Carl Jung’s Theory: Personality Types and How They Help Therapists
In this essay I aim to describe and evaluate Carl Jung’s theory concerning personality types and show how they might usefully help a therapist to determine therapeutic goals. I will also look at the origins and characteristics of attitudes and functions and show how these can be related to psychological disturbance.
Swiss psychologist Carl Gustav Jung was born in 1875 to a reverend who had lost his faith and was the only surviving son; which lent him to a rather solitary childhood which was emotionally deprived. His mother had bouts of mental anguish and illness and spent long periods of time in hospital. He was a lazy scholar and pretended to faint regularly to avoid school work, but after hearing his father voicing concerns he would amount to nothing in life, he stopped this and engaged with his studies. This is relevant in that he used this experience of his own behaviour as an example of how neurotic behaviour can be overcome when subjected to the realities of life.
Jung studied medicine at University, then trained as a psychiatrist specialising in schizophrenia. He spent time studying with Freud, with Freud even seeing Jung as his main partisan, but he struggled with Freud’s theory of everything being influenced by sexuality and they split their alliance in 1913. Jung was deeply affected by this split and experienced his own psychological ‘crisis’ resulting in him withdrawing to Zurich for six years, exploring his own unconscious. Patients still visited him however and he became renowned worldwide for his skills as a psychoanalyst.
“During this period, Jung spent considerable time working on his dreams and fantasies and seeking to understand them as far as possible, in terms of his everyday life” (Memories, Dreams, Reflections p.170, New York Vintage Books), this led to Jung developing his own theories and he travelled far and wide becoming fascinated with how culture affects the psyche (the word he uses for personality).
This fascination with culture
Swiss psychologist Carl Gustav Jung was born in 1875 to a reverend who had lost his faith and was the only surviving son; which lent him to a rather solitary childhood which was emotionally deprived. His mother had bouts of mental anguish and illness and spent long periods of time in hospital. He was a lazy scholar and pretended to faint regularly to avoid school work, but after hearing his father voicing concerns he would amount to nothing in life, he stopped this and engaged with his studies. This is relevant in that he used this experience of his own behaviour as an example of how neurotic behaviour can be overcome when subjected to the realities of life.
Jung studied medicine at University, then trained as a psychiatrist specialising in schizophrenia. He spent time studying with Freud, with Freud even seeing Jung as his main partisan, but he struggled with Freud’s theory of everything being influenced by sexuality and they split their alliance in 1913. Jung was deeply affected by this split and experienced his own psychological ‘crisis’ resulting in him withdrawing to Zurich for six years, exploring his own unconscious. Patients still visited him however and he became renowned worldwide for his skills as a psychoanalyst.
“During this period, Jung spent considerable time working on his dreams and fantasies and seeking to understand them as far as possible, in terms of his everyday life” (Memories, Dreams, Reflections p.170, New York Vintage Books), this led to Jung developing his own theories and he travelled far and wide becoming fascinated with how culture affects the psyche (the word he uses for personality).
This fascination with culture
Bibliography: Begg, Deike Synchronicity – 2001 Hayes, Nicky Foundations of Psychology – 1994 Jung, Carl Collected Works – Volume 8 – The Structure & Dynamics of the Psyche Jung, Carl Collected Works – Volume 12 – Psychology and Alchemy N. York Vintage Books Memories, Dreams, Reflections Mattoon, Mary Ann Jung and The Human Pscyhe