Adlerian Therapy

● Worked with a high percentage of people from lower and

PSY 3-7 | Buergo, Gando, Haduca, Tabua
1. Who are the key figures (founder or founders)
associated with Adlerian therapy?
2. What are some of the basic assumptions underlying
Adlerian therapy?
3. What key concepts are essential to Adlerian theory?
4. What should be considered the important goals of
Adlerian therapy?
5. What role does the therapeutic relationship play in
achieving successful therapy outcomes?
6. What techniques in therapy are used in the Adlerian
approach?
7. In what ways can Adlerian therapy be applied to client
populations, settings, and treatment of problems?
8. What are the strengths of Adlerian therapy?
9. What are the shortcomings of Adlerian therapy?
10. What is the most significant contribution of Adlerian
theory to an integrative approach?
11. What is the most significant limitation of Adlerian theory
in an integrative approach?
middle classes (versus other psychiatrists at the time whose
patients were mostly White and from upper classes)
● Was nontechnical in speaking and writing (Adler’s writing
style was said to be awkward and disorganized, but it made
his theory parsimonious)
● Advocated for women and children, community mental
health, and family counseling; outspoken about child-rearing
practices, school reforms, and prejudices
● Pioneered the practice of teaching professionals through live
demonstrations with parents and children in front of a large
audience
● Gave importance to rest and recreation with family and
friends despite an overcrowded work schedule
RUDOLF DREIKURS
CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE ADLERIAN APPROACH
● A significant figure in Adlerian therapy after Adler's death;
brought Adlerian therapy to the United States
● Popularized child guidance centers and professional training
that enables one to work with a wide range of clients
JON D. CARLSON
CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE ADLERIAN APPROACH
● Authored >60 books and 300 professional training videos
● Distinguished professor of Adlerian psychology at Adler
University in Chicago (as of 2017)
● Former editor of the Journal of Individual Psychology
JAMES ROBERT BITTER

CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE ADLERIAN APPROACH

1 — Key Figures ● Co-authored the chapter on Adlerian therapy in Corey’s book
● Opened the first family education center in Idaho; developed
an Adlerian model for group counseling
ALFRED ADLER ● President of the North American Society of Adlerian
Psychology in 2017-2018
FAMILY AND EDUCATION
● Born in Rudolfsheim, Austria to a middle-class Jewish family;
the second eldest of 7 children 2 — Basic Assumptions
● Had a strained relationship with his older brother Sigmund;
had a younger brother who died in the bed next to him when
he was 4 years old DIFFERENCES
● Was a sickly and accident-prone child who almost died of
pneumonia at 4 or 5 years old after an ice-skating incident FREUDIAN ADLERIAN
● Was pampered by his mother as a child due to his being ● Biological and deterministic ● Social-psychological and
sickly but did not feel very close to her; was closer to his view of human nature teleological (goal-oriented)
father who always encouraged him ○ Drives: sex & aggression view of human nature
● Was considered a bright kid but was more interested in ○ Male sup. a consequence of ○ Striving for superiority
social relationships and finished elementary school without biology ○ Male sup. a consequence of
difficulty or distinction ● 3 personality systems: id, gender inequality
● Studied medicine at the University of Vienna and practiced ego, superego—people behave ● Indivisible personality:
ophthalmology but later on shifted to general medicine; according to the distribution of holistic view—people can only
eventually specialized in neurology and psychiatry psychic energy in these be understood as complete
● Married Raissa Epstein, an early socialist and feminist systems beings
● Unconscious determinants of ● Conscious determinants,
THEORY AND PRACTICE behavior behavior is purposeful
● Experienced anti-Semitism during WWI that contributed to ● Pessimistic: people are mere ● Optimistic: people have the
his emphasis on humanism and the importance of products of their past power to shape their future
● Medical model: emphasis on ● Growth model: emphasis on
understanding people’s contexts and cultures
curing pathologies prevention & well-being

Adlerian therapy ★ 1
 3 — Key Concepts
VIEW OF HUMAN NATURE
★ Adler focused on the person’s past as perceived in the
present and how an individual’s interpretation of early events
continued to influence that person’s present behavior.
★ According to Adler, humans are motivated primarily by social
relatedness rather than by sexual urges; behavior is
purposeful and goal-directed; and consciousness, more than
unconsciousness, is the focus of therapy.
★ Adler’s theory starts with a consideration of inferiority
feelings, which he saw as a normal condition of all people
and as a source of all human striving.
SUBJECTIVE PERCEPTION OF REALITY
★ Adlerians attempt to view the world from the client’s
subjective frame of reference, an orientation described as
phenomenological.
★ Paying attention to the individual way in which people
perceive their world, referred to as “subjective reality,”
includes the individual’s perceptions, thoughts, feelings,
values, beliefs, convictions, and conclusions.
★ Objective reality is less important than how we interpret
reality and the meanings we attach to what we experience.
UNITY & PATTERNS OF HUMAN PERSONALITY
★ Adler chose the name Individual Psychology (from the Latin
individuum, meaning indivisible) for his theoretical approach
because he wanted to avoid Freud’s reductionist divisions
such as ego, id, and superego.
★ Adler emphasized the unity and indivisibility of the person
and stressed understanding the whole person in the context
of his or her life.
★ This holistic concept implies that we cannot be understood in
parts; rather, all aspects of ourselves must be understood in
relation to the socially embedded contexts of family, culture,
school, and work.
BEHAVIOR AS PURPOSEFUL & GOAL-ORIENTED
● Individual Psychology assumes that all human behavior has a
purpose, and this purposefulness is the cornerstone of Adler’s
theory.
● A basic assumption of Individual Psychology is that we can only
think, feel, and act in relation to our goal; we can be fully
understood only in light of knowing the purposes and goals
toward which we are striving.
● Adler was influenced by the philosopher Hans Vaihinger (1965),
who noted that people often live by fictions (or views of how the
world should be).
● Many Adlerians use the term fictional finalism to refer to an
imagined life goal that guides a person’s behavior.
STRIVING FOR SIGNIFICANCE & SUPERIORITY
● Recognition of inferiority feelings and consequent striving for
perfection or mastery are innate to humans
● According to Adler, the moment we experience inferiority, we are
pulled by the striving for superiority.
● However, it is important to note that “superiority,” as used by
Adler, does not necessarily mean superiority over others. Rather,
it means moving from a perceived lower (or minus) position to a
perceived better (or plus) position in relation to oneself
LIFESTYLE (or “plan of life,” “style of life,” “strategy for
living,” “road map of life”)
Our perceptions regarding self, others, and the world, including the
connecting themes and rules of interaction that give meaning to our
actions.
SOCIAL INTEREST COMMUNITY FEELING
The action line of Gemeinschaftsgefuhl; the feeling of
community feeling; being connected to all of humanity—past,
involves being as present, and future—and to being
concerned about involved in making the world a better
others as one is about place
oneself ● Entails the evolutionary need to belong
● For Adlerians, social and manifests itself in courage,
interest is the empathy, caring, compassion,
central indicator of engagement, and cooperation
mental health. ● Individual Psychology rests on a
central belief that our happiness and
success are largely related to this
social connectedness.
LIFE TASKS
SOCIAL TASK LOVE-MARRIAGE OCCUPATIONAL
(building TASK (establishing TASK (contributing
friendships) intimacy) to society)
● Each of these tasks requires the development of psychological
capacities for friendship and belonging, for contribution and
self-worth, and for cooperation
● These basic life tasks are so fundamental that impairment in any
one of them is often an indicator of a psychological disorder
● More often than not, when people seek therapy, it is because
they are struggling unsuccessfully to meet one or more of these
life tasks.
BIRTH ORDER AND SIBLING RELATIONSHIPS
● The Adlerian approach is unique in giving special attention to the
relationships between siblings and the psychological birth
position in one’s family.
● Birth order - not a deterministic concept but does increase an
individual’s probability of having a certain set of experiences.
● Adler observed that many people wonder why children in the
same family often differ so widely, and he pointed out that it is a
fallacy to assume that children of the same family are formed in
the same environment.
● Although siblings share aspects in common in the family
constellation, the psychological situation of each child is different
from that of the others due to birth order.
The following description of the influence of birth order is
based on Ansbacher and Ansbacher, Dreikurs, and Adler:
1. Oldest child
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- generally receives a good deal of attention
- typically somewhat spoiled during the time they were an only
child as they were the center of attention
- tends to be dependable and hardworking; strives to keep ahead
- when a new brother or sister comes, she feels ousted from the
favored position and is no longer unique or special; readily
believes that the newcomer will rob her of the love which she is
accustomed to.
- most often, reasserts position by becoming a model child,
bossing younger children, and exhibiting a high achievement
drive.
2. Second child (of only two)
- shares attention with another child since birth
- behaves as if they were in a race and is generally in full steam at
times; is always as if in training to surpass the older brother/sister
- develops a knack for finding out the elder child’s weak spots and
proceeds to win praise from both parents and teachers by
achieving successes where the older sibling had failed
- if one is talented in a given area, the other strives for recognition
by developing other abilities.
- often the opposite to the first born
3. Middle Child
- feels squeezed out; may become convinced of the unfairness of
life and feel cheated; may assume a “poor me” attitude and can
become a problem child
- in a family characterized by conflict, the middle child may become
the switchboard and the peacemaker, or the person who holds
things together
- in a family where there are four children, the second child will
often feel like a middle child and the third child will be more
easygoing, more social, and may align with the firstborn
4. Youngest Child
- always the baby of the family
- tends to be the most pampered one—because they are
pampered or spoiled, they may develop helplessness into an art
form and become an expert at putting others in their service.
- tends to go their own way, often developing in ways no others in
the family have attempted and may outshine everyone
5. Only child
- has a problem of her own
- although she shares some of the characteristics of the oldest
child (for example, a high achievement drive), she may not learn
to share or cooperate with other children
- she will learn to deal with adults well, as they make up her
original familial world.
- often, the only child is pampered by her parents and may become
dependently tied to one or both of them
- she may want to have center stage all of the time, and if her
position is challenged, she will feel it is unfair
4 — Goals of Adlerian Therapy
★ Clients develop a sense of belonging
★ Clients adopt behaviors and processes characterized
by community feeling and social interest
● Specific goals are defined by the client.
● Re-orientation. Clients are seen as “discouraged” instead of
having a psychopathology. Discouraged people have a
tendency to act only according to their perceived
self-interest. Adlerian therapy is focused on offering
encouragement—helping clients build self-confidence to
stimulate courage and a sense of belonging.
○ Courage: the willingness to act consistently with social
interest even when one is fearful.
○ Without fear, there is no courage. Clients are re-oriented
towards courage instead of fear.
● Re-education. Therapists teach clients to view the self,
others, and life from a different perspective. They provide
information and assist clients in developing a new cognitive
map.
Maniacci, Sackett-Maniacci, and Mosak’s (2014, as cited in
Corey, 2017) goals for re-education in therapy:
● Connect with responsibility to the community
● Overcome discouragement and inferiority
● Modify lifestyle toward adaptability, flexibility, and sociability
● Change faulty motivation
● Encourage equality and be accepting of self and others
● Become contributing members of the world community
5 — The Therapeutic Relationship
THERAPIST’S ROLE & FUNCTION
A. CONDUCT A LIFESTYLE ASSESSMENT
THERAPIST’S OBJECTIVES:
(1) Learn how client functions
(2) Learn and understand client’s goals and motivations
(3) Look for major mistakes in client’s thinking and valuing
(4) Help client identify and explore core fears
Family constellation questionnaire
● Asking about parents, siblings, and other people living in the
home; assessing birth order
● Summary & interpretation renders client’s life story, which
includes:
- major areas of success and failures
- how life goals are pursued
- cultural and sociopolitical influences on role constructs
Early recollections
● Recalling specific incidents (occurring before age 10) and
accompanying thoughts and feelings
● Summary & interpretation identifies client’s major successes
and mistakes and provides a starting point for therapy
B. PROVIDE ENCOURAGEMENT
CLIENT’S EXPERIENCE IN THERAPY
BEFORE: Clients may go to therapy because of a conflict
between their private logic and the requirements of social living.
○ Private logic: convictions and beliefs on self, others, and life
that serve as the basis of an individual’s lifestyle
○ Therapy serves to challenge the structure of private logic
which is the psychological focus of treatment
EXAMPLE: A chronically depressed middle-aged man goes to
therapy. Lifestyle assessment reveals his private logic: “I am
Adlerian therapy ★ 3

unlovable. The world is filled with rejecting people,
therefore I must keep to myself so I won’t be hurt.”
DURING: Clients work toward attaining desired outcomes and
building a resilient lifestyle.
○ A good deal of time is spent in discovering and
understanding the purpose behind the client’s emotions and
cognitions.
○ Think—Feel—Act: Adlerians believe that feelings are aligned
to thoughts before fueling actions.
EXAMPLE, continued: Mistaken beliefs (cognitions) that
developed during his youth are clung on to as rules for living.
Pessimistic expectations (feelings) tend to be fulfilled because
on some level he seeks to validate his beliefs. Depression
helps him avoid contact with others (action).
AFTER: Clients discover that there are resources and options to
draw on in dealing with significant life issues and life tasks.
EGALITARIAN THERAPEUTIC ALLIANCE
Relationship based on cooperation, mutual trust, respect,
confidence, collaboration, and alignment of goals
● Establishing and maintaining a person-to-person relationship
is essential to achieving successful outcomes
● It is suggested (but not required) that a plan or contract is
formulated in the beginning to set the goals of therapy and
the responsibilities of the therapist and the client.
6 — Techniques
4 central objectives corresponding to 4 phases:
1. Establish the proper therapeutic relationship.
2. Explore the psychological dynamics operating in the client (an
assessment).
3. Encourage the development of self-understanding (insight into
purpose).
4. Help the client make new choices (reorientation and reeducation).
Phases are not linear and do not progress in rigid steps,
instead it can be understood as weaving that leads to a tapestry.
- Incorporated in Dreikurs’ (1997) minor psychotherapy, which
is now elaborated in Adlerian brief therapy.
PHASE 1: ESTABLISHING THE RELATIONSHIP
● Collaborative and active
● Relationship is based on a sense of interest that grows into
caring, involvement, and friendship.
● The focus is on making person-to-person contact with
clients rather than starting with “the problem”.
● fosters a positive, warm, and supportive, created by
listening, responding and demonstrating respect
● Helps clients to be aware of their assets and strengths
rather than continually dealing with their deficits and
liabilities
● If the client feels deeply understood and accepted, the client
is likely to focus on what he or she wants from therapy and
thus establish goals.
PHASE 2: CONDUCTING THE ASSESSMENT
Aim: get a deeper understanding of an individual’s lifestyle
Focus: understand the client’s identity and how that identity
relates to the world at large
TWO INTERVIEW FORMS
I. Subjective Interview
The counselor helps the client tell his or her life story as completely
as possible.
● Treats clients as experts in their own lives, allowing them to be
completely heard
● More attention is given to subjective experiences of the client
than techniques to be used.
● “should extract patterns in the person’s life, develop hypotheses
about what works for the person, and determine what accounts
for the various concerns in the client’s life” (Bitter et al., 1998, p.
98)
● Ending questions:
○ “Is there anything else you think I should know to understand
you and your concerns?”
○ “How would your life be different, and what would you be
doing differently, if you did not have this symptom or
problem?”
II. Objective Interview
Seeks to discover information about:
(a) how problems in the client’s life began
(b) any precipitating events
(c) a medical history, including current and past medications
(d) a social history
(e) the reasons the client chose therapy at this time
(f) the person’s coping with life tasks
(g) a lifestyle assessment
Counselors also interpret the person’s early memories, seeking to
understand the meaning that she or he has attached to life
experiences.
- They operate on the assumption that it is the interpretations
people develop about themselves, others, the world, and life that
govern what they do.
- Lifestyle assessment seeks to develop a holistic narrative of
the person’s life, to make sense of the way the person copes
with life tasks, and to uncover the private interpretations and
logic involved in that coping.
Family Constellation.
Early Recollections.
Integration and Summary. Presented to client, discussed in the
session. Together, specific points are refined
Adlerian therapy ★ 4
 ● Clients are ncouraged to act as if they were the people they
PHASE 3: ENCOURAGE SELF-UNDERSTANDING AND
want to be challenging self-limiting assumptions
INSIGHT
● Clients are asked to catch themselves in process of
repeating old patterns that led to ineffective behavior
In this phase, Adlerian therapists interpret the findings of ● Commitment
the assessment as an avenue for promoting
self-understanding and insight. Making a Difference
● Difference manifested by a change in behavior, attitude or
Insight - understanding of the motivations that operate in a perception
client’s life; special form of awareness ● Focus on motivation modification more than behavior
Self-understanding is only possible when hidden purposes and change and encourage clients to make holistic changes on
goals of the behavior are made conscious. the useful living

Techniques facilitating process of gaining insight: All therapy is a cooperative effort and making a difference
● Disclosure depends on the therapist’s ability to win the client’s cooperation.
● Well-timed interpretations - deals with clients’ underlying
motives for behaving the way they do here and now.
7 — Applications
Both
➔ create awareness of one’s direction, goals and purposes,
FAMILY COUNSELING
private logic and how it works, and one’s current behavior
➔ are suggestions presented tentatively in the form of
open-ended questions and hunches or guesses such as ““I ● Individuals, couples, and families may all benefit from this
kind of treatment.
could be wrong, but I am wondering if … ,” “Could it be that
● Objectives often include:
… ,” or “Is it possible that …”
(1) Enhancing family relations
(2) Resolve conflict
The counselor helps the client understand the limitations of the (3) Providing insights and knowledge about where people
style of life the client has chosen. “fit in” or belong in their families, communities, and
societies.
PHASE 4: REORIENTATION AND REEDUCATION ● It may be combined with other forms of treatment such as
play therapy and art therapy.

● Action-oriented phase, putting insights into practice ○ Play and Art Therapies
● Focuses on helping clients discover a new and more → Different from traditional “talk therapy.”
functional perspective → They use creativeness as a therapeutic method and
● Clients are encouraged and challenged to develop courage fully engage emotions.
to take risks and make changes in life → Children can communicate their emotions more easily
● Clients learn to reorient their current style of living from the through play, which is their natural means of doing so,
as opposed to using words.
useful side away from useless side
→ Example: Encouraging a child to recreate something
stressful or frightening using hand puppets.
Reorientation - shifting rules of interaction, process and → Advantages: Promote and strengthen narratives and
motivation, changes in awareness in therapy session, storytelling.
transformed actions outside
Reeducation GROUP COUNSELING
Encouragement Process - increasing courage needed to face
difficulties
● People have the chance to share their experiences of
loneliness and insecurity in groups in a safe environment.
In Assessment In Reorientation ● The purpose of Adlerian Group Therapy is to encourage
patients to achieve their goals in a more efficient way by
comes from: comes when: assisting them in identifying their skills and strengths.
- illuminating personal strengths - new possibilities are generated → Unique aspect: Use of Early Recollections
- recognizing being in charge of - clients are acknowledged and
affirmed for taking positive
own lives and make different
steps to change lives for the
choices based on new better 8 — Major Strengths
understandings

Clients are encouraged to identify who they are in the

Change and the Search for New Possibilities context of their social environments and to be conscious of
● Clients can make decisions and modify their goals in how those environments affect their way of life and physical
reorientation phase wellbeing.

Adlerian therapy ★ 5
Focus on empowerment and encouragement
● Positive encouragement gives the patient the confidence
they need to integrate successfully into their community.
● Adlerian therapists tend to focus on cooperation and socially
oriented values as opposed to competitive and individualistic
values.
● Adlerian theory’s goals are sustainable in that they
encourage insight and personal growth even after therapy
has finished.
→ This promotes confidence and self-worth, which leads a
person to interact naturally in society and build healthy
relationships within his or her own community.
9 — Major Shortcomings
The Adlerian approach frequently highlights the individual
as the center of responsibility and change.
● This focuses on altering the autonomous self (a person’s
ability to act on his or her own values and interests).
Clients from those cultures who are not interested in
exploring their past experiences, memories, and dreams.
● Some individuals may believe that it is inappropriate to
reveal family information which may limit the effectiveness of
the approach when dealing with life’s current problems.
● A client is more likely to be receptive to the evaluation and
treatment process if the therapist can show that they are
aware of their cultural beliefs.
● Early recollections are a significant assessment intervention
in brief therapy.
● There are five characteristics that form basis for an
integrative framework in brief therapy:
1. Time limitation
2. Focus
3. Counselor directiveness ”
4. Symptoms as solutions
5. Assignment of behavioral tasks
One of Adler’s most important contributions is his
influence on other therapy systems.
- His basic ideas influenced other psychological schools
like existential therapy, cognitive behavior therapy,
rational emotive behavior therapy, reality therapy,
solution-focused brief therapy, feminist therapy, and
family therapy.
- Adlerians’ basic premise is that if the clients can change
their thinking, then they can change their feelings and
behavior.
- It was found in the study of contemporary counseling
theories that many of Adler’s notions have reappeared
in the modern approaches with different nomenclature,
and often without giving Adler the credit that is due to
him.
11 — Most Significant Limitation

Some clients may perceive the counselor as the “expert”

and anticipate that the counselor would offer them solutions
to their problems as a result of their cultural background.
● Adlerian therapists are not professionals at resolving other
people’s problems, instead, they see it as their responsibility
to work together to teach individuals new coping
mechanisms.
★ Adler’s written presentations are difficult to follow, and
many of them are transcripts of lectures he gave.
★ Research that supports the effectiveness of his theory is
limited, but has improved over the last 25 years.

REFERENCES
10 — Most Significant Contribution

Corey, G., & Bitter, J. R. (2017). Adlerian Therapy. In Theory and

It can be applied to a diverse range of clients in a variety of
Practice of Counseling and Psychotherapy (10th ed., pp.
settings and formats.
● It is flexible and integrative in nature, so the Adlerian 95-128). Cengage Learning.
therapists are resourceful and flexible in drawing on many
methods. Feist, G. J., Roberts, T.-A., & Feist, J. (2021). Adler: Individual
● Adlerian therapists are theoretically consistent and Psychology. In Theories of Personality (10th ed., pp.
technically eclectic. The therapists are mainly concerned 72-106). McGraw-Hill Education.
with doing what is in the best interests of clients rather than
squeezing clients into one theoretical framework

The Adlerian approach is suited to brief, time-limited

therapy.
● Adler is the proponent of the time-limited therapy. This
therapy includes quickly establishing a strong therapeutic
alliance, a clear problem focus and goal alignment, rapid
assessment and application to treatment, an emphasis on
active and directive intervention, a psychoeducational focus,
a present and future orientation, a focus on clients’ strengths
and abilities and an optimistic expectation of change, and a
time sensitivity that tailors treatment to the unique needs of
the client

Adlerian therapy ★ 6