Adler's Individual Psychology

Adler's Individual Psychology

• The focus is on each person's uniqueness.
• Holism dictates that each person should be studied and appreciated for the whole of their personality.
• Adler's theory stresses the unique motivations of the individual and the importance of a perceived niche in society.

Adler's Personality Typology

• It is based on body fluids, which is related to Greek humors.
• It is also based on Gemeinschaftsgefuhl (social interest or community feeling), which is a primary human motivation.
• Another base is activity level.

Basic orientation

• Individuals decide for themselves what direction their lives take.

Behavioral aspects

• All behavior has social meaning.
• All behavior has a purpose and is goal-directed.
• Unity and pattern are inherent in behavior
• Behavior is designed to overcome feelings of inferiority and to move toward feelings of superiority.
• Behavior is a result of subjective perceptions.

Life of Adler

• Adler lived from 1870-1937.
• The life of Adler can be broken down into Childhood and Adolescence, Adulthood, Relations with Freud, and Becoming a Celebrity in America.

Childhood and Adolescence

• Adler's childhood and adolescence were marked by illness, awareness of death, and intense jealousy of his older brother.
• He had feelings of inferiority, but compensated for weaknesses through persistence.
• Adler gradually achieved a sense of self-esteem and social acceptance.

Adulthood

• Adler studied medicine at the University of Vienna, which was his childhood ambition.
• His grades were average, and he first practiced as an ophthalmologist before shifting to general medicine.
• He took an interest in incurable diseases, but was distressed that he could not prevent death especially in children.
• He decided to specialize in neurology and psychiatry instead of general practice.

Relations with Freud

• Adler discussed ideas with Freud and was critical of his theory.
• They experienced interpersonal conflicts.

Becoming a Celebrity in America

• Adler eventually relocated to the United States and popularized his theories.

Inferiority feelings

• Jung coined the term 'complex' but Adler further explored the issues of inferiority/superiority.
• Inferiority feelings are the source of all human striving.
• Early in his career, Adler emphasized natural feelings of inferiority that appear very early in life and require compensation thereafter.

Inferiority Complex

• Feelings come from being helpless and not feeling good enough.
• Develops as a normal condition of people, and begins in infancy due to complete dependency on adults.
• Compensation is an individual's attempt to overcome real or imagined inferiorities, and to strive to be better.
• The inferiority entails feeling less capable and good than others.
• This can happen in various ways like being overwhelmed by life's demands.
• This results in a person feeling helpless.
• Causes for the complex include organic inferiority, spoiling, and/or neglecting.
• Weaknesses of the body shape personality through the person's efforts to compensate for that weakness.
• Spoiling/pampering includes being the center of attention in the home, where every whim is satisfied and little is denied.
• They may think they are the most important person in any situation.
• They may think others should always defer to them.
• This also includes overpermissiveness/overdomination/overprotection.
• Neglecting and rejecting a child, is a lack of love/security is present.
• Indifferent/hostile parents inflict feelings of worthlessness, anger, and distrust which is considered child abuse in the modern view.

Striving for Superiority

• Later in his career, Adler emphasized striving of humans to belong, which focuses on contributing to human welfare and to achieve perfection.
• The goal of the human soul is conquest, perfection, security, and superiority.
• Every child is faced with so many obstacles in life that no child ever grows up without striving for some form of significance.
• A superiority complex is an overcompensating, unrealistically positive perception of one's abilities and accomplishments.
• People may feel inside with no need to demonstrate, or may feel the need to prove it with accomplishments
• One response includes being boastful, self-centered, and tending to denigrate others.
• People who experience feelings of superiority are more emotionally detached (avoidantly attached).
• It is the universal tendency for individuals to seek to be their best selves.
• Initially it was conceptualized as masculine protest (will or drive toward power/aggression), but later it was reconceptualized as a drive for perfection.
• To drive for perfection means to complete or finish a task.
• We strive for superiority to perfect ourselves or make ourselves whole.
• One feels anxious because there is a concern about finding belonging with others, being defeated and especially protecting our feelings of superiority such feelings may drive our striving for perfection.
• Subjective beliefs is to strive toward a complete or whole state of being, and these are unfounded in fact, used to guide behavior.
• Involves an imagined or potential goal that guides behavior, but it is fictional.
• Adler believed that the best ideal of perfection is the concept of God.
• Striving is a key element of motivation in each person to urge toward future orientation, and completeness.
• Fictional finalism incorporates the idea that we have an ultimate goal, a final state of being, and a need to move toward imagined/potential fictional goals to guide behavior toward a complete state of being.

Styles of Life

-Working with kids who are ages >13 is too late because kids have already developed a sense of either inferiority or superiority by then.

• Style of life relates to the personality. It indicates a unique character structure that is a pattern personal behaviors, habits, and characteristics. By this we each strive for perfection. It also referred to as personality, self or character. Social interaction influences this style of life, but is not firmly crystallized until 4 or 5 years of age.
• There are two issues in Style of Life: The creative power of self , and four basic styles.
• In the creative power of self it helps us to develop an appropriate style of life.
• It is not a passive process, but rather active.
• Experiences from childhood are subjectively processed learned.
• Nature and nurture are both factors, along attitude and creative power of the self, as well as free-will.
• Once created, the style of life is consistent and persistent across the lifespan.

Four basic style of life identified with social interest include sociably useful

• Getting is the most common- people who expect to receive satisfaction from other people and become dependent on them.
• Avoiding occurs when one makes no attempt to face life's problems, by avoiding difficulties, failure is never on the table.
• Dominant displays with little social awareness and no regard for others, and usually embodies sadists, delinquents, psychopaths, alcoholics and drug addicts.
• Socially Useful cooperate with others and acts in accordance with their needs, to solve problems
• Gemeinschaftsgefuhl, refers to one's connectedness and interest in the well-being of others that enhances or pre-conditions psychological health.
• Social interest incorporates the potential to cooperate with other people in order to achieve personal and societal goals.
• The innate potential to cooperate with other people is developed with our early social experiences.
• Ultimately, we must cooperate and contribute to society to realize goals.

Social interest

• Parental behaviors may foster a child's development of social interest, and are often most influential when coming from the mother.
• A mother's first person contact and primary care giving, attachment and bonding, is vital in shaping social interest by teaching 'good' behaviors as well as by using observational learning.
• But because kids don't model the behavior of all people equally, kids would rather relate and learn by their peers and the people who are most similar to them.
• Although the mother a special role, the the father plays are crucial and unique role also.

Aspects of social interest include cooperation, companionship, and courage.

Children the are suspicious will approach life with suspicion, Those who have a good social network won't be criminals War, racial hatread and drunkenness stems from community.

Research of Social Interest

• There are many test developed to measuring social of life.
• Research those high in social interest report low stress.
• Women are high social interest are high in self actualization
• Social interest are associated with well being.

Birth Order

• Categories are:
• The first born child
• The second born child
• The youngest child
• An only child

Birth order

• Attention in life is the most biggest thing for first borns.
• They get followed by dethronement that results with rivalry between there sibling.
• They a responsible and intellectuals.
• The biggest research shows in lives of first born are successful.
• Older siblings and parents affects child most.
• Often become the focus of doting, care, and affections by the people. They have less chances of being stress and mental disorder. They often are selfish and often matured they have good life.

Assessment

• Early Recollection
• Strange Early Memory
• The nature of EarlyRecollection

Techniques

• Helps reveal the primary interest of life.
• They shape peoples adult life.
• Used the earliest memories real or fantasized.
• They subject recreations.

Dream Analysis

• Dreams involve feelings regarding.
• It requires knowledge requires they style of life.
• Did not reveal hidden conflict and to deal with a current situation.

Explore Adler's individual psychology, which focuses on each person's uniqueness and the importance of social interest. Understand personality typology rooted in body fluids and community feeling. Learn behavioral aspects, which include social meaning and overcoming inferiority.