Organ inferiority is a concept associated with which theorist?

• A. Jung
• B. Horney
• C. Adler
• D. Freud

Answer: (C)

Organ inferiority, a term from Alfred Adler’s individual psychology, refers to the sense of weakness or deficiency in a bodily organ that motivates compensatory efforts to overcome it. Adler argued that these early feelings of inferiority drive a person’s entire style of life—its goals, interests, and social orientation—leading to a striving for superiority and a move to be useful to others. This idea shows how felt physical weakness can shape personality through motivated striving and the development of coping strategies, rather than through innate drives or universal archetypes.

This view differs from Jung’s emphasis on the collective unconscious and archetypes, Horney’s focus on basic anxiety and neurotic needs, and Freud’s emphasis on psychosexual stages and instinctual drives. So organ inferiority is best aligned with Adler.