<P> The Oedipus complex is a concept of psychoanalytic theory . Sigmund Freud introduced the concept in his Interpretation of Dreams (1899). The positive Oedipus complex refers to a child's unconscious sexual desire for the opposite - sex parent and hatred for the same - sex parent . The negative Oedipus complex refers to a child's unconscious sexual desire for the same - sex parent and hatred for the opposite - sex parent . Freud considered that the child's identification with the same - sex parent is the successful outcome of the complex and that unsuccessful outcome of the complex might lead to neurosis, pedophilia, and homosexuality . </P> <P> Freud deprecated the term "Electra complex", which was introduced by Carl Gustav Jung in 1913 in regard to the Oedipus complex manifested in young girls . Freud further proposed that the Oedipus complex, which originally refers to the sexual desire of a son for his mother, is a desire for the parent in both males and females, and that boys and girls experience the complex differently: boys in a form of castration anxiety, girls in a form of penis envy . </P>

According to freud what is the resolution of the oedipus complex