Alfred 
              Adler
             (1870-1937)
               Core of Personality
 I. Core Tendency: 
 A.  Will to Power (early, up to around 1908) - emphasized poser 
     and aggression. 
 B.  Striving for Superiority or Perfection (after 1912) - "Probably, 
     the greatest source of unhappiness is the failure to meet 
     expectations". 
 1.  Similar to self-actualization, but for Adler, this process always 
     occurs within a social context. 
 2.  Teleology - views motivation according to some final purpose 
     - looks for ideal or final design. 
 a.  Adler: "We cannot think, feel, or act without the perception of 
     some goal" 
 b.  Aristotle: "Everything has a telos (purpose or goal). Thus, 
     every acorn has the essence of a tree". 
 c.  "Pull Theory" (by some goal) as opposed to "Push Theory" 
     (Causality & Freud). 
                  II. Core Characteristics: 
  •  A. Organ Inferiorities: Physiological defects that can trigger strong feelings 
     of inferiority. 
  •  B. Feelings of Inferiority: Normal and inevitable feelings of weakness, which 
     result from our helplessness during childhood. Are not necessarily 
     pathological or undesirable (may work to overcome). 
  •  C. Inferiority Complex: Exaggerated and pathological feelings of weakness, 
     including belief that one can not overcome one's difficulties through 
     appropriate effort. 
  •  D. Compensation: The process of overcoming real or imagined inferiority 
     through effort and practice, or by developing abilities in different areas. 
  •  1. Positive Compensation: always healthy, and within a larger social context. 
     Helen Keller, Demonesthenes, etc. 
  •  2. Overcompensation: carried to an extreme. Unproductive for the individual 
     or society. 
  •  3. Superiority Complex: A false feeling of power & security that invariably 
     conceals an underlying inferiority complex. From attempt to evade one's 
     problems rather than face them. 
                  II. Core Characteristics: 
 •   E. Fictional Finalism: possibly fictional goals that guide behavior. 
     Examples might include: 
 •   1. Men (women) are superior to women (men). 
 •   2. Aryans belong to a super race. 
 •   3. World is out to get me. 
 •   4. God, Heaven, Hell exist 
 •   5. Doctors care about their patients. 
 •   6. Honesty is the best policy. 
 •   F. Style of Life: The unique ("Individual") mode of adjustment to 
     life that influences almost everything a person does. G. Social 
     Interest: an innate sense of kinship with all of humanity. This is 
     the key difference between the way neurotics & normals strive for 
     superiority. Normals are aware of other and have high social 
     interest. Neurotics are basically selfish with low social interest. 
 •   H. Creative Self: A later concept, refers to the freedom to choose 
     between alternative life-styles and fictional goals. "Heredity and 
     environment provide the bricks; the final form of the building is up 
     to us". 
                             Development
 •   Adler does not have a stage approach. He says that adult 
     lifestyles are influenced by temperament, family atmosphere, 
     and family constellation. 
 •   I. Temperament: Adler maintained that he could observe 
     differences in temperament in children shortly after birth. 
     Although he did not get more specific, recent researchers have 
     identified three temperaments which the believe are the basic 
     building blocks of personality and appear to be stable into 
     adulthood. They are: 
 •   A. Emotionality: excitability & arousal - to both positive 
     (pleasurable) and negative (anxious, fearful) emotions. 
 •   B. Activity: amount of physical energy and vigor. 
 •   C. Sociability: for contact & interaction with others. 
 •   II. Family Atmosphere: The emotional aspects of the family is 
     important in determining whether the child will be active/passive 
     or constructive/destructive.