Electra complex Electra complex In Neo-Freudian psychology, the Electra complex, as proposed by Carl Jung in his ""Theory of Psychoanalysis"", is a girl's psychosexual competition with her mother for possession of her father. In the course of her psychosexual development, the complex is the girl's phallic stage; a boy's analogous experience is the Oedipus complex. The Electra complex occurs in the third—phallic stage (ages 3–6)—of five psychosexual development stages: (i) the Oral, (ii) the Anal, (iii) the Phallic, (iv) the Latent, and (v) the Genital—in which the source of libido pleasure is in a different erogenous zone of the infant’s body. In
Psychology of religion modified the Freudian theory and produced a more complex account of the functions of religion. In his book "Psychoanalysis and Religion" he responded to Freud's theories by explaining that part of the modification is viewing the Oedipus complex as based not so much on sexuality as on a "much more profound desire", namely, the childish desire to remain attached to protecting figures. The right religion, in Fromm's estimation, can, in principle, foster an individual's highest potentialities, but religion in practice tends to relapse into being neurotic. According to Fromm, humans need a stable frame of reference. Religion fills this need.