Harry Sullivan’s Interpersonal

Theory Presented by:

Mary Anne A. Portuguez, MP, RPm

Harry Sullivan’s

Interpersonal Theory

BRIEF BIOGRAPHY• Harry Stack Sullivan, (born Feb. 21, 1892, Norwich, N.Y., U.S.—

died Jan. 14, 1949, Paris), U.S. psychiatrist who developed a theory of psychiatry based on interpersonal relationships. Sullivan received his M.D. from the Chicago College of Medicine and Surgery in 1917. At St. Elizabeth’s Hospital in Washington, D.C., he came under the influence of the psychiatrist William Alanson White. After 1930 Sullivan devoted himself chiefly to teaching and elaborating his ideas, working with social scientists

BASIC TENETPeople are socially created animals. Sullivan emphasized that

society is the actual creator of people’s personalities. He stressed the importance of interpersonal theory. The human

being does not exist as a simple personality; its personality can only exist in relation to others.

Energy System• Tensions• Action

Energy transformation, transforms tensions into covert or overt behaviors and are aimed at satisfying needs and reducing anxiety.

TWO TYPES OF TENSIONS• Needs, tensions brought on by biological imbalance between a person

and the physiochemical environment, both inside and outside the organism.• Anxiety,

Dynamism• Smallest unit employed in the study of the individual. It is defined as

the relatively enduring pattern of transformation which recurrently characterizes the organism in its duration as a living organism.• It may be equated to a habit.

Two Classes of Dynamisms• Specific to the body

Zonal needs (may satisfy the general needs)• Tensions (potential for actions)

Three Classes of Dynamism:• Disjunctive dynamisms include those destructive patterns of behavior

that are related to the concept of malevolence• Isolating dynamisms include those behavior patterns (such as lust)

that are unrelated to interpersonal relations• Intimacy and the Self-system

Self-system• a consistent pattern of behaviors that maintains people’s

interpersonal security by protecting them from anxiety.

Two security operations:Dissociation includes those impulses, desires, and needs that a person refuses to allow into awareness. Selective inattention, is a refusal to see those things that we do not wish to see. It differs from dissociation in both degree and origin.

Personification• It is an image that one has of himself/herself or of another person. It

is a complex web of feelings, attitudes, and conceptions that grows out of experiences with the need- satisfaction and anxiety.• Personifications shared by most people are called stereotypes.

The Good Me, the Bad Me, and the Not Me• Sullivan made a distinction among three selves:• The ‘good me’ versus the ‘bad me’ based on social

appraisal and the anxiety that results from negative feedback

• The ‘not me’ refers to the unknown, repressed component of the self

The Developmental Epochs1. Infancy, the child begins the process of developing, but Sullivan

did not emphasize the younger years to near the importance as Freud.

2. Childhood, development of speech and improved communication is key in this stage of development.

3. Juvenile era, need for playmates and the beginning of healthy socialization

4. Preadolescence, the child’s ability to form a close relationship with a peer

5. Early adolescence, need for friendship to a need for sexual expression

6. Late adolescence, need for friendship and need for sexual expression get combined; long term relationship is primary focus.

Evaluation of Sullivan’s Theory• Sullivan incited interest in interpersonal theory, particularly on

aspects of agency and communion• Critics note the abstract nature of his concepts and the resultant lack

of empirical testing• The role of interpersonal factors in his theory may be overextended