Freud’s Stages of Psychosexual Development in Children
Block III
III.4 Affective-Social Development
According to Freud, affective-genital development, or sexual development, goes through several stages: the oral (up to 18 months), anal (from 18 months up to 3 years), the phallic (3 to 6 years), latency (until the first period or ejaculation), and genital (after the first period or ejaculation). Let’s describe each:
Oral Stage
In the oral stage, pleasure is concentrated in the mouth and is structured around the breast. This fact has a substantial impact because, for example, we have come to the market of “pecholatría” bras and breast operations. The shift from liquid to solid foods can be experienced by the child as a frustration. It is the theme of weaning, struggling to have to give up the breast and direct contact with the mother to make eating a pure act of eating. Hence, its importance later, as just said.
Anal Stage
Then, from the second year (18 months), the erogenous zone passes from the mouth to the anus. The child will find pleasure in bowel functions. Pleasure is obtained by loosening or retaining feces. It is the anal stage. Coinciding with this whole process, maternal education appears, aimed at sphincter control. Normally, the sphincters controlling bowel movements are controlled before those controlling urination (18-24 months). The mother requires, first, for the child to dispose of their feces and, secondly, to ill-treat them as objects (to be cast out and left out). All the education of the sphincters is accompanied by sadomasochistic experiences. The child, to please the mother, gives up pleasure and receives education related to the sphincters. This disclaimer is sadomasochistic. The child has to be good, giving up pleasure so that the mother still loves them. At the same time, the waiver will cause the child strong feelings of aggression. That is precisely the dynamics of the market-mediolatría-partitocrática (bp). They are filled with sadism against another, a rival, which is a distortion, schizophrenia, and paranoia, and appears to not kill us, pure sadism.
Phallic Stage
In the third year, the phallic stage appears. The child will make the discovery of their genitals and will entertain and manipulate them. The mysterious and punitive attitude among adults toward their fledgling masturbation causes the child to begin to appreciate their penis. The child will feel proud of possessing a penis, and what they most fear is castration. A castration idea may come from the threats of the father when he sees the child touching themselves, threatening to cut it off, but most likely, the horror of castration comes from the archaic experience of humanity borne by the collective unconscious (Jung).
For the girl, the focus of pleasure lies in the clitoris, with which they masturbate until puberty when the source of pleasure becomes concentrated in the vagina.
Oedipus Complex
Coinciding with all this genital thematic, the child directs their genital impulses toward the mother, but she is usurped and monopolized by the father. Libidinous desire toward the mother and the aggression to destroy the rival and get them out of the way, therefore, structure the Oedipus complex. The girl has some peculiarities. Until their genital stage, they were libidinally linked to the mother. Now, having discovered that they do not have a penis, the father is the person who can give it to them, the mother being a rival. Before the Oedipus complex, it is, for the child, repression, a neurotic way out of the trance with the aftermath of narcissism. Therefore, to fix it, to overcome it, the child must leave the mother, affectionately regarded as a lover who is in love, and move to love as one loves a mother. In the case of the daughter, Oedipus will be fully developed if the father is no longer for her an alleged lover and emotionally passes to a loved one as a source of life, a father. For both the child and the daughter, the parent of the same sex should stop being a person to beat, as happens later, for example, with the bp or when facing any other rival. In both cases, this knowledge also defers amorous love and then, by people other than parents, gives way to altruism, empathy, overcoming narcissism, and introducing into the children’s personality the possibility of any good development, all good education, that is, work for deferred satisfaction. The tremendous evils of the opposite attitude, immediate gratification, are reflected in the manipulations, lies, and aggressiveness of the bp that always works for instant gratification. Besides the conflict with parents as a couple, the child has conflicts with siblings. The siblings will compete for the affection of the mother or father. The child expects to eliminate all these rivals. This is what is called the Complex of Cain. Parents refer to him by saying that the child is “jealous” as the birth of a new baby causes severe depression and aggression in the child. They say clearly that they do not want the sibling. They make the subject of all sorts of attacks so that the mother is careful not to leave them alone together. They come, for example, even after controlling wetting the toilet to get the mother’s attention for the wee small draft.
Latency Stage
Having overcome or repressed Oedipus at 6-7 years, the child enters the latency period. Evolutionarily, it is a break from a problem so absorbing and so traumatic. Thus, children live without an interest in sexuality, as if it did not exist. In fact, it does exist, but it is dormant, hidden.
Puberty, Adolescence, Youth, and Adulthood
At 10, 11, or 12 years, the intense hormonal changes can no longer continue repressing sexual themes. The start of puberty (the first period or the first ejaculation), adolescence, youth, and then adulthood.