Karen Horney's theory: Neurotic, Neurotic Needs,Coping Strategies, Self Theory and Womb envy. Slides are made for educational purpose only. Reference is included at the end of the slides.

1. Psychoanalytic
Social Theory
KAREN HORNEY

2. Biography
♥ Born on September 16, 1885 in Germany.
♥ Only daughter of Clotilde and Berndt
Wackels Danielson.
♥ She picture out her father as a harsh
disciplinarian.
♥ She felt deprived of her father’s
affection even though her father brought
her gifts all over the world and even took
her on three long sea voyages.
♥ She developed something of a crush on
her own brother.
♥ 1904- her mother divorced her father.
♥ 1906- she entered medical school.
♥ 1909- she married Oscar Horney, a lawyer.

3. ♥ 1910- gave birth to her first
daughter Brigitte.
♥ 1911- Her mother died.
(Has 3 daughters)
♥ 1923- Oskar's business
collapsed and he developed
meningitis.
♥ 1923, Karen's brother died at
the age of 40 of a pulmonary
infection.
♥ Karen became very depressed.
♥ 1926 – divorce from Husband
and transfer to the U.S.
♥ Have an affair with Fromm.
♥ 1952- She died in her sleep. Karen with her husband and her daughters.

4. Theory
♥ Neurosis
♥ Development of Neurosis
♥ 10 Neurotic Needs
♥ Coping Strategies
♥ Self Theory
♥ Womb Envy

5. Neurosis
Neurosis according to Horney, it is an attempt
to make life bearable.
Irrational defenses against anxiety that
become a permanent part of personality and
that affect behavior.
Neurotic needs are unrealistic, unreasonable
and indiscriminate.
Neurotic need is much more intense.

6. Childhood
• Horney believes that
Childhood has a great
effect on our behavior as
we grow.
• If we felt unloved,
unwanted and so much
negative feelings dominant
our childhood there will be
a big problem when we
grow.
• Abused children has a big
possibility to be
aggressive.

7. Parental Indifference
• “Basic Evil”
• “The road to hell”
• Lack of warm and
affection in childhood.
• It is base in child
perception and not in
Parents’ intention.

8. Basic Hostility
• The first reaction to
Parental Indifference is
anger.
• Protesting injustice.
• Parents are unwilling to
love.
• Parents are incapable to
give love.
• Some children find
hostility as an habitual
response to life’s
difficulties.

9. Basic Anxiety
• Horney believe that
the nutritive soil of
Neurosis is Basic
Anxiety.
• Fear of helplessness
and abandonment.
• Basic Anxiety isn't
neurosis itself.

10. 10 Neurotic Needs
1. The neurotic need for affection and approval.
2. The neurotic need for a partner
3. The neurotic need to restrict one's life to narrow borders
4. The neurotic need for power, for control over others
5. The neurotic need to exploit others and get the better of
them.
6. The neurotic need for social recognition or prestige.
7. The neurotic need for personal admiration.
8. The neurotic need for personal achievement.
9. The neurotic need for self-sufficiency and independence.
10. The neurotic need for perfection and unassailability.

11. 1. The neurotic
need for
affection and
approval.
Normal: It is ok
that we need
affection but we
don’t expect it
from everyone
we meet.
• Neurotic: it is
when we have
indiscriminate
need to please
others and be
liked by them.

12. 2. The neurotic need for a
partner.
Normal: We all want to have a
partner that we can love and can
love us back.
• Neurotic: Partner is someone who
will take over one's life. This
includes the idea that love will
solve all of one's problems.

13. 3. The neurotic need to restrict
one's life to narrow borders.
Normal: It is ok that we want our lives
to be simple to manage.
Neurotic: it is when someone want to
be undemanding, satisfied with little,
to be inconspicuous.
Who hasn't felt the need to simplify
life when it gets too stressful.
They rather join a monastic order,
disappear into routine, or to return
to the womb?

15. 5. The neurotic need to exploit others and get the better of them.
Normal: its ok that we need to have an effect, to have impact, to be heard.
Neurotic: it can become manipulation and the belief that people are there to be
used. It may also involve a fear of being used, of looking stupid. You may have
noticed that the people who love practical jokes more often than not cannot
take being the butt of such a joke themselves!

16. 6. The neurotic need for social recognition or prestige.
Normal: We are social creatures, and sexual ones, and like
to be appreciated.
Neurotic: These people are overwhelmingly concerned with
appearances and popularity. They fear being ignored, be
thought plain, "uncool," or "out of it."

17. 7. The neurotic need for
personal admiration.
Normal: We need to be admired
for inner qualities as well as
outer ones. We need to feel
important and valued.
Neurotic: Some people are more
desperate, and need to remind
everyone of their importance.
Their fear is of being thought
nobodies, unimportant and
meaningless.

18. 8. The neurotic need for personal
achievement.
Normal: There is nothing intrinsically
wrong with achievement far from it!
Neurotic: Some people are obsessed with
personal achievement. They have to be
number one at everything they do.
Since this is, of course, quite a
difficult task, you will find these people
devaluing anything they cannot be
number one in! If they are good
runners, then the discus and the
hammer are "side shows." If academic
abilities are their strength, physical
abilities are of no importance, and so
on.

19. 9. The neurotic need for self-sufficiency and independence.
Normal: We should all cultivate some autonomy.
Neurotic: Some people feel that they shouldn't ever need anybody. They tend to
refuse help and are often reluctant to commit to a relationship.

20. 10. The neurotic need for
perfection and unassailability.
Normal: To become better and
better at life and our special
interests.
Neurotic: Some people are driven
to be perfect and scared of
being flawed. They can't be
caught making a mistake and
need to be in control at all
times.

21. Coping Strategies
Neurotic needs are classified into three coping strategies
Compliance Aggression Withdrawal

22. Coping Strategies
• Compliance:
Neurotic Needs
one, two and three.
• Moving- toward
strategy and self-
effacing solution.
• This person will say
that: “I should be
sweet, self
sacrificing and
saintly”.

23. Coping Strategies
• Aggression:
• Neurotic Needs 4-
8.
• Moving against and
expansive solution.
• This person will
say that: “ I
should powerful,
recognized and a
winner”.

24. Coping Strategies
• Withdrawal:
• Neurotic Needs 9,
10 and 3.
• Moving away and
resigning solution.
• This person will say
that: “I should be
independent, aloof
and perfect”.

25. Self Theory
• Self is the core of your being.
• If you are healthy you have an
accurate consumption of who you
are.
• Neurotic has split consumption.
• Despise self-if you see others
despise you then you take that
inside you.
• Ideal self- if your lacking in some
way, there is some ideals that you
should living up to.
• Ideal self is not a positive goal
because it is unrealistic and
ultimately impossible.

26. Self Theory
Healthy Person Neurotic Person
SELF-REALIZATION
Despised
SELF
Ideal
SELF
Vaccilation

27. Womb Envy
• A male counterpart
to penis envy by S.
Freud.
• Womb envy- is in
some men who feels
envious of a woman’s
ability to bear
children.
• Carrying, bearing and
nurturing their child.

28. That’s All!!! #Aldub u

29. Reference
• Personality Theories: Karen Horney by Dr. C.
George Boeree. Copyright 1997, 2006 C. George Boeree.
– Karen Horney's best book is Neurosis and Human Growth (1950).
– She wrote more "pop" versions called The Neurotic Personality of our Time
(1937) and Our Inner Conflicts (1945). Her thoughts on therapy can be found
in New Ways in Psychoanalysis (1939). For an early insight into feminist
psychology, read Feminine Psychology (1967).
– And to read about selfanalysis read SelfAnalysis (1942).
• Horney’s Theory by Kendra Cherry (Psychology
Expert ), About Education.com

30. Reference
• Disclaimer: I don’t personally own all
the pictures being used. This is just
for illustration purposes so that I can
remember the examples so easily. Its
easy to relate to things that you can
relate, right? I got pictures from…
• 9Gag
• Spiderman
• Mean Girls
• Selfie
• Just you
• And for some just google it.
• Google has everything.
Remember Adolf Hitler?
He could have been a good
painter rather than an evil
killer.
Only if he has a happy
childhood .
Make every child live a
joyful childhood, so they
can remember good things
when they grow up.
-Vee