Social Psychological Theories: The Zeitgeist Strikes Again We noted that Freud was influenced by the mechanistic and

positivistic outlook of nineteenth-century science. Toward the end of that century, new disciplines were suggesting other ways to view human nature, ways that exceeded the boundaries of biology and physics. Research in anthropology, sociology, and social psychology supported the proposition that people are products of social forces and institutions and therefore should be studied in social rather than strictly biological terms. As anthropologists publicized their studies of various cultures, it became clear that some of the neurotic symptoms and taboos Freud described were not universal, as he proposed. For example, not all cultures had prohibitions against incest. Further, sociologists and social psychologists had learned that much human behavior stems from social conditioning rather than from actions taken to satisfy biological needs. Thus, the Zeitgeist was calling for a revised conception of human nature, but Freud, to the dismay of some of his followers, clung to biological determinants of personality. Younger analysts, less constrained by tradition, drifted away from orthodox psychoanalysis to reshape Freudian theory in line with the then-current social science thought. Their focus, that personality is more a product of environment than of biological instincts was compatible with American culture and thought and offered a more optimistic scenario than Freuds deterministic position. We will discuss Alfred Adler and Karen Horney, two dissenters who believed that human behavior is determined not by biological forces but by the interpersonal relationships to which the person is exposed, particularly in childhood. Alfred Adler (18701937) Because he broke with Freud in 1911, Adler is usually considered the first proponent of the social psychological approach to psychoanalysis. He developed a theory in which social interest plays a major role, and he is the only psychologist to have a string quartet named for him. Adlers Life Adler was born to wealthy parents in a suburb of Vienna, Austria. His childhood was marked by illness, jealousy of an older brother, and rejection by his mother. He thought of himself as puny and unattractive. Adler felt closer to his father than to his mother. He later rejected the Freudian definition of the Oedipus complex perhaps because, as was true for Jung, it did not reflect his own childhood experiences. The young Adler worked intently to become popular with his peers and eventually achieved the self-esteem and acceptance he had not found within his family. Initially Adler was a poor student, so inept that a teacher told his father that the only job the boy was fit for was shoemakers apprentice. Through persistence and dedication Adler rose from the bottom to the top of his class. He strove academically and socially to overcome his handicaps and inferiorities, thus becoming an early example of his later theory of the necessity of compensating for ones weaknesses. Inferiority feelings, at the core of his system, are a direct reflection of his childhood, a debt Adler acknowledged. Those who are familiar with my life work, he wrote, will clearly see the accord existing

between the facts of my childhood and the views I expressed (quoted in Bottome, 1939, p. 9). Adler recalled that at age four, recovering from a near-fatal bout of pneumonia, he resolved to become a physician. He pursued this goal, and in 1895 he received his medical degree from the University of Vienna. He specialized in ophthalmology and practiced general medicine. When he became interested in psychiatry in 1902, he joined Sigmund Freuds weekly discussion group on psychoanalysis, one of four charter members. Although he worked closely with Freud, their relationship was not personal. (Freud once said Adler bored him.) Over the next several years Adler developed a personality theory that differed in several ways from Freuds, especially with regard to Freuds emphasis on sexual factors. In 1910, Freud named Adler president of the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society in an attempt to reconcile their growing rift, but by 1911 the inevitable split was complete. Their parting was bitter. Adler described Freud as a swindler and psychoanalysis as filth (Roazen, 1975, p. 210). Freud referred to Adler as abnormal and driven mad by ambition, as well as paranoid, jealous, sadistic, and short (Gay, 1988, p. 223). During World War I (19141918), Adler served as a physician in the Austrian army. He later organized child guidance clinics for the Vienna school system. During the 1920shis social psychological system, which he called individual psychology, attracted many followers. He frequently visited the United States to lecture and was appointed professor of medical psychology at New Yorks Long Island College of Medicine. His talks and his writings in America were immensely popular. A biographer noted that Adlers personal qualities, his geniality, optimism, and warmth coupled with an intensely ambitious drive, made it easy for people to accord him celebrity status and accept him as an expert on human nature (Hoffman, 1994, p. 160). Adler died in Aberdeen, Scotland, while on a strenuous speaking tour. Freud, replying to a letter from a friend expressing sadness at Adlers death, revealed his lingering bitterness over Adlers defection from his own point of view when he wrote: I dont understand your sympathy for Adler. For a Jewish boy out of a Viennese suburb a death in Aberdeen is an unheard-of career in itself and a proof of how far he had got on. The world really rewarded him richly for his service in having contradicted psychoanalysis. (Quoted in Scarf, 1971, p. 47) Individual Psychology Adler believed that human behavior is determined largely by social forces, not biological instincts. He proposed the concept of social interest, defined as an innate potential to cooperate with others to achieve personal and societal goals. Our social interest develops in infancy through learning experiences. In contrast to Freud, Adler minimized the influence of sex in the shaping of ones personality. Also, Adler focused on conscious rather than unconscious determinants of behavior. Whereas Freud associated present behavior with past experiences, Adler believed we are more strongly affected by our plans for the future. Striving for goals or anticipating coming events can influence present behavior. For example, a person who fears eternal damnation after death is likely to behave differently from a person with a different expectation. Whereas Freud divided personality into separate parts (i.e., id, ego, and superego), Adler emphasized the unity and consistency of personality. He posited an innate, dynamic force that channels the personalitys resources toward an overriding goal. This goal, for all of us,

is superiority (in the sense of perfection), and it represents the complete development and fulfillment of the self. Another crucial difference between Adler and Freud was their views on women. Adler argued that there was no biological reason, such as Freuds concept of penis envy, for any alleged sense of inferiority women might feel. Adler charged that this was a myth invented by men to bolster their own alleged sense of superiority. Any inferiority women might feel resulted from social forces such as sex-role stereotypes. Adler believed in equality for the sexes and supported the womens emancipation movements of the day. Inferiority Feelings Adler proposed a generalized feeling of inferiority as a motivating force in behavior, as it was in his own life. Initially Adler related this feeling of inferiority to physical defects. The child with a hereditary organic weakness will attempt to compensate, to overemphasize the deficient function. A child who stutters may, through conscientious speech therapy, become a great orator; a child with weak limbs may, through intensive exercise, excel as an athlete or dancer. Adler later broadened this concept to include any physical, mental, or social handicap, real or imagined. In infancy, the childs helplessness and dependence on other people awaken this sense of inferiority. Thus, it is a feeling experienced by everyone. Consciously aware of the need to overcome it, the child at the same time is driven by the innate striving for the betterment of the self. This pushing and pulling process continues throughout life, propelling us toward greater accomplishments. Inferiority feelings operate to the advantage of the individual and the society because they lead to continuous improvement. If in childhood these feelings are met with pampering or with rejection, however, the result can be abnormal compensatory behaviors. Failure to compensate adequately for inferiority feelings can lead to the development of an inferiority complex, which renders the person incapable of coping with lifes problems. Style of Life According to Adler, the drive for superiority or perfection is universal, but each of us behaves in a different way to try to reach that goal. We demonstrate our striving in a unique or characteristic mode of responding by developing a style of life. This style of life involves the behaviors by which we compensate for real or imagined inferiority. In the example of the physically weak child, the style of life may include exercise or sports that will increase stamina and strength. The style of life is fixed at the age of four or five and becomes difficult to change thereafter. It provides the framework within which all later experiences are dealt with. Again we see that Adler recognized the importance of the early years of life, but he differed from Freud in believing that we can consciously create a lifestyle for ourselves. The Creative Power of the Self Adlers concept of the creative power of the self suggests that we have the capacity to determine our own personality in accordance with our unique style of life. This active, creative human power may be likened to the theological notion of the soul. Certain abilities and experiences come to us through heredity and environment, but the way we actively use and interpret these experiences provides the basis for our personality, our attitude toward life. Adler meant that each of us is consciously involved in shaping our personality and

destiny. We can determine our fate rather than have it determined by past experience and by unconscious forces. Birth Order In examining his patients childhood years, Adler became interested in the relationship between personality and birth order. He found that the oldest, middle, and youngest children, because of their positions in the family, have varying social experiences that result in different attitudes toward life and different ways of coping. The oldest child receives a great deal of attention until dethroned by the birth of the second child. The first-born may then become insecure and hostile, authoritarian and conservative, manifesting a strong interest in maintaining order. Adler suggested that criminals, neurotics, and perverts are often first-born children. He also suggested that Freud was a typical eldest son. Adler found the second child to be ambitious, rebellious, and jealous, constantly striving to surpass the first-born. Adler himself was a second-born and had a lifelong competitive relationship with his older brother, whose name, coincidentally, was Sigmund. Even when Adler had achieved an international reputation for his work, he continued to feel overshadowed by his brother, then a wealthy businessman. Adler referred to Sigmund as a good, industrious fellow [who] was always ahead of meand is still ahead of me (quoted in Hoffman, 1994, p. 11). Nevertheless, Adler believed that the second-born child is better adjusted than the first-born or the youngest child. He said that the youngest child in the family was likely to be spoiled and predisposed toward behavioral problems in childhood and adulthood. In addition, an only child may experience difficulties in adjusting to the world outside the family, where he or she is not the center of attention. Karen Horney (18851952) An early feminist, Karen Horney was trained as a Freudian psychoanalyst in Berlin. She described her work as an extension of Freuds system rather than an effort to supplant it. Horneys Life Horney was born in Hamburg, Germany. Her father was a devout, morose ships captain many years older than her mother, who was a liberal and vivacious woman. Her mother made it clear to Karen that she wished her husband dead; she had married him out of fear of remaining a spinster. Her mother rejected Karen in favor of the first-born brother, whom Karen envied simply for being a boy, and her father belittled her appearance and intelligence. As a result, she felt inferior, worthless, and hostile (Sayers, 1991). Why is everything beautiful on earth given to me, she wrote in her diary at age 16, only not the highest thing, not love! I have a heart so needing love (Horney, 1980, p. 30). This lack of parental love fostered what Horney later called basic anxiety and provides another instance of the impact of personal experience on a theorists views. A biographer wrote, In all her psychoanalytic writings, Karen Horney was struggling to make sense of herself and to obtain relief from her own difficulties (Paris, 1994, p. xxii). As an adolescent Horney developed emotional crushes as part of her search for the love and acceptance she lacked at home. She began a newsletter she called a virginal organ for super-virgins and took to walking streets known to be frequented by prostitutes. In her diary she wrote, In my imagination there is no spot on me that has not been kissed by a

burning mouth. In my imagination there is no depravity I have not tasted, to the dregs (Horney, 1980, p. 64). Ignoring the opposition from her father, Horney entered medical school at the University of Berlin and in 1913 received her degree. She married, gave birth to three daughters (two of whom would later be analyzed by Melanie Klein to help them deal with their conflicts with their mother), and became increasingly depressed. She described a long period of unhappiness and oppression as well as marital difficulties. She complained of crying spells, stomach pains, chronic fatigue, compulsive behaviors, an inability to work, and thoughts of suicide. After several affairs, she divorced her husband to continue her restless quest for acceptance the rest of her life. Her most enduring affair was with the psychoanalyst Erich Fromm. When the relationship ended, she was devastated. She chose to undergo psychoanalysis to deal with her depression and sexual problems. Her Freudian analyst told her that her search for love and her attraction to forceful men reflected childhood Oedipal longings for her powerful father (Sayers, 1991). When Horney realized that Freudian analysis was not helping her, she turned to selfanalysis, a practice she continued throughout her life. Sensitive to Adlers observation that physical unattractiveness caused inferiority feelings, she concluded that by studying medicine and engaging in promiscuous sexual behavior, she was acting more like a man than like a woman. This helped her feel superior, but she never stopped her search for love. As she aged, however, she singled out younger and younger men, many of whom were analysts whose training she was supervising. Her attitude toward them became casual and detached. Telling a friend about one of these young men, she said that she did not know whether to marry him or to get a cocker spaniel. She chose the dog (Paris, 1994). From 1914 to 1918, Horney took orthodox psychoanalytic training at the Berlin Psychoanalytic Institute. Later she became a faculty member there and began a private practice. She wrote journal articles about problems of the female personality, outlining her disagreement with certain Freudian concepts. In 1932 she went to the United States as associate director of the Chicago Institute for Psychoanalysis. She also taught at the New York Psychoanalytic Institute and continued to see patients. Her growing disaffection with Freudian theory soon led her to break with this group. She founded the American Institute of Psychoanalysis and remained its head until her death. Disagreements with Freud Horney disputed Freuds view that personality depends on unchanging biological forces. She denied the preeminence of sexual factors, challenged the validity of the oedipal theory, and discarded the concepts of libido and the three-part structure of personality. However, she did accept unconscious motivation and the existence of emotional, non-rational motives. Counter to Freuds belief that women are motivated by penis envy, Horney argued that men are motivated by womb envy; that is, jealousy of women for their ability to give birth. She believed that men manifest womb envy and its accompanying resentment unconsciously, through behaviors designed to harass and belittle women. By denying women equal rights, limiting their opportunities, and downgrading their efforts to achieve, men attempt to retain an alleged natural superiority. To Horney, the fundamental reason for such masculine behavior is a sense of inferiority resulting from womb envy.Horney and Freud also differed in their views of human nature. Horney wrote: Freuds pessimism as regards neuroses and their treatment arose from the depths of his disbelief in human goodness and human growth. Man, he postulated, is doomed to suffer or

to destroy. My own belief is that man has the capacity as well as the desire to develop his potentialities and become a decent human being. I believe that man can change and go on changing as long as he lives. (Horney, 1945, p. 19) Basic Anxiety Basic anxiety is the fundamental concept in Horneys system. She defined it as the feeling a child has of being isolated and helpless in a potentially hostile world (Horney, 1945, p. 41). This definition characterized her own childhood feelings. Basic anxiety results from parental actions such as dominance, lack of protection and love, and erratic behavior. Anything that disrupts a secure relationship between child and parents can produce basic anxiety. Thus, the condition is not innate but results from social forces and interactions in the childs environment. Instead of accepting Freudian instincts as motivating forces, Horney proposed that the helpless infant was driven by the need to seek security, safety, and freedom from fear in a threatening world. Horney shared with Freud a belief that personality develops in the early childhood years, but she insisted that personality continues to change throughout life. Whereas Freud detailed psychosexual stages of development, Horney focused on how the growing child is treated by parents and caregivers. She denied universal developmental phases, such as an oral or anal stage. She suggested that if a child developed tendencies toward an oral or anal personality, these tendencies were a result of parental behaviors. Nothing in a childs development was universal; everything depended on social, cultural, and environmental factors. Neurotic Needs To Horney, then, basic anxiety arises from the parent-child relationship. When this socially produced anxiety becomes evident, the child develops behavioral strategies in response to parental behavior as a way of coping with the accompanying feelings of helplessness and insecurity. If any one of the childs behavioral strategies becomes a fixed part of the personality, it is called a neurotic need, which is a way of defending against the anxiety. Initially Horney listed 10 neurotic needs, including affection, achievement, and selfsufficiency. In later writings she grouped the neurotic needs into three trends (Horney, 1945): The compliant personalityone who needs to move toward other people, expressing needs for approval, affection, and a dominant partner The detached personalityone who needs to move away from people, expressing needs for independence, perfection, and withdrawal The aggressive personalityone who needs to move against people, expressing needs for power, exploitation, prestige, admiration, and achievement Movement toward people implies accepting ones feelings of helplessness and acting to win the affection of others, the only way the person can feel secure with other people. Movement away from people involves withdrawing, behaving so as to appear self sufficient and avoid dependency. Movement against people involves hostility, rebellion, and aggression. None of the neurotic needs or trends is a realistic way of dealing with anxiety. Because they are incompatible, they can lead to conflicts. Once we establish a behavioral strategy for coping with basic anxiety, this pattern ceases to be flexible enough to permit alternative behaviors. When a fixed behavior proves inappropriate for a particular situation, we are unable to change in response to the demands of the situation. These entrenched behaviors intensify

our difficulties because they affect the total personality, our relations with other people, with ourselves, and with life as a whole. The Idealized Self-Image The idealized self-image provides the person with a false picture of the personality or self. It is an imperfect, misleading mask that prevents neurotic persons from understanding and accepting their true selves. In donning the mask, they deny the existence of their inner conflicts. They believe that the idealized self-image is genuine, and that belief, in turn, enables them to think they are superior to the sort of person they really are. Horney did not suggest that such neurotic conflicts were innate or inevitable. Although they arose from undesirable situations in childhood, they could be prevented if warmth, understanding, security, and love characterized the childs home life.