider
2. Social Interests: Adler felt individuals needed to develop a sense that they are contributing to the greater social good, and a sense of "belongingness" in the world---that they matter to others; both senses can develop through work
3. Family Constellation: how a child perceives his "position" in her family and how the parents and siblings perceive the child; feeling he does not belong or that his siblings are better at certain activities than he is can lead to sense of discouragement and perhaps inferiority; early relations with the family affects how one achieves the 3 basic life tasks listed above
4. "Lifestyle": refers to how one approaches goals in life; this is influenced by relations within the family constellation; one's lifestyle can be one that expresses interest in society, or one that does not; one's attitude towards oneself and others often reflects one's lifestyle
   

Applying Adlerian theory to therapy in general

• important goal of Adlerian counselling and psychotherapy is to reduce feelings of inferiority, by discussing issues arising in the above four areas
• Adlerian therapy is fairly directive (therapist will suggest issues for discussion, may provide his own observations and "insights"), etc.
• areas of discussion may include:

1. Overcoming discouragements which occurred in early childhood
2. Correcting mistaken thoughts about the self, others, and society that developed in early childhood
3. Helping the client develop social interests, by encouraging more interpersonal co-operation, etc.
4. Suggesting client change her lifestyle
   

Brief aside: Should I use psychotherapy or counselling for my client?

• the Adlerian therapist must choose which approach to use with a client coming in for career-related issues
• it is the client's lifestyle that determines whether it should be career counselling, or psychotherapy:

1. If the client must change his lifestyle in order to change his behaviour, psychotherapy should be used (psychotherapy being a means of altering personality); lifestyle changes require analysis of early childhood experiences and corrections of mistaken perceptions in the four key areas listed above
2. If the client can make appropriate behavioural changes within the current lifestyle, counselling should be used; in counselling, the client can learn how to make behavioural changes such that behaviours are more consistent with her lifestyle; but remember, Adlerian therapy has not to date been used too frequently for career counselling

Applying Adlerian theory to career counselling

• counsellor should be aware that those with inferiority complexes may choose jobs which are not too challenging, may choose not to further their education, etc., because they (often mistakenly) believe they will not be able to succeed
• counsellor should also be aware that lifestyle is often manifested in career choice
• Adlerian career counselling involves two parts:

1. Assessment: structured interviews, projective techniques, autobiographies, and card sorts to determine interests, goals, life themes, life tasks, suitable work environments, etc.
2. Counselling: use results from assessment to help client see herself, her life themes, and her goals more clearly, so she can make more effective career decisions

• in general, the methods of Adlerian counselling are more specific than the other methods in this chapter
  

Applying Adlerian theory to career counselling: Savickas' approach

• Savickas created a special variant of Adlerian career counselling; it incorporates both assessment and counselling phases
• very specific, and very directive, as therapist is frank with client about her observations, is direct in trying to alter faulty decision-making styles, asks client to actively make a list of careers, and so forth
• the method is rather extensive so it will not be described here in full; you may refer to the text
• the Savickas's method emphasises asking various questions to determine the client's central life goal, and major concern/problem presenting in counselling, and what he thinks it will take to solve/deal with the problem
• counsellor will also ask client about important decisions she has made in her life, to help determine her decision-making style, which may also have been developed in childhood and may be faulty; this style can affect decisions regarding goals, differentiation of one's various abilities, type of schooling needed, job qualifications, etc.
• Savickas suggests a 7-step method for gathering and integrating all the assessment information
• the actual counselling process using Savickas's methods is very specific and structured; specific sessions are spent discussing:

1. interests (some of which the counsellor may suggest have "hidden meanings"), goals, "career styles," "career paths" (decisions about setting educational and career goals), and decision making styles
2. then, occupations to explore;
3. then, any difficulties in making a career decision
   

The role of testing in psychodynamic career counselling

• psychodynamic theories as applied to career counselling have not made extensive use of tests
• of the tests that are used, they are often projective (they help reveal unconscious desires, conflicts, etc.); e.g. TAT
• Bordin's method and Erikson-influenced methods have not been developed enough such that they suggest or do not suggest the use of tests
• Adlerian counsellors usually do not use tests due to their focus on an individual's unique goals, lifestyle, etc.; when they do use tests, they are often structured interviews and not projective
• note, however, that Savickas's method ties in with interest inventories and similar tests

A final reflection on our Rubik's Cube

Was anyone able to solve it? Not as easy as some might think, is it? Why did you have trouble solving it? Think about that question in terms of the essence of "psychodynamics." It may just increase your appreciation of the complexity of career choice, development, and adjustment.