Karen Horney facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Karen Horney
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| Born |
Karen Danielsen
16 September 1885 |
| Died | 4 December 1952 (aged 67) New York City, U.S.
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| Nationality | German |
| Spouse(s) | Oskar Horney |
| Children | 3 |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Psychoanalysis |
| Influences | Freud, Karl Abraham, Hanns Sachs |
| Influenced | Susan Quinn |
Karen Horney (born Danielsen; 16 September 1885 – 4 December 1952) was a German psychoanalyst. She later worked in the United States. Her ideas questioned some of the traditional views of Freud. She is known for starting feminist psychology. Karen Horney believed that differences in how men and women think and feel came from society and culture, not from biology.
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Karen Horney's Ideas About Psychology
Karen Horney is often called a neo-Freudian thinker. This means she built on Freud's ideas but also changed them. She was part of a group called The Cultural School. This group believed that culture and society play a big role in how our minds work.
Karen Horney's Early Life
Karen Danielsen was born on September 16, 1885, in Blankenese, Germany. This town is near Hamburg.
Her father, Berndt Wackels Danielsen, was a ship captain. He was very traditional and strict. Her mother, Clotilde, was more open-minded. But she was also described as often sad and bossy towards Karen.
Karen had an older brother named Berndt, whom she cared for deeply. She also had four older half-siblings from her father's first marriage. However, she did not have contact with them.
Karen started writing in her diaries when she was thirteen. These diaries showed she was confident about her future. She wanted to become a doctor. At that time, women were not usually allowed to attend universities. Karen felt her father favored her brother more. Even though he brought her gifts from faraway places, she felt he didn't show her enough affection. She became very close to her mother instead.
Around age nine, Karen became ambitious and a bit rebellious. She thought she wasn't pretty. So, she decided to focus on her intelligence. She developed a crush on her older brother, but he pushed her away. After this, she started to experience periods of deep sadness. This sadness would affect her throughout her life.
In 1904, when Karen was 19, her mother left her father. She took the children with her.
Karen Horney's Education and Family Life
Karen Horney went to medical school in 1906, even though her parents didn't want her to. The University of Freiburg was one of the first German schools to let women study medicine. Women were only allowed into higher education in Germany starting in 1900. She later transferred to the University of Göttingen and then to the University of Berlin. She earned her medical degree in 1913. It was common then to attend several universities for a basic medical education.
At university, she met Oskar Horney, a business student. They married in 1909. They moved to Berlin, where Oskar worked in industry. Karen continued her studies at the Charité hospital.
Within one year, Karen had her first child and lost both of her parents. She started seeing a psychoanalyst to help her cope. Her first analyst was Karl Abraham in 1910. Later, she saw Hanns Sachs.
Karen and Oskar had three daughters. Their first daughter, Brigitte Horney, born in 1911, became a famous actress.
Karen Horney's Career and Major Works
In 1920, Karen Horney helped start the Berlin Psychoanalytic Institute. She became a teacher there. She helped create and later led the training program. She taught students and did research in psychoanalysis. She also saw patients in her private practice and continued working at the hospital.
By 1923, Oskar Horney's company faced financial problems. Soon after, Oskar became very ill. He became bitter and difficult. In the same year, Karen's brother died. Both events made Karen's mental health worse. She went through another period of deep sadness.
In 1926, Karen and Oskar separated. They divorced in 1937. She and her three daughters moved out of Oskar's house. Karen felt Oskar was too much like her strict father. After learning more about psychology, she wished she had stood up to him more when their children were younger.
Even though her ideas were different from Freud's, she continued to teach at the Berlin Psychoanalytic Society until 1932. Freud became less supportive of her. Also, she was worried about the rise of Nazism in Germany. So, she accepted an invitation to work in the United States. In 1932, she and her daughters moved to Chicago.
Two years later, Horney moved to Brooklyn, New York. Brooklyn had a large Jewish community, including many refugees from Nazi Germany. Psychoanalysis was very popular there. In Brooklyn, Horney became friends with other analysts like Harry Stack Sullivan and Erich Fromm.
While in Brooklyn, Horney taught and trained psychoanalysts in New York City. She worked at the New School for Social Research and the New York Psychoanalytic Institute.
It was in Brooklyn that Horney developed her ideas about neurosis and personality. These ideas came from her work with patients in psychotherapy. In 1937, she published The Neurotic Personality of Our Time. This book became very popular. By 1941, Horney was the Dean of the American Institute of Psychoanalysis. This was a training institute for her own organization, the Association for the Advancement of Psychoanalysis. She started this group because she was not happy with how strict the main psychoanalytic community was.
Horney's different ideas led her to leave her teaching job. She then started teaching at the New York Medical College. She also started a journal called the American Journal of Psychoanalysis. She continued teaching and working as a psychiatrist until she passed away in 1952.
Karen Horney's Theory of Neurosis
Karen Horney had a different view of neurosis than other psychoanalysts of her time. She believed that neurosis is a continuous process. She thought it could happen at different times in a person's life. Other experts believed neurosis was a problem caused by big negative events, like losing a loved one or bad experiences in childhood.
Horney thought that childhood experiences were very important. She believed that a child's feelings about what happens, not just what the parents intended, were key to understanding neurosis. For example, if a parent makes fun of a child's feelings, the child might feel a lack of love. Or if a parent often breaks promises, it could harm the child's emotional well-being.
From her work, Horney identified ten patterns of "neurotic needs." These needs are based on things she thought all humans need to do well in life. But for people with neurosis, these needs become extreme. A person with neurosis might show many of these needs, but not all ten are required for someone to be considered neurotic.
Ten Neurotic Needs
Horney grouped these ten needs into three main ways people cope:
- Moving Toward People (Compliance)
* 1. The need for affection and approval: wanting to please others and be liked. * 2. The need for a partner: someone to love who will solve all problems. * 3. The need for social recognition: wanting to be seen as important or famous.
- Moving Against People (Aggression)
* 4. The need for power: wanting to control others. While most people want strength, a neurotic person might desperately seek it. * 5. The need to use others: wanting to get the better of people. Believing others are just there to be used.
- Moving Away from People (Withdrawal)
* 6. The need for personal achievement: wanting to achieve a lot. While many people want to achieve, a neurotic person might desperately seek it. * 7. The need for self-sufficiency and independence: wanting to be completely on their own and not need anyone. * 8. The need for perfection: wanting everything to be perfect and fearing any flaws. * 9. The need to limit life: wanting to live a very quiet and unnoticed life. * 10. The need for personal admiration: wanting to be valued for both inner and outer qualities.
Three Categories of Needs
Horney later grouped these ten needs into three main coping styles:
- Compliance (Moving Toward People)
* This includes the needs for affection, approval, and a partner. People using this style try to join in, submit, or make themselves seem less important. Children who have problems with their parents often use this. They fear being helpless or abandoned. People in this group want approval from others. They might look for a partner to solve all their problems. They also tend to avoid making demands and want to be unnoticed.
- Aggression (Moving Against People)
* This includes the needs to exploit others, for social recognition, personal admiration, and personal achievement. Neurotic children or adults in this group often show anger or hostility towards others. They need power and control. They might manipulate others, believing people are just there to be used. They also want to be recognized, perhaps even feared, by others. They seek personal admiration and achievement. These individuals tend to keep people around them but only care about their own wants and needs.
- Detachment (Moving Away from People)
* This includes the needs for perfection and to restrict life practices. When neither aggression nor compliance works, children might try to become self-sufficient. People using this style ignore others in a non-aggressive way. They see being alone and independent as the best path. They might strive for perfection above all else, to the point where any flaw is unacceptable. Everything they do must be perfect. They hide or deny their feelings towards others, especially love and hate.
Horney explained these needs and coping styles in detail in her book Neurosis and Human Growth.
Narcissism
Karen Horney saw narcissism differently from other thinkers like Freud. She believed that narcissistic traits are not something we are born with. Instead, she thought they develop from a certain kind of early environment. For her, narcissism comes from being overly indulged rather than from a lack of something.
However, a narcissist's self-esteem is not strong. This is because it is not based on real achievements.
Feminine Psychology
Karen Horney was a leader in the field of feminine psychology. As one of the first female psychiatrists, she was the first known woman to present a paper on this topic. Fourteen of her papers written between 1922 and 1937 were put together in a book called Feminine Psychology (1967).
As a woman, she felt that the study of female behavior was ignored. Women were often seen only for their charm and beauty. Horney believed this was wrong, as every person's goal is to reach their full potential.
Horney believed that women traditionally found their value only through their children and family. She challenged the old-fashioned idea of how marriage should be. Her work "The Problem of the Monogamous Ideal" focused on marriage. Her essay "Maternal Conflicts" looked at the challenges women face when raising teenagers.
Horney thought that both men and women want to be creative and productive. Women can satisfy this need naturally by becoming pregnant and giving birth. Men satisfy this need in other ways. Horney suggested that the great achievements of men in work or other fields could be a way to make up for their inability to have children.
Horney also wrote one of the first "self-help" books in 1946, called Are You Considering Psychoanalysis?. In this book, she suggested that people with minor neurotic problems could help themselves. She always stressed that self-awareness was key to becoming a better, stronger person.
Karen Horney's Later Theory
In the mid-1930s, Horney stopped writing about feminine psychology. She became more interested in the topic of neurosis. Her later theory of neurosis is considered a major contribution to understanding personality.
Self-Realization
Near the end of her career, Karen Horney summarized her ideas in her main work, Neurosis and Human Growth, published in 1950. In this book, she explained her three neurotic "solutions" to life's stresses.
She believed that people with neurosis have a much deeper and stronger desire to fulfill these needs than non-neurotic individuals.
Theory of the Self
Horney shared the view of Abraham Maslow that all people try to reach their full potential, which she called "self-actualization". By "self," she meant the core of who you are and what you can become. Horney believed that if we truly understand ourselves, we can achieve our goals within reasonable limits. So, she thought that self-actualization is the goal of a healthy person's life.
According to Horney, we have two views of ourselves: the "real self" and the "ideal self." The real self is who we actually are, with our strengths and weaknesses. The ideal self is the person we feel we should be. The ideal self can help the real self grow and reach its potential. But it's important to know the difference between these two.
For a person with neurosis, their self is split between an idealized self and a real self. They feel they don't live up to their ideal self. They think there's something wrong with them compared to who they "should" be. The goals they set are often not realistic. The real self then becomes a "despised self," which the neurotic person believes is their "true" self. This creates a back-and-forth struggle between a false "perfection" and self-hate. Horney called this the "tyranny of the shoulds" and a hopeless "search for glory." She believed these deep-seated traits prevent a person from reaching their potential unless the cycle of neurosis is broken, either through therapy or life lessons.
Karen Horney Clinic
The Karen Horney Clinic opened on May 6, 1955, in New York City. It was created to honor Horney's achievements. The clinic aims to research and train medical professionals, especially in mental health. It also serves as a low-cost treatment center. Some patients receive supportive psychotherapy and psychoanalytic psychotherapy, all based on Horney's ideas.
Works by Karen Horney
The following books by Karen Horney are still available:
- Neurosis and Human Growth, 1950.
- Are You Considering Psychoanalysis?, 1946.
- Our Inner Conflicts, 1945.
- Self-analysis, 1942.
- New Ways in Psychoanalysis, 1939.
- The Neurotic Personality of our Time, 1937.
- Feminine Psychology (a collection of papers from 1922-1937), 1967.
- The Collected Works of Karen Horney (2 vols.), 1950.
- The Adolescent Diaries of Karen Horney, 1980.
- The Therapeutic Process: Essays and Lectures, edited by Bernard J. Paris, 1999.
- The Unknown Karen Horney: Essays on Gender, Culture, and Psychoanalysis, edited by Bernard J. Paris, 2000.
- Final Lectures, edited by Douglas H. Ingram, 1991.
See also
In Spanish: Karen Horney para niños
