Adlerian Psychotherapy An Advanced Approach to Individual

Psychology - 1st Edition

Visit the link below to download the full version of this book:

https://medipdf.com/product/adlerian-psychotherapy-an-advanced-approach-to-indiv
idual-psychology-1st-edition/

Click Download Now

Advancing Theory in Therapy
Series Editor: Keith Tudor

Most books covering individual therapeutic approaches are aimed at the

trainee/student market. This series, however, is concerned with advanced and
advancing theory, offering the reader comparative and comparable coverage
of a number of therapeutic approaches.
Aimed at professionals and postgraduates, Advancing Theory in Therapy
will cover an impressive range of theories. With full reference to case studies
throughout, each title will

• present cutting-edge research findings

• locate each theory and its application within its cultural context
• develop a critical view of theory and practice

Titles in the series

Body Psychotherapy
Edited by Tree Staunton

Transactional Analysis: A Relational Perspective

Helena Hargaden and Charlotte Sills

Adlerian Psychotherapy: An Advanced Approach to Individual

Psychology
Ursula E. Oberst and Alan E. Stewart

Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy: Theoretical Developments

Edited by Windy Dryden
Adlerian Psychotherapy

An Advanced Approach to
Individual Psychology

Ursula E. Oberst and

Alan E. Stewart
First published 2003 by Brunner-Routledge

This edition published in 2012 by Routledge

27 Church Road, Hove, East Sussex BN3 2FA
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017, USA
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business

© 2003 Ursula E. Oberst and Alan E. Stewart

Typeset in Times by RefineCatch Limited, Bungay, Suffolk

Cover design by Sandra Heath

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or

reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic,
mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter
invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any
information storage or retrieval system, without permission in
writing from the publishers.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

Oberst, Ursula E., 1957–
Adlerian psychotherapy : an advanced approach to individual
psychology / Ursula E. Oberst and Alan E. Stewart.
p. cm. – (Advancing theory in therapy)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 1–58391–121–9 (hbk) – ISBN 1–58391–122–7 (pbk)
1. Adlerian psychology. 2. Psychotherapy. I. Stewart, Alan E.,
1961– II. Title. III. Series.
BF175.5.A33 O24 2002
150.19′53 – dc21 2002071243

ISBN - 978 1 5839 1122 8

Contents

Preface vi

1 Historical context, roots, and early developments 1

2 Classical Adlerian Psychology 12

3 Adlerian counselling and psychotherapy today 49

4 Adlerian family counselling and family psychotherapy 85

5 Child guidance and parenting: The psychoeducational

approach of Rudolf Dreikurs 102

6 Adlerian therapy and its relationship to other

psychotherapeutic approaches 120

7 Adlerian Psychology: Further developments and

relevance in a postmodern world 152

Appendix 1 Measures for research and practice in

Individual Psychology 170
Appendix 2 A case study 185
Appendix 3 Glossary of selected Adlerian terms 197
References 204
Index 217
Preface

The psychology of Alfred Adler is traditionally considered to be one of the

three so-called in-depth or psychoanalytic therapies, the other two being the
theories of Sigmund Freud and Carl Gustav Jung. This is partly due to
Adler’s initial association with Sigmund Freud’s Psychoanalysis and to the
use of several historical expressions by contemporary Adlerian authors, such
as ‘analysis’ or ‘organ inferiority’ when referring to aspects of Adlerian ther-
apy. But quite on the contrary, Adlerian Psychology (Individual Psychology),
in our view, has many more similarities with more recent therapeutic
approaches, such as humanistic and cognitive therapies. There are also some
striking resemblances to current constructivist theories.
On the other hand, Adlerian Psychology, though it has always had its place
among other psychological and psychotherapeutic approaches, specially in
Anglo-Saxon and German-speaking countries, has lived in the shadows in
others, for example the Spanish-speaking countries. We can only speculate
about the reasons for this phenomenon. It is certainly true that the rise of
Nazism in the early 1930s did great harm to the Adlerian movement, but also
to others. Furthermore, many of the formerly revolutionary Adlerian con-
cepts have rapidly merged with other psychological theories, possibly due to
the fact that Adler was a prescient observer of behaviour and relied on com-
mon sense language when explaining his ideas. Though he coined some
expressions that are typical for Individual Psychology (such as Life Style,
inferiority complex, etc.), they were drawn from plain German language and
so, as Adlerian Psychology had no ‘copyright’ for them, they could easily be
transferred into other theories. The founder of Psychoanalysis, Sigmund
Freud, used to coin more specific expressions drawn from Greek and Latin
(‘libido’, ‘the ego’), which are still identified with Psychoanalysis and only
with Psychoanalysis. Adler used to talk in common sense terms because it
was important to him that his ideas were not restricted to their use in aca-
demic psychology but that they reached the general public. Apparently, it was
also his wish that his theories should survive, even without associating them
with his name, and the historian Ellenberger commented: ‘It would not be easy
to find another author from which so much has been borrowed from all sides
 Preface vii

without acknowledgment than Adler’ (cited in Mosak 1989). One possible

reason for the lesser influence of Adlerian Psychology with respect to the
other two historical approaches could be that Adlerian psychologists may
have preferred clinical practice to academia and research. Another reason
may be that Adlerian scholarship traditionally has emphasised case study
analyses and other qualitative approaches rather than quantitative and
statistical methods.
In view of the recent developments in psychotherapy and of the increasing
movement towards psychotherapy integration we think it is necessary, not
only to present an overview of classical Adlerian theory and practice, but also
to revise some antiquated concepts and bring them up to date. We also think
it is both convenient and timely to compare the Adlerian ideas with other
contemporary therapeutic approaches and to revise them in the light of
therapy integration.
Thus this book aims at presenting a comprehensive exposition of Adlerian
Psychology as well as the contributions of other historical and contemporary
Adlerian authors, and to specify their applications in counselling and therapy.
It will also reflect our own development as Adlerian psychotherapists and
investigators, with respect to psychological theory and counselling practice,
which is influenced by a strong integrationist and constructivist standpoint.
The first part of the book discusses traditional Adlerian theory. Chapter 1
gives an overview of the origins of Adlerian theory, its philosophical roots
and the socio-political circumstances that influenced it. We present Adler’s
earlier ideas about psychotherapy and show the development of his own
standpoint to be more and more different from that of Freud. Chapter 2 gives
a critical review of classical Adlerian theory, as far as it is still in use in
contemporary Adlerian Psychology and Adlerian counselling. We revise
Adler’s theory of personality and his view of psychological problems and
mental disorder. Chapters 3, 4, and 5 are dedicated to different possibilities of
Adlerian intervention. Chapter 3 elaborates the existing Adlerian assessment
and therapy strategies and techniques (Life Style analysis, dream work,
encouragement, etc.). Chapter 4 explores the different modalities of family
and marital counselling and therapy, and Chapter 5 presents the psychoedu-
cational approach of Rudolf Dreikurs and others, i.e. child guidance, parent-
ing and classroom intervention. We complete these chapters with our own
view and new technical developments, and also present practical examples of
clinical casework.
The last part of the book goes beyond Adlerian theory and deals with the
most recent developments in psychology and psychotherapy. Considering
the general integrationist tendencies in counselling and psychotherapy, we
discuss Individual Psychology in the context of other psychotherapeutic
approaches and try to elaborate the direction Adlerian theories could (or
should) take in the future (Chapter 6). In Chapter 7 we analyse the relevance
of the Adlerian approach with respect to contemporary issues in
viii Adlerian psychotherapy

psychotherapy and social psychology, such as constructivism, social

constructionism, and postmodernity. We elaborate the ethical standpoint
of Individual Psychology and argue that Adler’s ideas can facilitate answers
to present and future problems in psychotherapy and make important
contributions to the pressing questions of a postmodern society.
We would like to mention that, although we consulted and present Adler’s
original works in German and English, we decided to quote consistently from
a selected compilation of Adler’s writings made by Ansbacher and
Ansbacher (1956), in order to avoid translations and to make it easier for
the interested reader to consult the broader context of our quotations.
Ansbacher and Ansbacher’s presentation is still in use and has been re-edited
many times, which is not the case with all of Adler’s original publications.
Chapter 1

Historical context, roots, and

early developments

Alfred Adler was born on 7 February 1870, in Vienna, as the second of six
children of a Jewish corn trader. Adler later developed his personality theory,
which holds that second children often develop a tendency toward striving for
equality and even superiority with respect to the first-born. Interestingly,
the name of the family’s first-born was Sigmund, like Sigmund Freud, the
founder of psychoanalysis and Adler’s later friend, tutor, and adversary.
Alfred was not a healthy child. As his biographers (Rattner 1972, Sperber
1983, Hoffman 1994) report, he suffered from illnesses and severe physical
problems. In one of his early recollections, Adler remembers himself as a
little boy wrapped in bandages because of rickets, being unable to participate
in the games and play of his siblings and friends. Death was also present in
the family; his younger brother died of diphtheria while sleeping, as usual, in
the same bed as 4-year-old Alfred. These experiences apparently moved
Adler towards the decision to study medicine in order to fight misery and
diseases, but most probably also influenced him in the development of some
concepts of his theory, such as organ inferiority and the human striving to
overcome misfortunes.
Thus Adler became a physician. First, he inclined to ophthalmology, and
later to neurology. While attending his university lectures, Adler became
interested in philosophy and politics, especially Marxism and socialism.
These ideas had a special attractiveness to the socially-minded young Adler.
He published a booklet titled Health book for the tailoring trade where he not
only criticises the squalid conditions the workmen and their families lived in,
but also suggests corrective measures, such as improving housing, fixing the
maximum working hours, etc. Manès Sperber (1983), one of his later dis-
ciples and biographers, characterises Adler’s efforts as genuinely socialist and
Marxist in their origins. Unlike Freud and other psychologists who described
the individual without taking much account of his or her environment and
relationships, Adler always considered people in a close relationship with
their social context; people are socially embedded. The idea of the individual
as the product of society stems from Karl Marx. But Adler, in considering the
interaction of individual and society, goes further than Marxism by moving
2 Adlerian psychotherapy

towards a humanistic point of view. We can say that Adler, though clearly
influenced by early socialism, was not a socialist, but much more of a human-
ist. He was not so much interested in the economic and political aspects of
society and citizens, but in the relationship possibilities embodied in the
community of people. He emphasised the necessity of improving the living
conditions for the poor, but he always insisted on the creative power of the
individuals themselves to change their lives.
Adler’s future wife though, Raissa Epstein, was an active Russian socialist
and an early feminist, apparently much more politically radical than her
husband, and it is reported by Adler’s biographers that the couple’s relation-
ship waxed and waned. Adler and Raissa had four children; Kurt and
Alexandra were the two to follow their father’s footsteps in psychotherapy.
The eldest daughter, Valentine, was politically and socially active like her
mother. Valentine and her husband perished in a Russian gulag; Adler
learned about this shortly before his death and this knowledge may have
contributed to his demise (Hoffman 1994). Cornelia, a middle child, worked
as an artist.
The concerns and challenges Adler faced in his personal and professional
lives, along with the socio-political climate of his times, affected the develop-
ment and expression of his theories. In this first chapter, we will analyse the
origins of Adler’s theory and the influences it received from other disciplines
and circumstances.

Medicine and psychoanalysis

Despite the advances in medicine at that time, health conditions were still
really difficult at the turn of the twentieth century. Although the existence of
bacteria had just been discovered by Pasteur in 1861, germs were not yet
recognised as causes of infectious diseases during Adler’s childhood. It was
not until 1928 that penicillin was discovered. The awareness of the influences
of the living and working conditions on health also was still in its infancy,
and the manifestations of psychiatric phenomena such as hysteria and
psychoses were still a complete mystery to the medicine of Adler’s time.
Hypnosis, called ‘Mesmerism’ after its discoverer, Mesmer, had been used to
produce spectacular and pseudo-therapeutic effects by Charcot (from 1872
on), but fell rather completely out of use after a few years and with the
development of Freud’s theories in the early 1900s.
The theories of Sigmund Freud marked a breakthrough in the understand-
ing of many psychological phenomena. The founding father of Psycho-
analysis was the first to postulate the existence of an unconscious mind. This
gave an alternative interpretative possibility for a variety of psychopatho-
logical manifestations, which the existing medical approach had not been able
to explain up to then. Though Freud continued to use a medical model, i.e. he
considered neuroses and psychoses to be diseases, he argued that they are
 Historical context 3

caused by an unconscious process that is psychological, and not biological, in

its essence. Thus he opened the door to an explanation that sees psycho-
pathology as a way of alternative psychological functioning.
When Sigmund Freud heard about the young physician Alfred Adler he
invited him to attend the (later famous) Wednesday discussion meetings in his
home at the Bergasse in Vienna (Hoffman 1994). By then, Adler had already
a certain reputation as a hands-on doctor with good bedside manner, and he
had even published his Health book for the tailoring trade. Adler had also
publicly stood up for the controversial and ridiculed Freudian ideas in the
Vienna Medical Society.
Adler is usually considered to be a follower and later dissident of Freudian
psychoanalysis by some historians, but other scholars emphasise, quite
accurately, that Adler never really was Freud’s disciple (Hoffman 1994).
Doubtless, Adler was initially interested in Freud’s ideas and in his early
conferences and publications, and Freud’s influences in Adler’s first publica-
tions are noteworthy. But in spite of the mutual respect the two men had for
each other, a certain rivalry between Freud and Adler existed from the incep-
tion of their relationship. It seems that Adler never was wholly convinced of
all of Freud’s ideas, especially the concept of sexuality being the primary
motivator of most behaviour. Nonetheless, Adler stayed in the group for
nearly a decade and was even president of the Vienna Psychoanalytic Associ-
ation for some time until the final breaking-off in 1911 when he published an
article criticising Freud’s theory of human sexuality and subsequently
founded the Society for Free Psychoanalytic Study.
Psychology at the beginning of the twentieth century was a very young
academic discipline. It was founded in 1879, when Wilhelm Wundt opened
the first experimental psychology laboratory in Leipzig, Germany, where he
could investigate human memory and reaction time processes. Wundt and his
successors created the ‘Psychology of the elements of consciousness’ and
used systematic self-observation as their empirical method. As a positivistic
countermovement, Behaviourism (Pavlov from 1904 on and Watson from
1913 on) refused self-observation as scientific methodology and argued that
only objectively observable and quantifiable events (stimulus and reactions)
could be the subject of scientific investigation. This is also contrary to
Freud’s Psychoanalysis. Initially a method of treating neuroses, Psycho-
analysis expanded into a general theory of human psychological functioning;
it emphasised unconscious processes, which cannot be observed and meas-
ured. Psychoanalysis and other psychodynamic theories have developed in a
way that is quite different from, and often contradictory to experimental
psychology.
In the years before 1911, Adler tried to think in medical and also in
Freudian terms. Adler’s Study on organ inferiority, for example, published in
1907, is probably the one where most Freudian influences can be found. It can
be considered an attempt to think, at least formally, in psychoanalytical terms
4 Adlerian psychotherapy

and it is one of Adler’s first attempts to explain the psychological aetiology of

medical diseases (in this case urological disorders), hitherto thought to have
exclusively organic causes. But traditionally psychoanalytic terms such as
‘psychic instances’ (Ego, Id, Superego) or ‘Oedipal complex’ were absent
from this study. We can summarise the Study on organ inferiority in the fol-
lowing way. Taking the functional disorders of the kidney and the bladder
(especially enuresis) as an example and then generalising to the rest of the
organs and body members, Adler hypothesised the existence of a hereditary
morphological or functional ‘organ inferiority’. This organ inferiority was
expressed as incomplete development or functional insufficiency; the inferior-
ity can affect a specific organ, a member of the body, or a whole group of
organs. ‘Inferiority’ (Minderwertigkeit) was a widely used medical expression
in Adler’s times and did not have the pejorative connotations it has now-
adays, when we would probably talk of ‘handicap’, ‘deficit’ or ‘dysfunction’.
The term ‘organ inferiority’ at that point of Adler’s development still refers
to exclusively somatic aspects, but already traces the way of Adler’s later
concept of ‘inferiority feelings’.
In his Study on organ inferiority Adler also introduces the concept of com-
pensation as a general tendency of life. In his view the insufficient functions
of an organ can be compensated either by using the symmetrical organ (e.g.
the healthy kidney), or by using another part of the affected organ or other
organs that can assume similar functions. But it can also be compensated –
and this is the beginning of genuine Adlerian thinking – by giving special
attention and special training to the affected organ and thus making the most
of it. Finally, compensation for the reduced functions of the ‘inferior’ organ
can be achieved by compensatory changes of the superordinate structures,
the neuronal pathways and other parts of the central nervous system. These
neuronal structures can be reinforced or new ones can be developed. As we
can see, Adler apparently tried to translate his ideas from physiological terms,
via neurology, to psychological terms.
This leads us to the psychological aspects of the disorder, which form the
basis of neuroses. In Adler’s view, the compensatory efforts of the organism
can lead to an overcompensation of the functions. This means that the indi-
vidual is giving a high degree of special attention to the affected organ and its
dysfunctions. On one hand, this kind of attention could be followed by a
major training of the organ and a subsequent ‘superiority’ of this part of
the body. In a later publication, Heilen und Bilden (Healing and education,
1914) Adler uses anecdotal examples of famous artists whose physical and
sensorial deficits led to superior artistic performances because they (over)
compensated for those dysfunctions by constant and massive training (e.g.
the composer Smetana, who had poor hearing). On the other hand, an
incomplete or imperfect compensation was, for Adler, the breeding ground
for neurosis. Adler’s explanations of this aspect at that point in the develop-
ment of his psychology were not very clear. Basically, he argued that the
 Historical context 5

demands of the cultural environment cause a certain tension in the affected

organism. When this tension becomes stronger and stronger, the individual
finally is unable to cope with those demands. Eventually, the inferior organ
gives up and then functions on a more primitive and infantile level,
exclusively to achieve pleasure. Disease is the result of organ inferiority and
external demands.
The Study on organ inferiority itself is of mere historical interest. But the
terms ‘organ inferiority’ and ‘compensation’ or ‘overcompensation’ are still
basic notions in contemporary Adlerian Psychology, although the existence
of an ‘organ inferiority’ (physical, mental, or sensorial deficits, or any other
chronic health problem) is now seen only as one possible additional factor in
the aetiology of psychological problems. It can never be considered to be a
determining cause of neurosis, neither is it indispensable for the development
of a neurotic disturbance.
As we can see, Adler’s reasoning as reflected in the Study on organ
inferiority is couched primarily in anatomical and physiological terms,
with few psychological concepts. His point of view is still characterised by
natural science, and psychological manifestations are ultimately reduced to
physiological processes.
Yet, some of Adler’s observations on organ inferiority and compensation
have been confirmed in modern psychosomatic medicine. In 1936, Selye (see
Kaplan and Saddock 1995) wrote about ‘stress’ as a non-specific reaction of
the organism to any external demand that functions as a stressing stimulus
(general adaptation syndrome) and described how the presence of coping
mechanisms can neutralise this stimulus. Modern psychoneuroimmunology
and psychoneuroendocrinology study the interaction between the
behavioural, neural, endocrine and immunological responses that allow the
organism to cope with physical or psychological stress factors and try to
explain how unsuccessful adaptation can lead to psychosomatic disorders,
such as some coronary diseases or gastrointestinal dysfunctions. The com-
pensating capacity of most of the organs and even of the central nervous
system (by functional adaptation of healthy parts when one functional unit
fails) is now commonly accepted and empirically validated (e.g. Oddy and
Humphrey 1980). The dysfunctional organ is seen as the locus minoris resist-
entiae (place of least resistance; the Latin term was already used by Adler)
where the organic expression of a basically psychological problem can be
located (e.g. stomach ulcer, migraine, cardiovascular disorders, etc.). Sperry’s
(1991, 1999, 2001) biopsychosocial approach in Adlerian therapy is based on
the initial Adlerian assumption that biological functioning is related to psy-
chological and social functioning, as well as the notions of organ inferiority
and organ dialect. Sperry describes how the Adlerian approach can contrib-
ute to a better understanding of the brain–mind interactions and outlines an
integrative therapy that takes into account all levels of biopsychosocial func-
tioning. Dreikurs, in his ‘Holistic medicine’ (1997) also sets the basis for an
6 Adlerian psychotherapy

Adlerian psychosomatic medicine that is specifically designed to be applied

by the general practitioner.
Adler himself was troubled by ‘organ inferiorities’ and apparently had to
exert considerable effort to compensate for them. None of Adler’s bio-
graphers can resist – nor can we – the temptation of pointing out his early
experiences and relating them to the development of Individual Psychology.
As we have mentioned above, Adler’s earliest childhood recollections deal
with illness and death. During his episode of rickets he observed his elder
brother Sigmund moving around effortlessly, while he, Alfred, had to struggle
to move at all. When 5 years old, a bout of pneumonia nearly killed him. The
doctors had already given him up, and Adler remembered hearing the doctor
say that he was probably going to die. Terribly scared of dying, and with some
good fortune in overcoming his infection, young Alfred made a quick
recovery.
It is Freud’s great merit to have ‘discovered’ the unconscious and to explain
certain pathological manifestations in the individual as having psychological
foundations. His classical model of the unconscious as part of the personality
hypothesised that repressed infantile wishes are hidden from the person’s
awareness and pop up from time to time – when defences are low – and
bother the individual with neurotic ailments. Freud’s model has been
described as a physicalist (hydraulic) model: tensions (also called ‘drives’)
accumulate in the organism as a result of intra-psychic energies and external
demands and have to be relieved from time to time and in some way – like
steam under pressure through a valve – either in a mature, culturally accepted
way (known as sublimation) or in an immature, pathological way that results
in conflicts, the need to repress, and ultimately in neurosis.
Adler, in his study on organ inferiority, tries to find a balance between the
scientific medicine of his time and the newly developed Freudian thinking,
using explanatory models like the Freudian ‘tension’, ‘drive’, or ‘Lust’. Fol-
lowing Freud’s thinking, the body–mind dynamic is still seen as an intra-
organismic process. Only a few years later, Adler abandoned this solipsistic
viewpoint – the individual stands alone with his or her intra-psychic conflicts
– in favour of a social model: instead of organs among organs there will be
persons among persons.
In his article ‘Der Agressionstrieb im Leben und in der Neurose’ (‘The
aggression drive in life and in neuroses’, 1908a), Adler postulates – still in the
Freudian tradition – the existence of an innate aggression drive as a unifying
dynamic principle in the human being (probably similar or in opposition to
Freud’s notion of libido). A few years later, he withdraws from this concept
by denying the existence of any ‘drives’ in the human being. In his early
publications, Adler used the expression ‘aggression drive’ in an ambiguous
way. On one hand, he refers to the normal activity impulse of a healthy organ
and, in the psychological field, to the active coping with difficulties. On the
other hand, he regards this aggression as a pathological manifestation in the
 Historical context 7

neuroses: in hysteria, paranoia, hypochondria, neurasthenic and hysterical

pain, self-mutilation and suicide, but also in epilepsy (not yet recognised as a
neurological disorder) and in temper tantrums.
Whereas Freud, from 1920 on, also started to postulate an aggression drive
– later called ‘destructive drive’ or ‘death instinct’ (thanatos), Adler, in his
later publications, took a detached view of the aggression drive and generally
abandoned the Freudian idea of the individual being dominated by drives.
The aggression drive was renamed and became the famous ‘striving for
power’, with aggression only its pathological expression.
Published in the same year as the ‘Aggression drive’, another of Adler’s
early publications deals with Freud’s concept of libido (‘Das Zärtlichkeits-
bedürfnis des Kindes’, ‘The child’s need for affection’, 1908b). But while
libido, in Freud’s view, is autoerotic and narcissist and directed towards one’s
own person, the child’s need for affection is, according to Adler, related to
other people (especially primary caregivers). It is also the key to socialisation,
education and culture: the child’s needs for love and care have to be met, and
Adler warns against the negative consequences of lack of care and love in
early childhood. But these needs have not to be satisfied in just any way.
Children should not be spoiled or pampered, but instead must be affection-
ately guided to become adapted and useful members of the human com-
munity. This aspect of human psychology will later be called Social Interest
by Adler. Thus, in that article, we can find a first turn from the psychoanalyt-
ical inner-psychic viewpoint to the future Adlerian stance of the human being
as a social being who cannot be understood outside the context of other
people; again, the theme of social embeddedness appears.
The split with Freud came in 1911 with the publication of ‘Zur Kritik der
Freudschen Sexualtheorie des Seelenlebens’ (‘Criticism of Freud’s sexual the-
ory’) where Adler refutes Freud’s ideas of human sexuality and the sexual
aetiology of neuroses. He tries to break down the pillars of psychoanalysis by
declaring the stages of psychosexual development (oral stage, anal stage, and
genital stage) mere artefacts of education and not an innate and autonomous
natural development. And the famous Oedipus complex, instead of being
related to sexuality, has more to do with power and authority in the family.
The sexual disorders, often found in neurotic individuals, might also be the
consequences or metaphoric expressions of neurosis and not its causes. Fur-
thermore, Adler refutes the existence of ‘repression’ (of infantile sexual
wishes) and accuses Freud of applying a circular conclusion: on one hand,
Freud postulates that human civilisation is the result of repression and sub-
limation, but on the other hand maintains that culture and civilisation
promote repression.
With these arguments, Adler hit at the core of Freud’s system and could no
longer be a member of the Vienna Psychoanalytical Society. This made him
free to found his own discussion group, the Society for Free Psychoanalytic
Study, which marked the onset of his own theory-building.