Part II    Psychodynamic Theories78
individuals strive for personal superiority, whereas psychologically healthy people 
seek success for all humanity.
Early in his career, Adler believed that aggression  was the dynamic power 
behind all motivation, but he soon became dissatisfied with this term. After reject -
ing aggression as a single motivational force, Adler used the term masculine protest,  
which implied will to power or a domination of others. However, he soon abandoned 
masculine protest as a universal drive while continuing to give it a limited role in his 
theory of abnormal development.
Next, Adler called the single dynamic force striving for superiority.  In his final 
theory, however, he limited striving for superiority to those people who strive for per -
sonal superiority over others and introduced the term striving for success  to describe 
actions of people who are motivated by highly developed social interest (Adler, 1956). 
Regardless of the motivation for striving, each individual is guided by a final goal.
The Final Goal
According to Adler (1956), people strive toward a final goal of either personal superi -
ority or the goal of success for all humankind. In either case, the final goal is fictional 
and has no objective existence. Nevertheless, the final goal has great significance 
because it unifies personality and renders all behavior comprehensible.
Each person has the power to create a personalized fictional goal, one constructed 
out of the raw materials provided by heredity and environment. However, the goal is nei -
ther genetically nor environmentally determined. Rather, it is the product of the creative 
power,  that is, people’s ability to freely shape their behavior and create their own person -
ality. By the time children reach 4 or 5 years of age, their creative power has developed 
to the point that they can set their final goal. Even infants have an innate drive toward 
growth, completion, or success. Because infants are small, incomplete, and weak, they 
feel inferior and powerless. To compensate for this deficiency, they set a fictional goal to 
be big, complete, and strong. Thus, a person’s final goal reduces the pain of inferiority 
feelings and points that person in the direction of either superiority or success.
If children feel neglected or pampered, their goal remains largely unconscious. 
Adler (1964) hypothesized that children will compensate for feelings of inferiority in 
devious ways that have no apparent relationship to their fictional goal. The goal of supe -
riority for a pampered girl, for example, may be to make permanent her parasitic rela -
tionship with her mother. As an adult, she may appear dependent and self-deprecating, 
and such behavior may seem inconsistent with a goal of superiority. However, it is quite 
consistent with her unconscious and misunderstood goal of being a parasite that she set 
at age 4 or 5, a time when her mother appeared large and powerful, and attachment to 
her became a natural means of attaining superiority.
Conversely, if children experience love and security, they set a goal that is 
largely conscious and clearly understood. Psychologically secure children strive 
toward superiority defined in terms of success and social interest. Although their goal 
never becomes completely conscious, these healthy individuals understand and pur -
sue it with a high level of awareness.
In striving for their final goal, people create and pursue many preliminary goals. 
These subgoals are often conscious, but the connection between them and the final 
goal usually remains unknown. Furthermore, the relationship among preliminary 
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