Humanistic Psychoanalysis

ERICH
FROMM
Humanistic Psychoanalysis
BULONG, Kenneth
ESPIRITU, Yare
UY, Gerald M.
WHO IS ERICH FROMM?
 Born in Frankfurt, Germany, 1900

 Studied law but eventually changed his field of study to
sociology at University of Heidelberg.
 After completing his training at the Berlin Psychoanalytic
Institute, he and Frieda Fromm- Reichmann helped to found
the Frankfurt Psychoanalytic Institute.
 Founder and director of the Mexican Psychoanalytic Institute
 Death at 1980 in Switzerland
WHAT IS HUMANISTIC PSYCHOANALYSIS?
-Humanity’s separation from the

natural world has produced feelings
of loneliness and isolation, a
condition called basic anxiety.
FROMM’ s BASIC ASSUMPTION
-Human Dilemma - Fromm (1947)

- Curse and Blessing of Reason
EXISTENTIAL DICHOTOMIES
1ST Life and death
2ND
“Life is too short to reach that goal”
People are ultimately alone

3RD
RELATEDNESS
- Submission (Negative)
-Domination (Negative)
-Love (Positive)
TRANSCENDENCE
-Destruction (Negative) - we can transcend life by
destroying it and thus rising above our slain
victims
-Creation (Positive) - Although other animals can
create life through reproduction, only humans are
aware of themselves as creators
*Malignant Aggression - only humans can kill

others for reasons other than survival
.
ROOTEDNESS
-Independence from Mother (Positive)-

people are weaned from the orbit of their
mother and become fully born.
-Fixation (Negative) - a tenacious

reluctance to move beyond the protective
security provided by one's mother.
SENSE OF IDENTITY
Adjustment to a Group (Negative) -
Neurotics try to attach themselves to
powerful people or to social or political
institutions.
Individuality (Positive) - Healthy people,

however, have less need to conform to
the herd, less need to give up their sense
of self.
FRAME OF ORIENTATION
-Irrational Goals (Negative) - those who
lack a reliable frame of orientation will
strive to put these events into some sort
of framework in order to make sense of
them.
-Rational Goals (Positive) - People who
possess a solid frame of orientation can
make sense of these events and
phenomena.
BURDEN OF FREEDOM
- As children become more

independent of their mothers, they
gain more freedom to express their
individuality, to move around
unsupervised, to choose their
friends, clothes, and so on.
3 MECHANISMs OF ESCAPE
1ST
Authoritarianism- or the tendency to give
up one’s independence and to unite with a
powerful partner
Destructiveness-an escape mechanism

2ND
aimed at doing away with other people or
things
Conformity- or surrendering of one’s

3RD individuality in order to meet the
wishes of others
POSITIVE FREEDOM
- this represents a successful

solution to the human
dilemma of being part of the
natural world and yet separate
from it.
CHARACTER ORIENTATION
-Similarwith Horney's Neurotic
trends, it is defined as the way a
person relate to the world in
response to how a person solves
his/her existential dilemma and
existential needs that comes with
it.
NON PRODUCTIVE ORIENTATION
Fromm used the term "nonproductive"

to suggest strategies that fail to move
people closer to positive freedom and
self- realization. Personality is always
a blend or combination of several
orientations, even though one
orientation is dominant.
RECEPTIVE CHARACTER
-this feel that the source of all good lies outside

themselves and that the only way they can relate
to the world is to receive things, including love,
knowledge, and material possessions.
The negative qualities - passivity, submissiveness,

and lack of self-confidence.
Positive traits - loyalty, acceptance, and trust.
EXPLOITATIVE CHARACTER
-believe that the source of all good is outside

themselves. They aggressively take what they
desire rather than passively receive it.
Negative traits - exploitative characters are

egocentric, conceited, arrogant, and seducing
Positive traits - Impulsive, proud, charming, and
self-confident.
HOARDING CHARACTER
-seek to save that which they have already
obtained. They hold everything inside and do
not let go of anything. They keep money,
feelings, and thoughts to themselves. They do
not like change.
Negative Traits - rigidity, sterility, obstinacy,

compulsivity, and lack of creativity
Positive Traits - orderliness, cleanliness, and
punctuality.
PRODUCTIVE ORIENTATION
They do not work to exploit others, to market

themselves, to withdraw from others, or to
accumulate needless material possessions. They
are neither lazy nor compulsively active, but use
work as a means of producing life's necessities.
PERSONALITY DISORDER
- If healthy people are able to work,

love, and think productively, then
unhealthy personalities are marked by
problems in these three areas,
especially failure to love
productively.
NECROPHILIA
-Fromm (1964, 1973) used necrophilia in a

more generalized sense to denote any
attraction to death.
- Necrophilic personalities hate humanity; they
are racists, warmongers, and bullies; they
love bloodshed, destruction, terror, and
torture; and they delight in destroying life
MALIGNANT NARCISSISM
-inits malignant form, narcissism

impedes the perception of reality so
that everything belonging to a
narcissistic person is highly valued
and everything belonging to another
is devalued.
INCESTUOUS SYMBIOSIS
-an extreme dependence on the mother

or mother surrogate. People are
inseparable from the host person;
their personalities are blended with
the other person and their individual
identities are lost.
PSYCHOTHERAPY
Compared with Freud, Fromm was much more
concerned with the interpersonal aspects of a
therapeutic encounter. He believed that the aim of
therapy is for patients to come to know themselves.
Fromm believed that patients come to therapy seeking
satisfaction of their basic human needs-relatedness,
transcendence, rootedness, a sense of identity, and a
frame of orientation. Therefore, therapy should be
built on a personal relationship between therapist
and patient.
FROMM’s METHOD OF INVESTIGATION
-Social Character in a Mexican Village - he

found out that marketing character is not
present here since capitalism was not yet
heavily influenced by capitalism.
-Psychohistory of Hitler - According to
Fromm, Hitler is the embodiment of
syndrome of decay
CRITIQUE OF FROMM
1. Falsifiability
2. Did not generate much research
3. Organizes knowledge well since it is covers much
about human personality
4. Guide to action is almost the same with Jung, it is
challenging but far from practical
5. Internally consistency is a bit clunky due to unclear
definition of some concepts/terms
6. Parsimony is low, same with Jung.
THANK
YOU!

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ERICH

 Born in Frankfurt, Germany, 1900

-Humanity’s separation from the

-Human Dilemma - Fromm (1947)

1ST Life and death

People are ultimately alone

*Malignant Aggression - only humans can kill

-Independence from Mother (Positive)-

-Fixation (Negative) - a tenacious

Individuality (Positive) - Healthy people,

- As children become more

Destructiveness-an escape mechanism

Conformity- or surrendering of one’s

- this represents a successful

Fromm used the term "nonproductive"

-this feel that the source of all good lies outside

The negative qualities - passivity, submissiveness,

-believe that the source of all good is outside

Negative traits - exploitative characters are

Negative Traits - rigidity, sterility, obstinacy,

They do not work to exploit others, to market

- If healthy people are able to work,

-Fromm (1964, 1973) used necrophilia in a

-inits malignant form, narcissism

-an extreme dependence on the mother

-Social Character in a Mexican Village - he

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