Karen Horney
1885 - 1952
Neurotic Needs
• Affection and approval
• Partner to take over one’s life
• Restrict one’s life within
narrow boundaries
• Power, control over others, and
façade of omnipotence
• Exploit others and get the better
of them
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Social recognition or prestige
Personal admiration
Personal achievement
Self-sufficiency and
independence
• Perfection and unassailability
Neurotic Needs and
Personality Disorders
• Affection and approval
• Partner to take over one’s life
• Restrict one’s life within
narrow boundaries
• Power, control over others, and
façade of omnipotence
• Exploit others and get the better
of them
•
•
Dependent, Histrionic, Borderline,
Narcissistic
Dependent, Borderline
•
Dependent, Avoidant, Paranoid
•
Antisocial, Narcissistic, Borderline,
Paranoid, Histrionic, Obsessive
Compulsive
Antisocial, Narcissistic, Borderline
•
Neurotic Needs and
Personality Disorders
•
•
•
•
Social recognition or prestige
Personal admiration
Personal achievement
Self-sufficiency and
independence
• Perfection and unassailability
•
•
•
•
Narcissistic, Histrionic
Narcissistic, Histrionic
Antisocial, Narcissistic
Avoidant, Paranoid, Schizoid,
Schizotypal
• Narcissistic, Borderline,
Avoidant
Theory
• Have an innate drive for positive personal growth (self
realization)
– Pathological behavior results when this is blocked
• Disturbed interpersonal relationships are at the core of
all healthy and unhealthy (neurotic) personality
functioning
Theory
• Neurotics show patterns of extreme and inflexible
approaches to handling interpersonal relationships
– “…the center of psychic disturbances are unconscious
strivings developed in order to cope with life despite
fears, helplessness, and isolation. I have called them
“neurotic trends” [neurotic needs].
Theory
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Safety and satisfaction are the two primary needs
Under ideal conditions, a child will feel loved, protected, and safe
Under less than ideal conditions, a child feels vulnerable, helpless and
abandoned producing basic anxiety
– “the feeling a child has of being isolated and helpless in a potentially
hostile world”
– Is the result of parental indifference
• Called this “the basic evil”
• As much perception as intention
Theory
• Parental indifference and the conflict it produces results in
defensive ways of perceiving oneself.
– Despised real self (fallible true self)
• Repressed hostility turns toward self and further proves ones
unworthiness and sense of being unlovable
– Self contemot
• Six major ways of manifestation:
Theory
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Relentless demands on self
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Merciless self-accusation
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Don’t believe we deserve to enjoy things
Self-torment
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Ridicule that prevents striving for improvement or achievement
Self-frustration
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Constantly berate self
Self-contempt
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“Tyranny of the should”
Inflict harm and suffering on self
Self-destructive actions and impulses
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Overeating, addictions, reckless behavior
Theory
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Then create the image of the idealized or ideal self to defensively restructure
the despised real self
The drive toward actualizing the ideal self is called the neurotic search for
glory.
• Manifests as:
– Need for perfection
» Attempt to mold the whole personality into the idealized
self
» “Tyranny of the should”
Theory
• Manifests itself (cont)
– Neurotic ambition
» Compulsive drive toward superiority
» Although desire to excel at everything, often channeled into
area most likely to succeed
– Drive toward a vindictive triumph
» “its chief aim is to put others to shame or defeat them
through one’s very success; or to attain the power…to
inflict suffering on them – mostly of a humiliating kind”
» Most destructive of the three
Theory
• Later added :
– Real self
• True core of persons being
• Contains all potential of growth and health (possible self)
• Damaged by parental indifference
• Alienation from this and adoption of the idealized self is called the
core neurotic conflict
Theory
• Basic anxiety around parental indifference makes the child angry
and resentful toward parents
• Called this basic hostility
• Creates conflict and anxiety for child
– Child needs parents and wants to approach them
– On the other hand hates them and wants to punish them
• This is the basis of neurosis
Theory
• A child deals with this by adopting one of three
relationship strategies:
– Accentuate dependency and move toward the parents
– Accentuate hostility and move against the parents
– Give up on the relationship and move away from the
parents
• Calls these the basic conflict
Theory
• Moving Toward People: “If you love me, you will not
hurt me”
– Compliant Personality
• Intense needs for affection and approval
• Need for a partner
• Need to restrict ones life within narrow boundaries
• Goal is to achieve harmony with others and avoid friction
Theory
– Compliant Personality
• May mask underlying feelings of need to compete, excel, and
dominate, or feelings of rage, anger and hostility
• Called this the self-effacing solution
– The ideal self is the despised self
– Qualities of suffering, helplessness and martyrdom
Theory
• Moving against people: “ If I have power, no one can hurt
me”
– Aggressive Personality
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Need for control and power as protection against feelings of helplessness
Need to excel by exploiting others
Success and prestige are measures of their self worth
Driven by insecurity, anxiety, and hostility
Called this the expansive solution
– Ultimate attempt to actualize the ideal self
Theory
• Moving away from people: “If I withdraw, nothing can
hurt me”
– Detached personality
• Detached from human affairs
• Resigned to an emotionally flat life
• Protection from being hurt by others
• Intense needs of self sufficiency and perfection
Theory
– Detached personality
• Narrow limits of life so that will not have to be dependent on
others
• Remove selves from “inner battlefield” of their own conflicts
• Called this the solution of resignation
Theory
• Healthy people move between these and use what is
appropriate when needed
• Neurotics mainly emphasize one of the Neurotic solutions
– Two less emphasized remain at work in the unconscious
Auxiliary Conflict Solutions
• Creation of Blind Spots
– Type of denial
– Refusal to see the discrepancy between their behaviors and the
idealized self
Auxiliary Conflict Solutions
• Compartmentalization
– Life compartmentalized with different rules for each
– What happens in one has not effect or link to another
– Situational ethics
• Rationalization
– Using logical, plausible, but inaccurate excuses to justify one’s
perceived weaknesses, failures, or inconsistencies.
Auxiliary Conflict Solutions
• Excessive self control
– Avoidance of emotions (good or bad)
• Arbitrary rightness
– Because of difficulty in taking action, will appear to arbitrarily
make decisions (showing one is arbitrarily right or in charge)
(dogmatism)
Auxiliary Conflict Solutions
• Elusiveness
– Postpones making any decisions, voice any opinions, etc.
– If I am not committed to anything, I can’t be wrong; If I am not
wrong I can’t be criticized
• Cynicism
– Doesn’t believe in anything
– By not believing in anything, I am immune to the disappointment
of being committed to something shown to be false.