Atlas personality
The Atlas personality, named after the story of the Titan Atlas from Greek mythology who is forced to hold up the sky, is someone obliged to take on adult responsibilities prematurely. They are as a result liable to develop a pattern of compulsive caregiving in later life.
Origins and nature
The Atlas personality is typically found in a person who felt obliged during childhood to take on responsibilities such as providing psychological support to parents, often in a chaotic family situation.[1]
The result in adult life can be a personality devoid of fun, and feeling the weight of the world on their shoulders.[2] Depression and anxiety, as well as oversensitivity to others and an inability to assert their own needs, are further identifiable characteristics.[3] In addition, there may also be an underlying rage against the parents for not having provided love,[4] and for exploiting the child for their own needs.[5]
While Atlas personalities may appear to function adequately as adults, they may be pervaded with a sense of emptiness and be lacking in vitality.[6]
Treatment
Persons suffering from Atlas personality may benefit from psychotherapy. In such cases, a therapist talks with the patient about the patient's childhood and helps identify behavioral patterns that may have arisen from being given too many responsibilities too early in life.
- v
- t
- e
- Parent
- Mother
- Father
- Adoptive
- Alloparenting
- Coparenting
- Extended family
- Foster care
- Kommune 1
- Noncustodial
- Nuclear family
- Orphaned
- Shared parenting
- Single parent
- Blended family
- Surrogacy
- In loco parentis
- Attachment theory
- Applied behavior analysis
- Behaviorism
- Child development
- Cognitive development
- Developmental psychology
- Human development
- Identity formation
- Introjection
- Love
- Maternal bond
- Nature versus nurture
- Parental investment
- Paternal bond
- Pediatrics
- Social emotional development
- Socialization
- Social psychology
- Achievement ideology
- Atlas personality
- Attachment parenting
- Baby talk
- Buddha-like parenting
- Concerted cultivation
- Enmeshment
- Free-range parenting
- Gatekeeper parent
- Helicopter parent
- Nurturant parenting
- Slow parenting
- Soccer mom
- Strict father model
- Taking children seriously
- Theybie
- Tiger parenting
- Work at home parent
- After-school activity
- Allowance
- Bedtime
- Child care
- Co-sleeping
- Dishabituation
- Education
- Habituation
- Homeschooling
- Identification (psychology)
- Introjection
- Latchkey kid
- Moral development
- Normative social influence
- Parent management training
- Play (date)
- Role model
- Social integration
- Television
- The talk (race)
- The talk (sex education)
- Toy (educational)
- Positive Parenting Program
- Blanket training
- Corporal punishment in the home
- Curfew
- Grounding
- Positive discipline
- Tactical ignoring
- Time-out
social aspects
- Mary Ainsworth
- John Bowlby
- T. Berry Brazelton
- Rudolf Dreikurs
- David Elkind
- Jo Frost
- Haim Ginott
- Thomas Gordon
- Alan E. Kazdin
- Truby King
- Annette Lareau
- Penelope Leach
- Matthew Sanders
- William Sears
- B. F. Skinner
- Benjamin Spock
See also
References
- ^ R. Baron, Psychology (1995) p. 516
- ^ N. Barry, Mother's Ruin (2013)
- ^ L. Z. Vogel: Atlas personality
- ^ John Bowlby, The Making and Breaking of Affectional Bonds (London 1979) p. 139
- ^ Alice Miller, 'The Drama of Being a Child (London 1990) p. 38
- ^ R. Rentoul, Ferenczi's Language of Tenderness (Plymouth 2011) p. 44
Further reading
- L. J. Cozolino, The Making of a Therapist (New York 2004)