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Jungian psychology refers to a school of psychology originating in the ideas of Swiss psychologist Carl Jung and advanced by many other thinkers who followed in his tradition. (See also Analytical Psychology and Depth Psychology.) Psychology is an academic and applied field involving the study of the human brain and behavior. ...
Carl Jungs autobiographical work Memories , Dreams, Reflections, Fontana edition Carl Gustav Jung (July 26, 1875, Kesswil, – June 6, 1961, Küsnacht) (IPA: ) was a Swiss psychiatrist and founder of analytical psychology. ...
Analytical psychology is part of the Jungian psychology movement started by Carl Jung and his followers. ...
Depth psychology is a broad term that refers to any psychological approach examining the depth (the hidden or deeper parts) of human experience. ...
Overview The overarching goal of Jungian psychology is the reconciliation of the life of the individual with the world of the supra-personal archetypes. Central to this process is the individual's encounter with the unconscious. The human experiences the unconscious through symbols encountered in all aspects of life: in dreams, art, religion, and the symbolic dramas we enact in our relationships and life pursuits. Essential to the encounter with the unconscious, and the reconciliation of the individual's consciousness with this broader world, is learning this symbolic language. Only through attention and openness to this world (which is quite foreign to the modern Western mind) is the individual able to harmonize their life with these suprapersonal archetypal forces.
"Neurosis" results from a disharmony between the individual's consciousness and the greater archetypal world. The aim of psychotherapy is to assist the individual in reestablishing a healthy relationship to the unconscious (neither being swamped by it — a state characteristic of psychosis — nor completely shut off from it — a state that results in malaise, empty consumerism, narcissism, and a life cut off from deeper meaning). The encounter between consciousness and the symbols arising from the unconscious enriches life and promotes psychological development. Jung considered this process of psychological growth and maturation (which he called the process of individuation) to be of critical importance to the human being, and ultimately to modern society. In modern psychology, the term neurosis, also known as psychoneurosis or neurotic disorder, is a general term that refers to any mental imbalance that causes distress, but (unlike a psychosis or personality disorder) does not prevent rational thought or an individuals ability to function in daily life. ...
In order to undergo the individuation process, the individual must be open to the parts of oneself beyond one's own ego. In order to do this, the modern individual must pay attention to dreams, explore the world of religion and spirituality, and question the assumptions of the operant societal worldview (rather than just blindly living life in accordance with dominant norms and assumptions).
Key terms
The collective unconscious Jung's concept of the collective unconscious has often been misunderstood. In order to understand this concept, it is essential to understand his idea of the archetype, something foreign to the highly rational, scientifically-oriented Western mind; the collective unconscious could be thought of as the DNA of the human psyche. Just as all humans share a common physical heritage and predisposition towards specific physical forms (like having two legs, a heart, etc.) so do all humans have a common psychological predisposition.
However, unlike the quantifiable information that composes DNA (in the form of coded sequences of nucleotides), the collective unconscious is composed of archetypes. In contrast to the objective material world, the subjective realm of archetypes can not be fully plumbed through quantitative modes of research. Instead it can be revealed more fully through an examination of the symbolic communications of the human psyche — in art, dreams, religion, myth, and the themes of human relational/behavioral patterns. Devoting his life to the task of exploring and understanding the collective unconscious, Jung theorized that certain symbolic themes exist across all cultures, all epochs, and in every individual.
The Shadow -
The shadow is an unconscious complex that is defined as the diametrical opposite of the conscious self, the ego. The shadow represents everything that the conscious person does not wish to acknowledge within themselves. For instance, someone who identifies as being kind has a shadow that is harsh or unkind. Conversely, an individual who is brutal has a kind shadow. The shadow of persons who are convinced that they are ugly appears to be beautiful. This article is about the psychological concept. ...
The shadow is not necessarily good or bad. It simply counterbalances some of the one-sided dimensions of our personality. Jung emphasized the importance of being aware of shadow material and incorporating it into conscious awareness, lest one project these attributes onto others.
The shadow in dreams is often represented by dark figures of the same gender as the dreamer, such as gangsters or prostitutes or beggars or liars.
The Self -
Perhaps the most important archetype to Jung would be what he termed the "Self." It could be described as the ultimate pattern of psychological life; he characterized it as both the totality of the personality, conscious and unconscious, and the process of becoming of the whole personality. It could be described as both the goal of one's psychological life and that which pulls one toward it teleologically. One important point to note here about Jung's thinking is that he did not hold to be absolute the four-dimensional space-time continuum that we conventionally conceptualize (see synchronicity). Self might refer to various different things: Look up self on Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...
It has been suggested that Personality psychology be merged into this article or section. ...
In special relativity and general relativity, time and three-dimensional space are treated together as a single four-dimensional pseudo-Riemannian manifold called spacetime. ...
synchronicity - graphic by Christoph Balzar, copyright VG-Bildkunst 2006 Synchronicity is a word coined by the Swiss psychologist Carl Jung to describe the temporally coincident occurrences of acausal events. ...
We can better understand Jung's views of the Self by looking at two other archetypal or structural views that were highly important to him: the idea of "the opposites" and his work describing many old, largely despised and forgotten alchemical texts. Jung saw these texts as valuable psychological treatises rather than dry descriptions of arcane magical practices. For other uses, see Alchemy (disambiguation). ...
The Complex -
Early in Jung's career he coined the term and described the concept of the "complex". Jung claims to have discovered the concept during his free association and galvanic skin response experiments. Freud obviously took up this concept in his Oedipus complex amongst others. Jung seemed to see complexes as quite autonomous parts of psychological life. It is almost as if Jung were describing separate personalities within what is considered a single individual. But to equate Jung's use of complexes with something along the lines of multiple personality disorder would be to stretch the point beyond breaking. In psychology a complex is generally an important group of unconscious associations, or a strong unconscious impulse lying behind an individuals otherwise mysterious condition: the detail varies widely from theory to theory. ...
In psychology a complex is generally an important group of unconscious associations, or a strong unconscious impulse lying behind an individuals otherwise mysterious condition: the detail varies widely from theory to theory. ...
A Free Association is an association which meets certain mostly negative criteria. ...
Galvanic skin response (or GSR), also known as electrodermal response (EDR) or psychogalvanic reflex (PGR), is a method of measuring the electrical resistance of the skin and interpreting it as an image of activity in certain parts of the body. ...
The Oedipus complex or Oedipus conflict is a concept developed by Sigmund Freud to explain the origin of certain neuroses in childhood. ...
Overview In psychiatry, Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) is the current name of the condition formerly listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders as Multiple Personality Disorder (MPD) and Multiple Personality Syndrome. ...
Jung saw an archetype as always being the central organizing structure of a complex. For instance, in a "negative mother complex," the archetype of the "negative mother" would be seen to be central to the identity of that complex. This is to say, our psychological lives are patterned on common human experiences. Interestingly, Jung saw the Ego (which Freud wrote about in German literally as the "I", one's conscious experience of oneself) as a complex. If the "I" is a complex, what might be the archetype that structures it? Jung, and many Jungians, might say "the hero," one who separates from the community to ultimately carry the community further. This article or section may be confusing or unclear for some readers, and should be edited to rectify this. ...
From the Greek , in mythology and folklore, a hero (male) or heroine (female). ...
Clinical Theories -
Jung's writings have been of much interest to people of many backgrounds and interests, including theologians, people from the humanities, and mythologists. Jung often seemed to seek to make contributions to various fields, but he was mostly a practicing psychiatrist, involved during his whole career in treating patients. A description of Jung's clinical relevance is to address the core of his work. Psychoanalysis is a family of psychological theories and methods based on the pioneering work of Sigmund Freud. ...
Analytical psychology is part of the Jungian psychology movement started by Carl Jung and his followers. ...
Jung started his career working with hospitalized patients with major mental illnesses, most notably schizophrenia. He was interested in the possibilities of an unknown "brain toxin" that could be the cause of schizophrenia. But the majority and the heart of Jung's clinical career was taken up with what we might call today individual psychodynamic psychotherapy, in gross structure very much in the strain of psychoanalytic practice first formed by Freud. Mental illness (or emotional disability, cognitive dysfunction) is a broad generic label for a category of illnesses that may include affective or emotional instability, behavioral dysregulation, and/or cognitive dysfunction or impairment. ...
Psychodynamic psychotherapy is a type of psychotherapy, usually meeting about once or twice a week. ...
Look up Psychotherapy in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...
It is important to state that Jung seemed to often see his work as not a complete psychology in itself but as his unique contribution to the field of psychology. Jung claimed late in his career that only for about a third of his patients did he use "Jungian analysis." For another third, Freudian psychology seemed to best suit the patient's needs and for the final third Adlerian analysis was most appropriate. In fact, it seems that most contemporary Jungian clinicians merge a developmentally grounded theory, such as Self psychology or Donald Winnicott's work, with the Jungian theories in order to have a "whole" theoretical repertoire to do actual clinical work. Adlerian is an umbrella term that encompasses a diversity of approaches to psychology and psychotherapy generally related to the ideas of Alfred Adler. ...
The self is a key construct in several schools of psychology. ...
Donald Woods Winnicott (7 April 1896 - January 28, 1971) was a pediatrician and psychoanalyst. ...
The "I" or Ego is tremendously important to Jung's clinical work. Jung's theory of etiology of psychopathology could almost be simplified to be stated as a too rigid conscious attitude towards the whole of the psyche. That is, a psychotic episode can be seen from a Jungian perspective as the "rest" of the psyche overwhelming the conscious psyche because the conscious psyche effectively was locking out and repressing the psyche as a whole. eGO is a company that builds electric motor scooters which are becoming popular for urban transportation and vacation use. ...
Psychopathology is a term which refers to either the study of mental illness or mental distress the manifestation of behaviours and experiences which may be indicative of mental illness or psychological impairment. ...
Psychosis is a generic psychiatric term for a mental state in which thought and perception are severely impaired. ...
A repressed memory, according to some theories of psychology, is a memory (often traumatic) of an event or environment which is stored by the unconscious mind but outside the awareness of the conscious mind. ...
John Weir Perry's book The Farside of Madness explores and fleshes out this idea of Jung's very well. Note: this is a psychological description of a psychotic episode.
Jung hypothesized a medical basis for schizophrenia that was beyond the understanding of the medical science of his day (and seems to still be beyond present medical science in a satisfactory sense). Twin studies and plenty of clinical material seem to point clearly to a medical basis for schizophrenia. It perhaps can best be said that schizophrenia is both medical and psychological. A medical understanding (again, as yet still lacking) would not change the fact that schizophrenia is lived by those who have it psychologically; that is to say, as theorists and scientists, we may be able to say that schizophrenia happens in genes, brains, and the electrochemical, but for one who has schizophrenia it also happens in their mind and experience. This is to say a purely medical treatment of major mental illness is inadequate, as is a purely psychological treatment of major mental illness.
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