Chapter 5 The Psychoanalytic Approach: The Neo-Freudians

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Chapter 5The Psychoanalytic ApproachThe
Neo-Freudians
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Alfred Adler (1870-1937)

• Born in Vienna in 1870, the third of six children
• Had a series of childhood illnesses, including
  pneumonia and rickets, and was nearly run over
  twice by carts in the streets
• Was first pampered by his mother, then
  dethroned when his younger brother was born
• Strove to overcome his sense of inferiority by
  studying furiously
• Earned his medical degree in 1895
• Became interested in Freuds ideas, defended
  Freud, and was invited to join Freuds inner
  circle
• Split with Freud in 1911 and form his own Society
  for Free Psychoanalytic Research, later named the
  Association of Individual Psychology

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Key concepts introduced by Adler

• Striving for superiority
• Inferiority complex
• The social interest
• Parental influences on personality development
• The optimal parenting style
• Problematic parenting styles
• Pampering
• Neglect
• Birth order influences on personality
• First borns problem children, neurotics,
  criminals, drunkards, and perverts?
• Middle borns de-throned and therefore
  motivated to strive for superiority?
• Last borns pampered throughout their childhoods
  to the point of being spoiled?

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Birth order differences What the research
findings actually show

• Firstborns work hard to meet adult standards from
  an early age. They tend to achieve more in life
  and assume positions of greater responsibility,
  but they also tend to be more anxious and
  stressed.
• Middle borns dont stand out as a group. They
  tend to be more like firstborns, however, when
  the age gap between them and their older
  sibling(s) is large, rather than small.
• Lastborns tend to be charming, sociable, and
  relatively popular with their peers. They can
  also be somewhat rebellious and unsatisfied with
  the existing social order.
• Only children tend to resemble firstborns in many
  respects. They often feel particularly burdened
  by the responsibility of fulfilling their
  parents hopes and dreams for them.

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Design of the study by Ickes and Turner (1983)
? with older sister(s) ? with younger sister(s)
? with older brothers ? with OS - ? with OB ? with YS - ? with OB
? with younger brothers ? with OS - ? with YB ? with YS - ? with YB
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Birth order influences in mixed-sex dyads (Ickes
Turner, 1983)
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Birth order influences in mixed-sex dyads (Ickes
Turner, 1983)
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Birth order influences in mixed-sex dyads (Ickes
Turner, 1983)
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Birth order influences in mixed-sex dyads (Ickes
Turner, 1983)
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Birth order influences in mixed-sex dyads (Ickes
Turner, 1983)
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Carl Jung (1875-1961)

• Was born in a small Swiss canton
• As a child, he was a loner who was extremely
  introspective
• Earned his medical degree in 1900
• Began a correspondence with Freud, whom he met in
  1907
• Became Freuds disciple and heir apparent, and
  accompanied Freud on his 1909 trip to the US
• Broke with Freud in 1914 and spent the next seven
  years in virtual isolation
• Emerged from this period with a new view of
  personality that built on many of Freuds ideas
  but added many new and unique elements

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Key concepts introduced by Jung

• Identification of introversionextraversion as a
  fundamental dimension of human personality
• The collective unconscious
• complemented the personal unconscious
• represents the collective experience of the human
  species
• Archetypes primordial images found in all
  cultures at all times
• Primary archetypes
• The self
• The shadow the dark side of the self
• The anima the feminine aspect of the male
• The animus the masculine aspect of the female

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Jungian archetypes
Primary Archetypes Primary Characters Primary Characters Women Figures Primary Situations Symbols and Associations
The Self The Hero The Woman Figure The Great Mother The Quest Light-Darkness
The Shadow The Scapegoat The Child The Temptress The Task Water-Desert
The Anima The Outcast The Eternal Boy The Platonic Ideal The Initiation Heaven-Hell
The Animus The Devil Figure The Superman The Unfaithful Wife The Journey
The Wise Old Man The Divine Couple The Fall
The Trickster God (or The Gods) Death and Rebirth
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Jungian archetypes in the movie Star Wars
Jungian archetype Character
The Hero Luke Skywalker
The Father Ben Kenobi
The Anima Princess Leia
The Wise Old Man Yoda
The Shadow Darth Vader
The Trickster Han Solo
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Erik Homberger Erikson (1902-1994)

• His Danish father abandoned the family before he
  was born.
• His mother married Dr. Theodor Homberger, whom he
  believed to be his real father.
• He had identity problems that led him to resist
  becoming a physician and wander about Europe
  instead.
• He met Anna Freud and her colleagues, acquired a
  Montessori teaching credential, and learned about
  the psychoanalytic approach.
• He fled the Nazis in 1933 and moved to the US,
  where he published on ego psychology and proposed
  a psycho-social stage theory of personality
  development.

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Key concepts introduced by Erikson

• Ego psychology emphasized the important
  functions of the ego
• Acts as the mediator between the id, the
  superego, and the demands of external reality
• Works to establish and maintain a sense of
  identity
• Stable sense of identity (successful outcome)
• Identity crisis (unsuccessful outcome)
• Works to establish and maintain mastery over the
  environment
• A psychosocial stage model of personality
  development
• Viewed the conflicts at each stage as primarily
  psychosocial conflicts, rather than psychosexual
  conflicts
• Added stages that extended throughout the entire
  lifespan, from infancy through old age

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Ericksons psychosocial stage theory
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Karen Horney (1885-1952)

• Born in Hamburg, Germany in 1885
• Resented her authoritarian fathers sexist
  attitudes
• Determined to always be first in her class, to go
  to college, and then to medical school
• Earned her medical degree in 1915
• Studied to become a psychoanalyst and found much
  to criticize in Freuds writings
• Joined the New York Psychoanalytic Institute in
  1934 but split with them in 1941 over differences
  of opinion
• Established the American Institute for
  Psychoanalysis

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Key concepts introduced by Horney

• Neurotic adaptation styles
• Moving toward others
• Moving away from others
• Moving with others
• Moving against others
• Neurotic shoulds neurotic demands placed on
  oneself
• Feminine psychology
• Countered Freuds concept of penis envy with her
  own concept of womb envy
• Pointed out the more sexist aspects of Freuds
  theorizing and called for a greater emphasis on
  social and cultural factors

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Key concepts introduced by Horney

• Neurotic adaptation styles
• Moving toward others
• Moving away from others
• Moving with others
• Moving against others
• Neurotic shoulds neurotic demands placed on
  oneself
• Feminine psychology
• Countered Freuds concept of penis envy with her
  own concept of womb envy
• Pointed out the more sexist aspects of Freuds
  theorizing and called for a greater emphasis on
  social and cultural factors

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Two ways to better integrate the real self and
the ideal self in response to neurotic shoulds
real self
ideal self
real self
ideal self
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Key concepts introduced by Horney

• Neurotic adaptation styles
• Moving toward others
• Moving away from others
• Moving with others
• Moving against others
• Neurotic shoulds neurotic demands placed on
  oneself
• Feminine psychology
• Countered Freuds concept of penis envy with her
  own concept of womb envy
• Pointed out the more sexist aspects of Freuds
  theorizing and called for a greater emphasis on
  social and cultural factors

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Erich Fromm (1900-1980)

• Was deeply troubled by the destructiveness of the
  first Word War he witnessed as a Jew living in an
  anti-Semitic environment
• Sought answers in the psychoanalytic writings of
  Freud and the economic theory of Marx
• Received his PhD in 1922 and studied
  psychoanalysis in Berlin
• Emigrated to the US when the Nazis gained power
  in Germany
• Published his influential book Escape from
  Freedom in 1941
• Taught at several universities in the US

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Key concepts introduced by Fromm

• The rise of modern democracies brought people
  freedom
• But this freedom, and the responsibility it
  carried with it, was intimidating and
  overwhelming
• People therefore looked for ways to escape from
  freedom and responsibility
• through authoritarianism
• through destructiveness
• through automaton conformity
• Positive freedom requires spontaneity and results
  in individuation

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Views of religion held by psychoanalytic theorists

• Sigmund Freud was an atheist who thought that
  religion was the opiate of the masses, and
  viewed it as a type of collective wish
  fulfillment.
• The son of a minister, Carl Jung struggled with
  religious issues throughout his life but felt
  that the universality of the God archetype
  attested to its importance.
• Erich Fromm drew a strong distinction between
  authoritarian religions and humanistic religions,
  and argued that the first type require people to
  deny their own identity whereas the second type
  provide opportunities for personal growth.

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Jungs eight psychological types
Attitude
Function Extraversion Introversion
Thinking Focus on learning about the external world. Practical, objective thinker. Interested in facts. Interested in understanding own ideas. Reflective. Interested in philosophical issues and the meaning of ones own life.
Feeling Likely to be moody, capricious. Easily conforms to a group. Likes to follow fads and fashions. Can be highly emotional at times. Has deep emotional experiences, but keeps them to himself or herself. Often a nonconformist.
Sensing Interested in experiencing the external world. Often sensual, and can become obsessed with pleasure seeking. May live for the moment. More interested in own thoughts and inner sensations than in external objects. May express self through art or music in idiosyncratic ways.
Intuiting Constantly seeking new challenges and interests in the external world. Gets bored easily. Enjoys novel situations. Likes to explore new and different ideas but has difficulty developing insights or communicating them to other people.
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Optimal career settings for personality types
Type Career Setting
Extraverts Work requiring group interactions, meeting with people
Introverts Quiet, solitary desk work with few interruptions
Thinking Work involving a lot of problem solving, especially requiring logic
Feeling Service jobs, especially those benefiting underprivileged groups
Sensing Work requiring attention to details, with immediate goals and relevance
Intuiting Non-repetitive tasks with new challenges, requiring insight
Judging Highly organized and structured work, requiring fact-based decisions
Perceiving Work requiring the ability to adapt to new circumstances
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Strengths and criticisms of neo-Freudian theories

• Strengths
• Elaboration of important concepts that Freud
  ignored or de-emphasized
• Introduction of many new and useful concepts
• Set the stage for the humanistic approach
• Made the psychoanalytic approach more widely
  acceptable
• Criticisms
• Sometimes lacking in research support
• Patient samples make it difficult to generalize
  to all people
• None dealt with so many topics in so much depth
  as Freud
• As with Freud, the tone and emphases of the
  neo-Freudians theories reveal their personal
  biases

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