The Researcher's Foreword
Modern psychology is considered one of the most important achievements of the twentieth century. Its theorists sought to complete what philosophers and therapists had begun in exploring the depths of the human psyche, starting from the view that human development begins from the inside (the human psyche) and moves outward to the natural world.
From this starting point I chose the subject of this research, which deals with modern psychoanalytic theories. Because psychological research is so voluminous, I have condensed much of it, while taking care to preserve the scientific coherence of these theories.
In the name of the Creator of this universe, I begin this research.
Introduction to the Research
Since earliest times, human beings have been devoted to forming a social order, from the moment the structure of society took shape, particularly after the rise of the first civilizations and the beginning of laws and systems that organized societies socially, politically and economically, in successive steps over time. Human civilizations emerged separately, each with its own frameworks and characteristics distinguished by the particular geographic and economic circumstances around it. Then the ethnic formation of human societies began, along with their political formation, and leadership was the dividing line between societies, whether spiritual or political leadership.
Societies had distinguishing traits. For example, in the Chinese society of the East, at one stage the political side, represented by royal dynasties, predominated, while the spiritual side was dominated by Buddhism, Confucianism and Taoism. In India, trade, capitalism and religious spiritual leaders played a large role in forming Indian societies. Kingdoms spread across the western part of the East, such as Persia and the Eastern and Western Roman worlds, with religious and spiritual leadership in Rome, while in Arab societies the Islamic religious dimension spread.
To complete the picture, the psychological sciences were an integral part of every human civilizational current. It is natural that no civilizational current arises without clear attention to the human sciences, alongside the other concerns imposed by environmental conditions such as climate, geography and existing living circumstances. The human being remains the center of the sciences. If humans are still discovering the environment around them, then the human psyche, all the more, still holds much that is undiscovered. Humankind has explored the science of the cosmos and continues to discover everything around it, while the self has not yet been discovered.
Such is the human condition: we look outward and do not look inward with the same attention and force required. Yet in the twentieth century, and specifically in its middle or, we might say, its early part, humanity became aware of the need to explore the human psyche. With the accelerating pace of scientific and material progress, the gap between people and themselves widened, and psychological conditions grew deeper and more extensive because of the expansion of civilizational and material advancement. Modern societies therefore took an interest in psychological studies, sensing the widening gap between the human being and the self, and between the psychological and material sciences, and so they were keen to apply them and to restore a measure of balance.
We can divide these psychological interests, in broad terms, into stages, or into two stages.
The first stage: this is the stage in which modern psychology was founded. It was begun by Bernheim and Charcot, preceded by (interest in hypnosis at the beginning of the nineteenth century). Freud is regarded as the true founder of the schools of modern psychoanalysis, to which Carl Jung added much, and the stage ended with Alfred Adler.
The Second Stage
This is the stage on which this research is based, and it can be called the stage of liberation from the proprietary constraints of the old theories. In this stage, researchers took care to connect and bring together the theories that preceded them, and each researcher added their own contribution from their own practical experience, and that is what distinguished this stage.
We begin with the interpersonal relationship theories of Karen Horney, the first to focus on the importance of interpersonal relationships, then move to the dyadic interpersonal relationships of Erich Fromm, followed by Harry Stack Sullivan.
Next comes the renewer of Freudian ego psychology, Erik Erikson. I could not neglect the modern academic theories that represent a new starting point in psychology, foremost among them trait theories led by Allport, and the theories of basic needs by Henry Murray.
Nor did we neglect the role of cognitive psychology theories, which focused on personality constructs, as in Kelly, and which appeared at a critical period of the twentieth century (the period of wars) and scientific progress.
Penultimate in this research is the importance of the neo-Freudians, who added attention to the scientific, clinical, research-based study of the human self. Foremost among them are Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow.
Finally, we conclude with the scientific necessity that underlies all modern sciences, beginning with existential psychology, which represents a revival of existential thought, ever renewing and present across all the human sciences and in every historical era of humankind. Among the most prominent to write on it, at its first appearance in the twentieth century, was Rollo May.
I hope the reader will enjoy this research after appreciating the depth it aims for.
The Third Stage
Behavioral psychology is, to some extent, contemporary with our own time. Research in it is still ongoing and tied to human existence, and I intend to devote a separate study to it in the coming stages.
