Analytical psychology facts for kids

A portrait of Carl Jung

Analytical psychology (sometimes analytic psychology), also called Jungian psychology, is a school of psychotherapy which originated in the ideas of Carl Jung, a Swiss psychiatrist. It emphasizes the importance of the individual psyche and the personal quest for wholeness.

Important concepts in Jung's system are individuation, symbols, the personal unconscious, the collective unconscious, archetypes, complexes, the persona, the shadow, the anima and animus, and the self.

Analytical psychology is distinct from psychoanalysis, which is a psychotherapeutic system created by Sigmund Freud.

The basic assumption is that the personal unconscious is a potent part — probably the more active part — of the normal human psyche. Reliable communication between the conscious and unconscious parts of the psyche is necessary for wholeness.

Analytical psychology distinguishes between a personal unconscious and a collective unconscious. The collective unconscious contains archetypes common to all human beings. That is, individuation may bring to surface symbols that do not relate to the life experiences of a single person.

This content is more easily viewed as answers to the more fundamental questions of humanity: life, death, meaning, happiness, fear. Among these more spiritual concepts may arise and be integrated into the personality.

Images for kids

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  An 1890 etching of Burghölzli hospital where Carl Jung began his career

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  Still talking, Jung with psychoanalytic colleagues. Front row, Sigmund Freud, G. Stanley Hall, Carl Jung. Back row, Abraham Brill, Ernest Jones, Sándor Ferenczi. 1909 in front of Clark University.

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  Psychology of the Unconscious (1916), the book which precipitated Jung's break with Freud

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  The C.G. Jung Institute in Kusnacht, Switzerland

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  An example of a sandplay scenario

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  Main critics of Analytical Psychology: seated from left to right: Sigmund Freud, Sándor Ferenczi (IPA-President 1918–19), Hanns Sachs; standing: Otto Rank, Karl Abraham (IPA-President 1914–18 und 1924–25), Max Eitingon (IPA-President 1925–32), Ernest Jones (IPA-President 1920–24 and 1932–49). photo 1922.

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  Aurora thesaurusque philosophorum 1577 title page of a work by Paracelsus, studied by Jung

See also

In Spanish: Psicología analítica para niños