The Pleasure Principle
by Jonathan M. Gransee, Psy.D. Licensed Psychologist
Unlocking the mystery to parenting, love, and happiness
Simply put, the pleasure principle is one of the fundamental truth’s about human nature. We are governed by our drive to obtain pleasure, from a newborn child (or perhaps even before then) to the eldest human. Pleasure motivates us in ways we may not even be aware of, and it also entraps us, and destroys us, if we allow it to. Thus, understanding it, and how it motivates us, is key to insuring that you are able to live your life the way you want to.
First of all, let me wax ‘Freudian’ for a bit. Freud was one of the great minds of psychology, and though he did not start the field, his thinking and writing were seminal in the development of the thinking that guides psychologists, psychiatrists, and other mental health professionals. And, his thinking has pervaded into our general pop culture. In other words, his thinking and writings have had a phenomenal influence on life as we know it.
Freud believed that infants were governed, at least to some extent, by the pleasure principle. He speculated that there were ‘pleasure zones’ in the body that changed as the infant developed. While I am not certain if he said this, he implied that their development was guided by pleasure. So, he felt that the infant’s first pleasure zone was the mouth … that they desired oral gratification, and thus sought it out, through sucking it’s mother’s breast for nurturance, and then, through ingesting other foods through it’s mouth, as it developed as an infant. Essentially, instinct guided the child to do what it had to do to survive … Eat! Then, as that skill became firmly implanted in the child’s brain, the pleasure zone shifts to the anal area. There, the child focus on elimination … another necessary part of the whole developmental process, as without elimination, the body could not continue to intake food. Again, the brain, early on, guides the body to do what it needs to do to survive, through providing pleasure when the behavior is done. Freud then thought that the pleasure zone shifted to the phallic area (penis/vagina), perhaps in preparation for puberty, or to motivate the body to begin the process of puberty … at any rate, he felt that at that point, the young child now obtained pleasure most significantly in that area. Following that was a ‘latency period,’ where pleasure was not focused in any particular area of the body, and then, after puberty, there was a return to the pleasure zone being in the phallic area.
Freud hypothesized that a child could get ‘stuck’ in a developmental stage where their pleasure zone would not shift to the next zone, but would stay in one particular zone indefinitely (such as the anal zone, or the oral zone). He also speculated that the child could become partially stuck in one zone, and that only part of the pleasure zone would develop in the next area, while some would remain behind. This was the basis of much of his thinking about what motivated human behavior in adulthood, and why it was that there were deviant sexual desires, and adults with immature interests or desires.
There is more to be discussed, however, in regards to the early pleasure zones. Those who followed Freud expounded on his ideas, for instance stating that the child also needed to learn to attach, at an early age. Some thought that the child idealized the breast of the mother, and that they needed to have the actual behavior of sucking on the mother’s breast in order to establish an attachment to the mother (Melanie Klein, Anna Freud, etc). Some thought it was a bit less specific, and that the general closeness and physical contact, as well as eye contact, was what was important in the child learning to attach to others (Bowlby, Ainsworth, etc). But, underlying both of those schools of thought is the concept of pleasure: The child presumably obtained pleasure from this behavior. So, in other words, the brain rewards the sucking of the breast, or the closeness to the mother, by producing pleasurable sensations, and the child begins to see attachment to others as pleasurable.
There are some possible issues with this. For one, it does not always happen as it is supposed to. Children with an Autism Spectrum Disorder do not appear to obtain pleasure from such closeness, and indeed, seem to find it painful or aversive. And, they seem to find pleasure in isolation, rather than connection. So, they do not attach to their mother, or for that matter, to anyone, and tend to develop social skills (if at all) much later, and have much weaker social skills and social success than a typical child. And, the autistic child seems to get pleasure out of all the wrong things: obsessive and repetitive behavior, social withdraw, odd use of language, etc.
The same seems to be true of children who do not get the nourishing and attention they should be getting, when they are an infant and toddler. Children who were raised in the orphanages of Romania and Hungary, years back, were given only minimal sustenance, and were given minimal attention and loving by their overworked and underfunded caregivers. Many, coming out of these orphanages, looked autistic. They were socially withdrawn, hand flapped or did other odd behaviors, and seemed to be very odd, in general. Interestingly, however, most recovered within a year, if put into a ‘normal’ nourishing home. Perhaps one way to look at this is that they were not shown the pleasure of attachment while in the orphanages, but once out, and shown the pleasure of attachment, they righted themselves, and everything else fell into line. Yet another demonstration of the power of the pleasure principle in keeping a child on track, developmentally.
Copyright June 2008. These articles cannot be used in any fashion without the explicit permission of the author, except for individual use.
Disclaimer: This information is not intended to diagnose or treat any condition, and is for the sole purpose of providing alternate perspectives. If you feel that a mental health condition exists in yourself or the person you are reading this article for, you are advised to seek out psychological or psychiatric services.