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Psychoanalytic Theory:

Sigmund Freud

At the turn of the 20th century, Sigmund Freud was developing the first modern approach to Psychology in his innovative Psychoanalytic theory. In his book The Interpretation of Dreams, literally translated dream-reading, Freud’s original argument held that all dreams, and their intermittent content, were a type of subconscious wish fulfillment that could be understood or interpreted relative to the preceding day’s events, or the ‘dream day.’ The basis for this theory was his claim that it was evident adolescents always engaged in this manner of dreaming. In adults, however, interpretation was considered much more complicated as they become distorted. The direct imagery characteristic of adult dreams, or ‘manifest content,’ was merely a cleverly disguised derivative of the true subconscious desires at the basis of the dream, termed ‘latent content.’ The significance of adult dreams is therefore hidden and unclear to the dreamer themselves.



Dreams and the Super-Ego


Freud believed the censoring of the dreams significance was the work of the super-ego. In Psychoanalytic theory, Freud theorized there were three parts of the human psyche. The ego, or our own conscious conception of both reality and our personal identities, is simultaneously plagued by both the id, our subconscious drive for the unconditional satisfaction and fulfillment of desire, and the super-ego, our subconscious drive to adhere to the moral expectations and institutions of society. Thus, Freud felt that the super-ego was a type of ego defense mechanism. Even in waking life, the repressed wishes of the id are suppressed or prevented from entering consciousness by the super-ego. It is only during sleep that these subconscious desires are able to break the defense and transcend the gap into our conscious mind. However, the super-ego is still at work and is able to produce a ‘veil of disguise’ hiding the true nature of these desires. In order not disrupt biological sleeping patterns, the mind makes a compromise between the two opponent forces, the id and super-ego, and presents the dream to the ego as a concealed completion of the reticent wishes and desires of the id. Presenting these wishes and desires as fulfilled ensures the dreamer is not disturbed and remains in a sleeping state.

Freud used the term ‘dream work’ to describe the distorting processes the mind engages in due to the super-ego’s repression of the id. This dream work is the force that causes the discrepancy between the manifest and latent content of adult dreams. The only means to interpret the dream’s true nature, then, is through the reversal of these mechanisms in an attempt to discover the latent content.






Mechanisms of Dream Work:


  • Condensation – a single object in the dream’s manifest content represents numerous symbolic associations and ideas. It is through the work of condensation that complex thoughts and ideas are translated into brief imagery.

  • Displacement – the emotional significance of a particular dream object is stripped, only to be attached to a different dream object entirely. The functionality of this dream work mechanism is to mislead the ego in an attempt to disguise the suspicions of the super-ego’s censor and bring the repressed desires into the conscious mind.

  • Secondary Elaboration – the mind’s natural tendency to make sense out of the various elements in a dream’s manifest content by constructing a narrative, story, or time line. Through this mechanism, Freud argued that the manifest content in dreams are independent of one another and can only be interpreted as singular symbolic representations and not a unified whole.


    • The dream work’s representation and symbolism represent the popular use of ‘dream symbols’ to interpret the significance in dreams.

  • Representation – thoughts are translated to visual images.

  • Symbolism – actions, people, or ideas are translated to symbols.





Freud and Nightmares

Freud argued that nightmares, or other anxiety producing dreams, were the direct result of malfunction within the dream work. These typically occur when the repressed desires of the id are too powerful and insufficiently disguised. With the dream work’s failure the ego becomes aware of the presence of these repressed desires. The ego then reacts to this awareness through fearful cognition and physiological stress (i.e. increased heart rate or sweating) in an attempt to break the sleep cycle, waking the dreamer in order to prevent the repressed desires from entering the consciousness of the ego and maintaining equilibrium.

Freud made a distinction between these nightmares and another type of anxiety producing dream, which he called traumatic dreams. A traumatic dream is the vivid reliving of an upsetting experience of the past. Such dreams are an exception to Freud’s theory of wish representation as he believed the traumatic dream was the mind’s attempt at forcing repressed disturbances into consciousness.



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