Voting Station

Alfred Adler

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Doctor

The Resume

    (February 7, 1870-May 28, 1937)
    Born in Vienna, Austria
    Eye doctor, neurologist and psychiatrist
    Wrote 'The Neurotic Character' (1907), 'The Practice and Theory of Individual Psychology' (1927) and 'What Life Should Mean To You' (1931)
    Introduced the concept of the inferiority complex to psychiatry
    Founder of the school of individual psychology

Why he might be annoying:

    He hated being described as a 'pupil' of Freud instead of a 'colleague.'
    Anyone else think it is no coincidence that the guy who came up with the inferiority complex was prone to comments like, 'My eldest brother is a good industrious fellow. He was always ahead of me -- and for that matter, he is still ahead of me.'
    He described homosexuals as among the 'failures of life.'
    He died during a lecture tour in Scotland and his cremated remains were lost for seven decades before being rediscovered and buried in Vienna.

Why he might not be annoying:

    He developed rickets which left him unable to walk until age four.
    He encouraged a non-authoritarian relation between the doctor and patient, including eliminating the psychiatric couch in favor of a pair of chairs.
    Unlike Freud and Jung, he did not insist that his theories were the only possible explanation for human behavior.
    He was described by one author as 'one of the healthiest figures in the early days of psychology.'
    His death may have been caused from stress after learning that his oldest daughter, Valentina, had been sent to a Soviet gulag during one of Stalin's purges.

Credit: C. Fishel


Featured in the following Annoying Collections:

Year In Review:

    In 2023, Out of 5 Votes: 20.0% Annoying
    In 2022, Out of 2 Votes: 0% Annoying
    In 2021, Out of 11 Votes: 81.82% Annoying
    In 2020, Out of 1 Votes: 100% Annoying
    In 2019, Out of 2 Votes: 100% Annoying
    In 2018, Out of 5 Votes: 20.0% Annoying
    In 2017, Out of 2 Votes: 100% Annoying
    In 2016, Out of 5 Votes: 40.0% Annoying
    In 2015, Out of 5 Votes: 60.0% Annoying
    In 2014, Out of 8 Votes: 75.00% Annoying
    In 2013, Out of 8 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2012, Out of 10 Votes: 60.0% Annoying