Adlerian Theory

1. Adlerian Theory Alfred Adler

3. Theory of personality Striving for superiority (Feelings of inferiority) Born helpless and dependent Impetus of personality development – The Style of Life Social Interest Individual’s attitude toward and awareness of being a part of the human community Healthy personality related to the degree to which we successfully share with others and are concerned with their welfare Happiness and success are largely related to social connectedness Three universal life tasks Building friendships Establishing intimacy Contributing to society Birth Order Ordinal position predicts some degree of style of life

4. The creative self The concepts involved in the development of the style of life manifest through the CREATIVE SELF Objective facts translated into personally meaningful events The creative self drives the individual to negotiate the BASIC LIFE TASKS Work Opposite sex relationships Being a constructive part of society

5. Inferiority and compensation As children search for significance, they draw conclusions about the self> 4 goals of the “discouraged child” ATTENTION GETTING POWER SEEKING REVENGE TAKING DECLARING DEFICIENCY OR DEFEAT

6. The discouraged child All of the 4 goals identified by Dreikurs can be portrayed by any child, discouraged or otherwise. It is a matter of degree, frequency, and whether or not the child has an underlying sense of hopefulness, acceptance and significance that determines the health of the child.

7. Psychopathology Two problems drive psychopathology Exaggerated inferiority feeling Insufficiently developed feeling of community Manifest through pathological lifestyles Pampered lifestyle Parental overindulgence Compulsive lifestyle Parental domination Other manifestations Abuse Neglect

8. Psychopathology - Basic mistakes OVERGENERALIZATIONS FALSE OR IMPOSSIBLE GOALS OF SECURITY MISPERCEPTIONS OF LIFE AND LIFE’S DEMANDS MIMIMIZATION OF ONE’S WORTH FAULTY VALUES Thought: This is a short list but a valuable one; many psychological problems that people have can be explained by these 5 “basic mistakes”.

9. Goals of Therapy Educate clients about psychological processes Educate clients about “basic mistakes” Release or encourage clients’ social interest Encourage clients to recognize their equality

10. Therapeutic Relationship Prototype of social interest Love, faith and hope for the human condition Therapist’s Role Psychoeducator/role-model Cooperative Egalitarian Authentic, caring, and genuine Client Active learner taking social interest within the session

11. Adlerian Therapeutic Techniques Analysis Interpretation geared toward increasing the perception of purposive nature of life The Life Style Investigation/Feedback Family constellation Earliest Recollections Catching oneself – Contingency control Acting “As If” – Choosing/reevaluation Push button technique – Precursor to cognitive interventions. Change through choosing

12. Content Intrapersonal conflict important, but marked a distinct move toward dealing with interpersonal conflict Moved beyond conflict and into meaning and fulfillment

13. Strengths of Adlerian Therapy Brief or time-limited Applicable to community mental health Addresses social equality issues Useful for counseling culturally diverse populations Focus on social context

14. Limitations Not very systemized Which interventions with which patients with which disorders Is inferiority that important Difficult to test the idea of creative self or the primacy of social interest Behavioral explanation is simpler

15. Other Ego Psychotherapies More than Adler broke from Freud and focused on the ego as opposed to the Id Object relations Interpersonal focus based on mental representations of self and people (objects). The concept of attachment came for OR theory TR is more open and warm than traditional psychoanalysis