Personal notes from online resources:
The superego consists of two systems: The conscience and the ideal self. The conscience can punish the ego through causing feelings of guilt. For example, if the ego gives in to the id's demands, the superego may make the person feel bad through guilt.
The idea of the "mirror stage" is an important early component in Lacan’s critical reinterpretation of the work of Freud. Drawing on work in physiology and animal psychology, Lacan proposes that human infants pass through a stage in which an external image of the body (reflected in a mirror, or represented to the infant through the mother or primary caregiver) produces a psychic response that gives rise to the mental representation of an "I". The infant identifies with the image, which serves as a gestalt of the infant's emerging perceptions of selfhood, but because the image of a unified body does not correspond with the underdeveloped infant's physical vulnerability and weakness, this imago is established as an Ideal-I toward which the subject will perpetually strive throughout his or her life.
Study Task 1: Comparison of Identity Theory and Psychoanalysis
In Freud's psychoanalytic theory of personality, the ego ideal is the part of the superego that includes the rules and standards for good behaviors. These behaviors include those that are approved of by parental and other authority figures. Obeying these rules leads to feelings of pride, value, and accomplishment. Breaking these rules can result in feelings of guilt.
The ego ideal is often thought of as the image we have of our ideal selves - the people we want to become. It is this image we hold up as the ideal individual, often modeled after people that we know, that we hold up as the standard of who we are striving to be.
Comparison of Identity Theory and Psychoanalysis
The main similarities that i've drawn from Identity theory and psychoanalysis is the belief of an ideal self, a role model for our actual self to aspire to be like. Styker and Freuds theories could work together. Freud's theory suggests that there is a negotiation to your actions and feelings between the ID, Ego and Super Ego. The super ego consists of the conscience and ideal self that has empathy for others and stops your ID and Ego acting on pure impulse. The diferent balances of ID, Ego and Super ego make us diferent from each other emotionally and can create the Hierarchy within social situations that Sheldon Stryker mentions.
Stryker's theory speaks more of identities that a person can take on when in diferent social situations. There is a hierarchy of identities that a person has which has been formed with positive feedback from others. This belief suggests that there is a Ideal self that above all other identities is the one that we want to be. Much like the ideal self mentioned in Freuds 'ego ideal' theory that set rules for good behaviour which have been approved by parental and authoritative figures. Stryker's theory suggests that the feedback for your ideal self is a constant one that is never complete.
Freud's ID, Ego, Super Ego theory ties in well with George J. McCall and J.L.Simmons' Theory of Identity (1960) with the belief that identity is improvised as the individual seeks to realise their various plans and goals. The way Freud explains his theory it seems as though the ID, Ego, and super ego's balance of ability to control your actions changes with the social situation. If you seek to realise a plan or goal (as mentioned in Theory of Identity (1960)), the impulsive ID seeks to act impulsively to achieve your goal. The semi-concious ego works partially alongside the super ego to achieve the goal without causing harm to itself and other peoples perception of the ideal self.
