ADLER, Alfred
- Era: 1870 - 1937
- Location: Austria
- Categories: SOCIAL SCIENCE
A key figure in the development of psychoanalysis and psychotherapy, with direct implications for the process and priorities for moral education. His emphasis on 'individual psychology' rooted personal identity and development in a 'wholeness' that included its social context as well as its own inwardness. The notions of birth order within family constellation, inferiority complex, and will to power were central to his approach (and differentiating it from that of Freud). From earliest years each person's sense of individual direction in life (teleology) is being worked out in its three main areas of application: occupation/work, society/friendship, and love/sexuality. Moreover, this sense is open to education and a basis for community feeling with all living creatures and the wider universe. In this, his Jewish heritage and later Christian faith were important.
Life
Encyclopaedia of World Biography entry on Adler
Writings
Works by Adler on the Internet Archive
An excerpt from What Life Should Mean To You
Video