Alfred Adler

Adler attended the Vienna Medical School, where he studied under an internist who stressed the importance of a physician treating the whole patient, not just the ailment. During his university days, Adler was attracted to the humanistic side of socialism - its stress on equality, cooperation and democracy.

Following graduation, Adler established a private practice in Vienna and in 1902 joined Freud's Wednesday Night Psychological Society (which soon changed its name to the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society). In 1910, he succeeded Freud as the group's president, but resigned after a year due to his forthright criticism and questioning of Freud's concepts. Shortly thereafter, Adler formed the Society for Free Psycholo-Analytic Research, choosing the title in protest of what he considered Freud's dictatorial ways. In 1913, he changed the group's name to the Society for Individual Psychology to better reflect his own approach to personality theory.

During World War I, Adler worked as an army doctor in a Vienna hospital, where his exposure to the effects of war on people led him to develop his concept of social interest.

In the late 1920s and early 1930s, he authored several popular books, including The Practice and Theory of Individual Psychology (1927), Understanding Human Nature (1927), The Science of Living (1929/1969), The Education of Children (1930a), The Pattern of Life (1930b), What Life Should Mean to You (1931), and Social Interest: A Challenge to Mankind (1933).