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Despite the many years of debate and discovery, the centerpiece of Freud's libido theory seems to have remained surprisingly intact, and in fact seems to be enjoying a healthy career. As Simon (1983) recently observed, however, the oedipal theory has avoided some of the inherent risks of any scientific theory insofar as it presents more of a moving target than a static and fixed entity. Over the years, the complex has become even more complex.
A variety of issues have contributed to this increasing complexity. Freud had originally envisioned the Oedipus complex as embracing a positive aspect as well as a negative aspect. The positive oedipal configuration is generally regarded as the basic and classical formation, embellished by the addition of the negative configuration in which the positive attachment is directed toward the same-sex parent and the negative attachment toward the opposite-sex parent, thus reversing the positive configuration. The negative Oedipus complex was originally envisioned as explaining the homosexual resolution of the oedipal involvement.
Fredu's early view of the interplay between these configurations has opened the door to a much more far-ranging and elaborate understanding of the dialectical process in which these component configurations play themselves out in seemingly infinite variety. The classic configurations, both positive and negative, in their current perspective, would seem to provide more or less prototypical outcomes of the oedipal involvement, representing the extremes of a continuum or spectrum of possible combinations.