Adlerian Psychotherapy Flashcards
(42 cards)
Holism
Adler believed that people should not be broken into parts. He preferred to look at people and not break them into parts. The field of study is the whole person in the person’s social network.
Teleology
Adlerian psychology is concerned with purposes. To understand a thing, it must be analyzed according to the following four cases: Material, Efficient, Formal, Final
Creativity
People are viewed as actors, not merely reactors. They are co-creators of their worlds. All relationships are bidirectional. (People are aware of how other people affect them, but not always aware of how the affect people.)
Phenomenology
It is important to know how children perceive what they were born with. It is important to understand children’s perceptions into their situations to gain insight. Adlerians want to know the objective situation, but the subjective situation is far more helpful.
Soft Determinism
“A most often leads to B, if that is of use to the person and that is how the person perceives the situation.” Soft determinism stresses influences, not causes; speaks of probabilities, not certainties. Life has limits and given those limits, we still have some choice. Adlerians point out those choices and instead of blaming them, teach them new choices.
Social Field Theory
Adlerians closely examine the social field where the behavior takes place.
Motivation as Striving
People are motivated to move from a “minus situation” to a “plus situation.” Minus situations may be labeled: inferior, weak, hated. Plus situations may be labeled: superior, perfection, power. The principle objective of Adler’s growth model is striving.
Idiographic Orientation
Emphasis is on the idiographic rather than the nomothetic nature of people. The specifics of the case are more important than the generalities. i.e. one person’s major depressive disorder arises when her children go to school in the fall, another person’s arises when her husband is trying to control her.
Psychology of Use
It is important to know what “use” a person makes of what they have. Specific emotions are not as important as how those emotions are used. i.e. Many people may be intelligent, but how are they using their intelligence, for what purposes?
Acting “As If”
People form maps of their worlds and act “as if” those maps are accurate representations of reality. It is of interest the extent to which a person clings to their maps. Adlerians tend to analyze how useful people’s maps are given the particulars of their lives. Their “lifestyle” provides clues to the maps individuals act on.
The four main components of lifestyle
Self-Concept, Self-Ideal, Worldview, Ethical Convictions
Self-Concept
All the instructions about who I am or am not
Self-Ideal
All the instructions about who I should be or should not be
Worldview
All the instructions about people, life, and the world
Ethical Convictions
All the instructions about what is right or wrong, good or bad
Psychopathology
Can be conceptualized, in part, as a matter of goodness of fit between the terrain and the map. The better the fit, the less likely behavior will appear as maladaptive.
Self-Fulfilling Prophecy
“Believing is seeing.” When people act “as if” their maps were real and correct, they actively shape the feedback they receive. i.e. If they act as if people are hostile, then they often get back hostile responses.
Optimism
Human nature is neutral, which leads to psychotherapeutic stance of optimism. Everybody can be better than they are at any given point, regardless of how dysfunctional they may appear to be. Hope, faith, and compassion are crucial to optimism and these traits must be modeled for clients.
Lifestyle
Adlerian psychology describes personality from the perspective of lifestyle. The use of personality, traits, temperament, and psychological and biological processes in order to find a place in the social matrix of life.
Temperament
Primarily genetic inborn characteristics that makes up one’s predisposition. Temperaments are quickly modified through learning and socialization.
Personality
A collection of traits and characteristics children develop through the process of socialization. (Personality develops as a combination of temperamental predispositions and early childhood experiences.)
Factors influencing the development of lifestyle
Degree of activity, organ inferiority, birth order and sibling relationships, family values, family atmosphere, and parenting style.
Degree of Activity
Is partially learned and partially a product of temperament. (Some children are more active than others.) The degree of activity children display in childhood often becomes the amount of energy adults have in solving problems later on in life.
Organ Inferiority
Can influence the development of lifestyle. Can shape the process directly, for example, through the law of compensation, or indirectly, through the perceptions and attitudes of parents and siblings, etc.
