horney

• Karen Horney


  • Widely regarded as the founder of feminine psychiatry, which focuses on the psychiatric treatment of women, and feminist psychology
  • Her contributions to the field of psychology was her feminine psychology and her theory on neurosis
• Feminine psychology


  A revision of psychoanalysis to encompass the psychological conflicts inherent in the traditional ideal of womanhood and women's roles
• Horney began work on her version of feminine psychology in 1922, the year she became the first woman to present a paper on the topic at an international psychoanalytic congress
• Reasons Horney was critical of Freud's theories of psychosexual development

  • Orthodox psychoanalysis would lead to stagnation in both theoretical thought and therapeutic practice
  • Freud's depictions of women as inferior to men was negative and damaging to women—specifically the concept of the penis envy
  • Psychoanalysis should move beyond instinct theory and emphasize the importance of cultural influences in shaping personality
• Penis envy


  Freud's notion that women were victims of their anatomy, forever envious and resentful of men for possessing a penis
• Masculine protest


  A pathological belief that men are superior to women, which many women possess according to Adler
• Womb envy of men


  An unconscious behavior designed to disparage and belittle women and to reinforce their inferior status, manifested in men due to a sense of inferiority deriving from their womb envy
• Freud's explanations result in a pessimistic concept of humanity based on innate instincts and the stagnation of personality, while Horney's view of humanity is an optimistic one and is centered on cultural forces that are amenable to change
• Basic hostility


  Feelings of hostility toward parents that develop when children's needs for safety and security are not met
• Basic anxiety


  A feeling of being isolated and helpless in a world conceived as potentially hostile, resulting from repressed hostility toward parents
• Ways children display repressed hostility

  • Love (when parents' warmth and affection are not honest, and the child must repress hostility for fear of losing even these unsatisfactory expressions of love)
  • Guilt (when children are made to feel guilty about any hostility or rebelliousness)
  • Punishment, physical abuse, or more subtle forms of intimidation (when children are kept in an excessively dependent state and made to feel fearful of their parents)
• Four ways people try to protect themselves against basic anxiety in childhood

  • Securing affection
  • Being submissive
  • Attaining power, prestige, or possession
  • Withdrawing
• Securing affection


  Trying to purchase love with self-effacing compliance, material goods, or sexual favors, in an attempt to say "If you love me, you will not hurt me"
• Being submissive


  Complying with the wishes of either one particular person or of everyone in our social environment, in an attempt to say "If I give in, I will not be hurt"
• Attaining power, prestige, or possession


  Compensating for helplessness and achieving security through success or a sense of superiority, as a buffer against humiliation, destitution, and poverty
• Withdrawing


  Becoming independent of others, not relying on anyone else for the satisfaction of internal or external needs, by blunting or minimizing emotional needs
• Whereas normal individuals are able to use a variety of defensive maneuvers in a somewhat useful way, neurotics compulsively repeat the same strategy in an essentially unproductive manner
• Neurotic needs

  • Affection and approval
  • A dominant partner
  • Power
  • Exploitation
  • Prestige
  • Admiration
  • Achievement or ambition
  • Self-sufficiency
  • Perfection
  • Narrow limits to life
• Affection and approval


  Neurotics attempt indiscriminately to please others, try to live up to the expectations of others, tend to dread self-assertion, and are quite uncomfortable with the hostility of others as well as the hostile feelings within themselves
• A dominant partner


  Neurotics try to attach themselves to a powerful partner, which includes an overvaluation of love and a dread of being alone or deserted
• Power, prestige, and possession


  Neurotics' need to control others and avoid feelings of weakness, often combined with the needs for prestige and possession
• Neurotic Needs

  • Affection & Approval
  • A Powerful Partner
  • A Dominant Partner
  • Power
  • Exploitation
  • Prestige
  • Admiration
  • Achievement or Ambition
  • Self-sufficiency
  • Perfection
  • Narrow Limits to Life
• Affection & Approval


  In their quest for affection and approval, neurotics attempt indiscriminately to please others. They try to live up to the expectations of others, tend to dread self-assertion, and are quite uncomfortable with the hostility of others as well as the hostile feelings within themselves.
• A Powerful Partner


  Lacking self-confidence, neurotics try to attach themselves to a powerful partner. This need includes an overvaluation of love and a dread of being alone or deserted.
• A Dominant Partner


  Lacking self-confidence, neurotics try to attach themselves to a powerful partner. This need includes an overvaluation of love and a dread of being alone or deserted.
• Power


  Power and affection are perhaps the two greatest neurotic needs. The need for power is usually combined with the needs for prestige and possession and manifests itself as the need to control others and to avoid feelings of weakness or stupidity.
• Exploitation


  Neurotics frequently evaluate others on the basis of how they can be used or exploited, but at the same time, they fear being exploited by others.
• Prestige


  Some people combat basic anxiety by trying to be first, to be important, or to attract attention to themselves. Individuals with a need for prestige value themselves in terms of public recognition and acclaim.
• Admiration


  Neurotics have a need to be admired for what they are rather than for what they possess. Their inflated self-esteem must be continually fed by the admiration and approval of others. Individuals with a neurotic need for personal admiration are narcissistic and have an exaggerated self-perception.
• Achievement or Ambition


  Neurotics often have a strong drive to be the best. They must defeat other people in order to confirm their superiority. People push themselves to achieve greater and greater things as a result of basic insecurity.
• Self-sufficiency


  Many neurotics have a strong need to move away from people, thereby proving that they can get along without others. These individuals exhibit a "loner" mentality, distancing themselves from others in order to avoid being tied down or dependent on other people
• Perfection


  People with a neurotic need for perfection and unassailability strive for complete infallibility. A common feature of this neurotic need is searching for personal flaws in order to quickly change or cover up these perceived imperfections.
• Narrow Limits to Life


  Neurotics frequently strive to remain inconspicuous, to take second place, and to be content with very little. They avoid wishing for material things, often making their own needs secondary and undervaluing their own talents and abilities.
• Neurotic Trends

  The diagram shows Horney's conception of the mutual influence of basic hostility and basic anxiety as well as both normal and neurotic defenses against anxiety. People can use each of the neurotic trends to solve basic conflict, but unfortunately, these solutions are essentially nonproductive or neurotic. Horney (1950) used the term basic conflict because very young children are driven in all three directions—toward, against, and away from people.
• Moving Towards People (Compliant)


  Refers to a neurotic need to protect oneself against feelings of helplessness; such a person has an intense and continuous need for affection and approval, an urge to be loved, wanted, and protected. Compliant personalities manipulate other people, particularly their partners, to achieve their goals. They often behave in ways others find attractive or endearing. In dealing with other people, compliant personalities are conciliatory.
• Moving Against People (Aggressive)


  In their world, everyone is hostile, and only the fittest and most cunning survive. Life is a jungle in which supremacy, strength, and ferocity are the paramount virtues. Moving toward others and moving against others are, in many ways, polar opposites. However, like compliant personalities, aggressive personalities are driven by insecurity, anxiety, and hostility.
• Moving Away People (Detached)


  This strategy is an expression of needs for privacy, independence, and self-sufficiency. Many neurotics find associating with others an intolerable strain. As a consequence, they are compulsively driven to move away from people, to attain autonomy and separateness. Many people use this in an attempt to solve the basic conflict of isolation. These people cannot actively compete with others for superiority; they believe their greatness should be recognized automatically, without struggle or effort on their part.
• Idealized Self-Image


  Horney argued that all of us, normal or neurotic, construct a picture of our selves that may or may not be based on reality. In normal people, the self-image is built on a realistic appraisal of our abilities, potentials, weaknesses, goals, and relations with other people. They construct an idealized self-image for the same purpose as normal people do: to unify the personality. But their attempt is doomed to failure because their self-image is not based on a realistic appraisal of their strengths and weaknesses
• Neurotic Search for Glory


  As neurotics come to believe in the reality of their idealized self, they begin to incorporate it into all aspects of their lives—their goals, their self-concept, and their relations with others. Horney (1950) referred to this comprehensive drive toward actualizing the ideal self as the neurotic search for glory. In addition to self-idealization, the neurotic search for glory includes three other elements: the need for perfection, neurotic ambition, and the drive toward a vindictive triumph.
• Tyranny of the Shoulds


  The need for perfection refers to the drive to mold the whole personality into the idealized self. They try to achieve perfection by erecting a complex set of "shoulds" and "should nots." They tell themselves they should be the best or most perfect student, spouse, parent, lover, employee, friend, or child. Because they find their real self-image so undesirable.