Editing Superiority complex (section)

==Alfred Adler==

Alfred Adler was the first to use the term superiority complex. He claimed that a superiority complex essentially came from the need to overcome underlying feelings of inferiority: an [[inferiority complex]].<ref name=":0">{{Cite book|title=The Individual Psychology of Alfred Adler: a Systematic Presentation in Selections from His Writings|last=Adler |first=Alfred |author-link=Alfred Adler|isbn=9780061311543|edition=1st|location=[[New York City | New York]]|publisher=[[Basic Books]]|oclc=5692434|date = 1964-12-30}}</ref> Throughout his works Adler intertwines the occurrence of an inferiority complex and a superiority complex as cause and effect.<ref name="Mosak1">{{cite book |first1=Harold |last1=Mosak |first2=Michael |last2=Maniacci |title=Primer of Adlerian Psychology: The Analytic - Behavioural - Cognitive Psychology of Alfred Adler |date=2013 |location=[[Milton Park]]|publisher=[[Taylor & Francis Group]]|isbn=9780203768518|doi=10.4324/9780203768518 |page=83}}</ref> Among his writings touching on the topic were ''Understanding Human Nature'' (1927),<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://archive.org/details/understandinghum00adlerich/mode/2up|last=Adler|first=Alfred |translator=Walter Biran Wolfe |title=Understanding human nature |location=[[New York City | New York]] |publisher=Greenberg, Publisher, Inc. |via=[[Internet Archive]] (archive.org)|date=1927|access-date=2023-02-28}}</ref> and ''Superiority and Social Interest: A Collection of Later Writings'', a collection of twenty-one papers written by Adler and published posthumously in 1964.<ref>{{Cite journal|url=https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2007-17788-001|last=Toal|first=Robert A.|title=Review of ''Alfred Adler—Superiority and social interest: A collection of later writings'' [abstract]|via=[[PsycNET]] (psycnet.apa.org)|doi=10.1037/h0087963|date=February 1966|journal=[[Psychotherapy (journal) | Psychotherapy: Theory, Research & Practice]]|volume=3|issue=1|pages=43–44|issn=0033-3204|eissn=1939-1536 |access-date=2019-11-07|url-access=subscription}}</ref>

Adler distinguished a normal striving to achieve from superiority complexes,<ref name="Scharf1">{{cite book |ref=Scharf1 |first=Richard S. |last=Scharf |title=Theories of Psychotherapy and Counselling: Concepts and Cases |date=2011 |publisher=[[Cengage | Cengage Learning]] |isbn=9780357671047|location=[[Boston]]|page=130}}</ref> the latter being attempts in order to overcompensate a feeling of inferiority.<ref name=":0" /> He states that those with an inferiority complex develop a superiority complex to overcome the difficulties presented by the former, primarily by inflating their sense of self-importance in some way.<ref name="Scharf1"/> Dreams of heroism, and a false assumption of success,<ref>{{cite book |first=Alfred |last=Adler |editor-first=Henry T. |editor-last=Stein |translator=Cees Koen and Gerald Liebenau |title=Collected Clinical Works of Alfred Adler |date=2002 |location=[[Bellingham, Washington]] |publisher=Alfred Adler Institute |page=78}}</ref> revealed for Adler the reactive nature of such strivings.<ref name="Mosak1"/>  

While Adler considered what he refers to in his writing as striving for superiority was a universal of human nature,<ref name=":0" /> he thought sound-minded individuals do not strive for personal superiority over others, rather for personal ambition and success through work.  By contrast, those with an actual superiority complex were riddled with conceited fantasies, and with dreams of immutable supremacy.<ref>{{cite book |editor-first=Richard |editor-last=Gregory |title=The Oxford Companion to the Mind |edition=2nd |date=1987 |url=https://archive.org/details/oxfordcompaniont00greg |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]]|isbn=9780198661245|via=[[Internet Archive]] (archive.org)|pages=[https://archive.org/details/oxfordcompaniont00greg/page/368/mode/1up 368],[https://archive.org/details/oxfordcompaniont00greg/page/6/mode/1up 6]}}</ref><ref name=":2" />