ALFRED ADLER'S INDIVIDUAL PSYCHOLOGY THEORY

Alfred Adler's Individual Psychology Theory

Alfred Adler's Individual Psychology theory

Introduction

Individual Psychology is the name of the theory which developed by Adler. Adler's conviction, the dominant requirement for individual psychology is to prove that unity in each person: his thoughts, feelings and actions, the so-called conscious and unconscious, in every manifestation of personality. The structure of the self and a single person Adler described as a lifestyle. In this concept more than any other, expressed in his attempt to treat a person as a whole (Scott Osgood Peterson 2009). The individual psychological research aims at deepening the knowledge of human nature, which is to get only from an understanding of the social position of the individual for achieving his specific task. It gives information about the degree of fusion of a human with the demands of life, of others, and of the universe. It also gives insight about the character of momentum of human beings' physical and mental will. It can trace back to its origins in the era of ego-discovery and shows the position of the human childhood, the first resistors of the external world and the shape and strength of will and attempts to overcome them. In these earliest days of childhood, the child creates erring and foolish his goals and role models, and the life plan. The framework gives the surrounding culture to the human beings.

Critique on the theory

Adler's theory argues that to understand an individual means understanding his attitude towards the world. Therefore, according to him, the human creature emerged as social and cultural rather than as a sexual creature. According to Adler, human beings motivate by social interests and our fundamental life problems are social. The theorists said that when a person behaves in a certain way then the question arises why he is behaving so. The past physiological causes can give the answer of this question. There is a problem in his statement because it is not enough to look physiological causes, but also must try to understand the psychological motivations that underlie the behavioral events. Adler emphasized the determination of human behavior by recognizing that the motivating force of all human action is the goal or future direction of that action. According to him, the struggle for superiority is innate and is part of the struggle for survival that humans share with other species in the evolutionary process (Lewin Adams Zener 2005). According to Adler, life motivates by the need to reduce tension and restore balance, as Freud tended to think; rather, life fuels by the desire to move from the bottom up, from less to more, from bottom to top. Adler did not run any stage of development as Freud did, but stressed the importance of family atmosphere and family constellation. Adler's view about consciousness was in direct contrast with Freud. Adler did not deny the forces of the unconscious, but minimized by reducing the unconscious to a simple momentary ...