Evening star., 1937-01-11
ADLER DISPUTED
ON LIFE THEORY
Town Hall Lecture Raises
Issue as to Individual
Psychology.

DR. Alfred Adler, the eminent
viennese psychiatrist who invented
"inferiority complex" believes firmly
IN the major tenents of the Sermon
on the Mount" and he also Is con-
vinced 1t would be excellent If there
were no sin in the world.
His technique for bringing about
mis- blissful state, which he expounded
ut Town Hall at the Shoreham Hotel
last night, didn't appeal very strong
" to DR.. Ernest T. Hadley, Washing
ton psychiatrist, and the devastating
iy cynical DR.. Harry Stack Sullivan
Of New York, who sat on the panel
DIR. Adler's system of individual
psychology" which he now is pro-
mitigating at the Long Island College
of Medicine, holds that Americas vast
number of neurotics and growing
numbers of criminals all arise from
. common cauSe-lack of social in
terest with or without activity. II
one has scant social interest and a
lot of energy, one is likely to become
q criminal, he holds. Without energy
the result Is neurosis.
Corrections Required.
This lack of social interest, he holds,
results from conditionings established
in the first three or four years of life.
They could be corrected, he believes,
II all the school teachers who take
charge of children just after these
formative years were individual psy-
biologists"
No general system can be laid down,
DR.. Adler said. Every case must be
analyzed and dealt with according to
its own peculiarities. Once the schools
were set up as individual psychology
clinics, he believes, the children would
take what they had learned back to
the homes and help reform criminal
parents.
If crimes could be cut in half, DR..
Adler said, the United States would
save $7,000,000000 a year, although
there would be the problem of finding
other employment for jailers, judges,
lawyers and others who now make an
honest living out of it. Therefore,
DR.. Adler argued. how could anybody
with the good of mankind at heart
oppose the expense of using schools
as psychological clinics
DR.. Sullivan wanted to know what
he meant by "sin," the concept Of
which varies enormously in time and
place, and gave rather dreary picture
of a sinless world as one in which
everybody was spending all his spare
time trying to convert everybody else
to his own particular brand of right
eousneSS. Besides, DR.. Sullivan didn't
think it would work. He has dealt
with some tough actors in his day and
has not been able to find any common
factor responsible for their departures
from the normal.
Result Doubted by Hadley.
DR.. Hadley also was dubious of the
sort Of world which would result from
DR.. Adlers system, even If it did work
The very attitude of avoidance of
society, he pointed out, Is often the
atmosphere in which genius develops.
DR.. Adler's reformed race might be
characterized by an intolerably dreary
sameneSs.
DR.. Adler's writings are much
more convincing than his lecture, but
he pleaded that he couldn't be ex-
pected to 60 into the fine points of
his technique in half an hour. As
he outlined it in brief:
The small child gets a bad bump
out of its first contacts with the
world.
To save itself from any more such
bumps, it avoids, as far as possible,
any future contacts or adopts a hos
tile attitude toward the world and
seeks revenge.
These attitudes subconsciously color
its whole personality as it grows up.
The avoider adopts all sorts of
schemes to stay clear Of normal asso-
Citations with people. One. frequently
encountered, is "laziness." The lazy
man, DR.. Adler believes, is a fellow
who is afraid Of competitive activity
and, as an excuse, makes a fetish of
doing nothing. He is proud of his
own inertia. It's much better to have
folks say of him, Hes too lazy to
work." than He's too dumb to do this
or that" The lazy" reaction works
q few times with the child and conse-
quently becomes built into the individ-
ual's habit system.
The cry-baby attitude also often
works and produces a very disagree
able, but often very successful type of
individual. Folks make the way easy
for him because they pity him, with
the result that he often gets much
further ahead in life than the far
more competent persons with whom
he associates.
EnTYFSArrnNA