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object relations theory

any psychoanalytically based theory that views the need to relate to objects as more central to personality organization and motivation than the vicissitudes of the instincts. These theories developed from and in reaction to classic Freudian theories of psychodynamics. Some theories—for example, Fairbairnian theory and the approach of Melanie Klein—view the personality as organized in terms of a complex world of internal object representations and their relationships with each other.

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Psychology term of the day

November 11th 2024

multimodal distribution

multimodal distribution

a set of data in which there is more than one mode or score that occurs most frequently. For example, the ages of a sample of college students would form a multimodal distribution if the largest number of people are either 18, 19, or 20 years old, with the remaining individuals aged 17 or 21 through 70. See also bimodal distribution; unimodal distribution.