Is Psychoanalysis dead?

[IDK]

Is psychoanalysis dead? My understanding is that its not but it isnt widely used and only a handful of people use it. Should it be taken seriously? A lot of Frueds theories have been disproved or at least been proven improbable. I also heard that none of his theories were good enough to be tested scientifically and that his theory would be the same as me making up a theory subconciously everyone is schizophrenic but they are better at subconciously controlling their dopamine level. Im not a pro at this subject so im asking anyone here who knows anything about Frueds theory to inform me if im wrong. I am disturbed by his theory of latent homosexuality because honestly I have most of the "signs" of one. Dont worry im not homophobic LOL but I have the rest of the signs. So before I post this I have a couple of questions, I'd be grateful if you could answer them:

1)Where did the link between homophobia and homosexuality come from (this one isnt about me)

2)Should Frued be taken seriously?

3)Did Frued even have a bit of science/study behind his theories or were they all made from scrap?

4)Do dreams have meanings?

5)If the subconcious is capable of all these things then why cant it hide their sexuality?

One last thing, I have HOCD and that is partly the reason I am here but for the past week I havent felt scared of being gay in over 3 weeks, so I am a lot better but I keep having these weird disturbing dreams. Usually they involve homosexal sex. I had HOCD for 2 months now and only started having them regularly very recently. I mostly dream every other day but when I dont pay attention to remembering my dreams I almost always have normal dreams, but if I wake up for a minute and think if I had a gay dream (which I dont) I almost always have a gay dream the second time I sleep. Whats up with that? I believe in Calvins Cognitive dream theory but I just had this dream where I did something I havent done in a while which is acting like a girl on a chat site. I remember it was a passing thought earlier today before I slept (either today or yesterday) but it was only there for a 10 seconds or less, could I really have remembered that in my dream?

[lewin]

Here's your assigned reading:

The scientific legacy of Sigmund Freud: Toward a psychodynamically informed psychological science.

"Although commentators periodically declare that Freud is dead, his repeated burials lie on shaky grounds. Critics typically attack an archaic version of psychodynamic theory that most clinicians similarly consider obsolete. Central to contemporary psychodynamic theory is a series of propositions about (a) unconscious cognitive, affective, and motivational processes; (b) ambivalence and the tendency for affective and motivational dynamics to operate in parallel and produce compromise solutions; (c) the origins of many personality and social dispositions in childhood; (d) mental representations of the self, others, and relationships; and (e) developmental dynamics. An enormous body of research in cognitive, social, developmental, and personality psychology now supports many of these propositions. Freud's scientific legacy has implications for a wide range of domains in psychology, such as integration of affective and motivational constraints into connectionist models in cognitive science."

Freudian Defense Mechanisms and Empirical Findings in Modern Social Psychology: Reaction Formation, Projection, Displacement, Undoing, Isolation, Sublimation, and Denial

"Recent studies in social psychology are reviewed for evidence relevant to seven Freudian defense mechanisms. This work emphasizes normal populations, moderate rather than extreme forms of defense, and protection of self-esteem against threat. Reaction formation, isolation, and denial have been amply shown in studies, and they do seem to serve defensive functions. Undoing, in the sense of counterfactual thinking, is also well documented but does not serve to defend against the threat. Projection is evident, but the projection itself may be aby-product of defense rather than part of the defensive response itself. Displacement is not well supported in any meaningful sense, although emotions and physical arousal states do carry over from one situation to the next. No evidence of sublimation was found."

 

All that said, Freud's claims and findings need to be taken into context -- he used case studies and introspection, methods which aren't a great means of determining causality and susceptible to confirmation bias. His research was also conducted >100 years ago. The ideas he proposed are foundational to many areas of psychology but, of course, don't reflect current scientific thinking in many ways--just like Darwin or, closer to home, Piaget.

 

Do dreams have meaning? People sure seem to think so.