SULLIVAN:
INTERPERSONAL THEORY
SULLIVAN:
Interpersonal Theory
Eduard Canares
Alleah Bustillo
BSSW, AS12
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Overview of
Interpersonal Theory 1 3
“
Harry Stack Sullivan believed that people
develop their personality within a social
context
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“
◉ Sullivan insists repeatedly that personality is
a purely hypothetical entity, “an illusion”
which cannot be observed or studied apart
interpersonal situations.
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◉ His Interpersonal Theory emphasizes the
importance of various developmental
stages:
infancy, childhood, juvenile era,
preadolescence, early adolescence,
late adolescence, and adulthood.
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Biography of Harry
Stack Sullivan 2 7
Harry Stack Sullivan
Born Feb. 21, 1892
Oldest existing son of
poor Irish Catholic parents
Lonely childhood
existence
Poor relationship with
father
Close friendship with
Clarence Bellinger
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Harry Stack Sullivan
Academically gifted
Poor academic
performance in freshmen
year at Cornell
Suffered a schizophrenic
breakdown
Enrolled for Medicine,
received degree 2 years
after graduation
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Harry Stack Sullivan
Work with William Alanson Died of Cerebral
White Hemorrhage on Jan 14,
Private practice in New 1949
York Rumors of homosexuality
Zodiac Group
His therapy was neither
psychoanalytic nor neo-
Freudian
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Energy System
or Tensions 3 11
1.Tensions
(potentiality for action) or as action
themselves
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Tensions
a. Needs b. Anxiety
These are tensions brought It s disjunctive, is more
on by biological imbalance diffuse and not clear, and
between a person and the calls forth no consistent
physiochemical actions for its relief. Interfere
environment, both inside the satisfaction of needs.
and outside the organism.
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a. Needs Conjunctive; they help integrate personality
1. General needs (facilitate the overall well-being of a
person)
1.1 Interpersonal (tenderness, intimacy, and love)
1.2 Physiological (food, oxygen, water etc)
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a. Needs Conjunctive; they help integrate personality
2. Zonal needs (may also satisfy general needs)
2.1 oral
2.2 genital
2.3 manual
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b. Anxiety
Is the experience of tension that results from
real or imaginary threats tom one’s security
How does anxiety
originate?
Sullivan postulated that it is transferred from the parent
to the infant through the process of EMPATHY.
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b. Anxiety
How does anxiety
originate?
Anxiety in the mothering one inevitably induces
anxiety in the infant. Because all mothers have
some amount of anxiety while caring for their
babies, all infants will become anxious to some
degree
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Anxiety
is the chief disruptive force blocking the development of
healthy interpersonal relations.
it produces behaviors that:
1. prevent people from learning from their mistakes
2. keep people pursuing a childish wish for security
3. generally ensure that people will not learn from their
experience.
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2. Energy transformations
transform tensions into either covert or overt
behaviors and are at satisfying need and reducing
anxiety.
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Energy system
Energy
Tension
transformation
Need Anxiety
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DYNAMISMS 4 21
Dynamisms
it is the smallest unit that can be employed in
the study of the individual.
“ the relatively enduring pattern of energy
transformations, which recurrently characterize the
organism in its duration as a living organism”
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Two major Classes of Dynamisms
1. Specific zones of the body including the mouth, anus and genital
2. Related tensions
a. Disjunctive dynamisms include destructive patterns of
behavior that are related to the concept of Malevolence.
b. Isolating dynamisms include those behavior pattern such as
lust that are unrelated to interpersonal relations
c. Conjunctive dynamisms include beneficial behavior patterns,
such as intimacy and self-system.
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Malevolence
is the disjunctive dynamism of evil and hatred,
characterized by the feeling of living among one’s
enemies.
it originates around age of 2 or 3 years when
children’s actions that earlier brought about maternal
tenderness are rebuffed, ignored, or met anxiety or
pain.
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Intimacy
grows out of the earlier need for tenderness but is
more specific and involves a close interpersonal
relationship between two people who are more or less
of equal status. Intimacy must not be confused with
sexual interest.
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Lust
is an isolating tendency, requiring no
other person for its satisfaction. It manifest
itself as autoerotic behavior even when
another person is the object of one’s lust.
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Self-System
it is the most complex and inclusive of all the
dynamisms, a consistent pattern of behaviors
that maintains people’s interpersonal security
by protecting them from anxiety.
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Self-System
it is the principal stumbling block to favorable changes in
personality
As a consequence, people attempt to defend themselves against
interpersonal tensions by means of security operation, the purpose of
which is to reduce feelings of insecurity or anxiety that result from
endangered self-esteem.
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Two important security operations
Dissociation
includes those impulses, desires and needs that a person
refuses to allow into awareness.
Selective inattention
it is the refusal to see those things that we do not wish to see. It differs
from dissociation in both degree and origin. Selectively inattended experiences
are more accessible to awareness and more limited in scope.
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Personification 5 30
Personification
It is an image that an individual has of him or herself or
of other person. It is a complex of feelings, attitudes, and
conceptions that grows out of experiences with need-
satisfaction and anxiety.
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Bad-Mother, Good-Mother
Sullivan’s notion of the bad-mother and good-mother is similar to Klein’s
concept of the bad breast and good breast.
Bad-Mother personification- grows out of the infant’s experiences with
bad-nipple.
Good-Mother personification- is based on the tender and cooperative
behaviors of the mothering one.
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Me Personifications
Bad-me personification-fashioned from experiences of
punishment and disapproval that infants receive
from their mothering one.
Good-me Personification- results from infants’
experiences with reward and approval.
Not-me personification- may be cause from severe
anxiety
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Eidetic Personifications
Unrealistic traits or imaginary friends
that many children invent in order to
protect their self-esteem.
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Levels of
Cognition 6 35
Levels of Cognition
It refers to ways of perceiving, imagining,
and conceiving
Sullivan divided cognition into three
levels or modes of experience: Prototaxic
Parataxic, and Syntaxic.
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Prototaxic Level
the earliest and most primitive experiences of an infant take
place. Because this experience cannot be communicated to others,
they are difficult to describe or define.
Parataxic Level
• Experiences area prelogical and usually result when a
person assumes a cause-and-effect relationship between two
events that occur coincidentally.
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Syntaxic level
Experiences that are consensually validated that can be
symbolically communicated take place on a syntaxic
level. Consensually validated experiences are those
who meaning two or more persons agree.
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Stages of
Development 7 39
Stage 1 :Infancy
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Stage 2 :Childhood
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Stage 3: Juvenile Era
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Stage 4:Preadolescence
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Stage 5: Early Adolescence
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Stage 6: Late Adolescence
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Stage 7: Adulthood
The successful completion of late adolescence
culminates in adulthood, a period when people can
establish a love relationship, Sullivan stated that” this
really highly developed intimacy with another is not
the principal source of satisfaction in life’
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THANKS!
Any questions?
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“
Everyone is much more simply human than
otherwise
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