Alfred Adler

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I was born in Rudolfsheim, Vienna, Austria, and raised in Vienna, and was the third child of a Jewish family consisting of a grain merchant and his wife. I trained as a doctor at the University of Vienna Medical School and qualified in 1895. I soon became interested in psychology as it related to physical disorders, and met Sigmund Freud in 1899, with whom I formed the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society with myself as a president. In my early career I was influenced by the mental construct ideas of Hans Vaihinger and developed a theory of organic inferiority and compensation Society of Individual Psychology in 1912. I developed my approach to human personality and published a book defining my key ideas in 1912: Über den nervösen Charakter (The Neurotic Character). I argued that human personality could be explained teleologically, separate strands dominated by the guiding purpose of the individual's unconscious self ideal to convert feelings of inferiority to superiority (or rather completeness). The desires of the self ideal were countered by social and ethical demands. If the corrective factors were disregarded and the individual over-compensated, then an inferiority complex would occur, fostering the danger of the individual becoming egocentric, power-hungry and aggressive or worse. I believe that personality can be distinguished into the getting, avoiding, ruling and socially useful types. Although I differed from Freud in many ways, I did agree with Freud that early childhood experience is important to development, and believe that birth order may influence personality development. This belief was influenced by my feelings of inferiority compared to my older brother and those feelings related to several childhood illness I suffered as I grew.
Following is a brief time line of my life and accomplishments:
1870 Born on February 7th
1888 Began studies atUniversity of Vienna Medical School
1895 Received medical degree from the University of Vienna
1897 Married Raissa Timofeivna Epstein
1898 Established private practice in Vienna
----Birth of first daughter, Valentine
----Published two articles in Austria's "Medical News Bulletin" 1901 Second child, Alexandra, is born
1902 Published two articles in Medical News Bulletin
----Sigmund Freud invited me to join the fledgling Wednesday Psychological Society (later renamed to Vienna Psychoanalytic Society) 1904 Published most important article to date; "The Physician as Educator"
----Converted from Judaism to Protestanism
----Birth of Kurt Adler
1905 Publication of A Study of Organ Inferiority
1909 Birth of Cornelia (daughter)
1911 Expelled from the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society under Freud's impetus
----Formed own group, initially called the Society for Free Psychoanalytic Inquiry
1912 Published The Neurotic Constitution
1913 Renamed my group 'The Society for Individual Psychology'
1914 Published Healing and Education
1916 Drafted as a military physician for the Austro-Hungarian Empire during World War I
1918 Discharged from military service, began emphasizing social feeling in writings
1922 Published The Practice and Theory of Individual Psychology
---Begins setting up educational consulting teams in child guidance for Vienna's public schools
1924 Became a professor at Vienna's Pedagogical Institute
1928 First lecture-tour of the United States.
----Published The Case of Miss R: The Interpretation of a Life Story
1929 Became an adjunct professor at Columbia University, started to shift base of operations from Vienna to New York City
----Published Individual Psychology in the Schools
1931 Published What Life Should Mean to You
1932 Professor at the Long Island College of Medicine, First full-time academic position in the United States
1933 Published Religion and Individual Psychology and Social Interest: A Challenge to Mankind
1937 I died on May 28th, Aberdeen, Scotland which has been quite an interesting experience to say the least.