Individualpsychologie

Individual psychology

Individual psychology is a term used specifically to refer to the psychological method or science founded by the Viennese psychiatrist Alfred Adler.

In   the concept of "individual psychology" Adler broke away from the psychoanalytic school of Sigmund Freud.


Adler shifted the grounds of psychological determinance from sex and libido, the Freudian standpoint, to environmental factors. He gave special prominence to societal factors. According to him a person has to combat or confront, battle, fight, struggle three forces: societal, love-related, and vocational (berufliche)forces.

These confrontations determine the final nature of a personality. Adler based his theories on the pre-adulthood development of a person. He laid stress on such areas as hated children, physical deformities at birth, birth order, etc.

The theory of compensation, defeat and over-compensation
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