psychohydraulicadj.
/ˌsʌɪkə(ʊ)hʌɪˈdrɒlɪk/, U.S. /ˈˌsaɪkoʊˌhaɪˈdrɔlɪk/, /ˈˌsaɪkoʊˌhaɪˈdrɑlɪk/ Zoology and Psychology.
Relating to or designating a mechanistic model of behaviour in which instinctive drives or other forms of internal motivation are held to act in the manner of a fluid working under pressure.Originally with reference to the theory of animal behaviour proposed by Konrad Lorenz, who used the terms hydromechanical and hydrostatical with reference to models of behaviour.
ΚΠ
1961 J. M. Smith in M. Banton Darwinism & Study of Society 85 Examples of such analogies are the ‘psycho-hydraulic’ model of the brain evolved by Lorenz, and the comparison by Waddington of a developing organism with a ball rolling down an ‘epigenetic landscape’.
1972 Q. Rev. Biol. 47 421 Lorenz's psychohydraulic model (1950) would be applicable in this line of reasoning.
1982 R. Hinde Ethology (1986) xvi. 266 Lorenz's psychohydraulic model of motivation..had much in common with the Freudian one.
1990 E. Harth Dawn of Millennium (1991) vi. 85 The repressed recollection must surface somewhere else with dire consequences. Such is the modern psychohydraulic version of Galen's old theory of humors.
This is a new entry (OED Third Edition, September 2007; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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adj.1961