Final answer:
Heinz Hartmann's view of the ego differs from Freud's by suggesting that it includes autonomous, conflict-free functions that are more adaptive and oriented towards the environment, providing the ego with greater autonomy and potential for positive development compared to Freud's model of constant internal conflict.
Step-by-step explanation:
The views of Heinz Hartmann on the ego differ significantly from those of Sigmund Freud. While Freud's model of the psyche consisted of the id, ego, and superego, with the ego acting as a mediator tasked with balancing the impulsive demands of the id and the moralistic demands of the superego, Hartmann introduced the concept of a conflict-free sphere of ego functioning. Allied with Freud's psychoanalytic tradition, Hartmann acknowledged the existence of innate ego functions, which he reasoned to be autonomous and separate from the conflicts among the id, ego, and superego.
Freud suggested that the ego is primarily formed through interactions with one's environment and is heavily involved in managing internal conflicts. In contrast, Hartmann believed that the ego included a set of adaptive functions that are primarily oriented toward the individual's interaction with the environment, conceptualizing the ego as having more autonomy and less continual conflict than Freud proposed. Hartmann's perspective was less deterministic than Freud's and suggested that the ego had more potential for growth and adaptation, rather than being perpetually engulfed in a struggle between primal drives and moralistic values.
Hartmann's theory is considered one of the significant developments in the evolution of psychoanalytic theory, expanding the understanding of the ego beyond Freud's original conceptualization.