Organizational Psychology Short Paper

The creation of a new, and successful, program within a psychiatric unit is lauded. Rewards for the creator are given. The creator of the project is asked to speak at meetings and teach others how to provide care in the same manner. After the creating the Yoga for Wellness program on an inpatient psychiatric unit this writer was provided with many of these opportunities to edify peers on the program and to share the successes and failures experienced. As opportunities arose a certain peer became intrusive, demanding information to share as his own, and requesting the program be taught in the outpatient setting within which he provides programming. In learning about the differing approaches of Freud, Horney, and Skinner this writer made several interesting discoveries which will be described below.

To describe this specific peer's behavior would take many pages but to condense this peer asked this writer for specific data regarding participation of patients, music used, the response of patients on the units, the average attendance, and for the data gathered from patients regarding their experiences in the yoga sessions. The peer requesting the information used this information as his own, as if he had created the program. This writer then worked with this peer (unaware of the misuse of information) to create an outpatient program in which yoga would be made available to the individuals whom this peer provides care.

Using the theories of Freud one would begin to believe this peer had little control over his Id, and that his Ego was having difficulty balancing his instant gratification with his morals. It may also be suggested from this standpoint that this individual is experiencing what Freud references as "mirroring transference (Segal p. 36)" in the way that he requested information about a program he did not have a hand in creating and presented the information as his own. This is suggestive of unsatisfactory relationships in childhood, according to Freud. This is described, in Segal's text as "unfulfilled need for recognition was partially achieved by taking the recognition belonging to others and reflecting it back to himself (p. 36, Segal)."

Upon the creation of the program within the facility this peer provides care he began praising this writer quite overtly. Attempting to hug this writer as congratulations at the end of yoga sessions, reporting he has bragged about this writer to mutual peers, and, for lack of a better term, gushing about each session and the benefits for the patients participating. This writer understands, when applying Freud's theory, that this peer may be conveying Reaction Formation. Segal describes this as "the exaggerated nature of the response (Segal, p. 31)" in which this peer is over-praising this writer to cover up his subconscious belief that the program should not be successful without his influence.

Using Horney to analyze the situation it could be said that this peer is experiencing an "idealized image" of himself which is described as "an unrealistic and grandiose image of the self that the individual believes he or she should be (Segal, p. 118)." This would explain the demand for information and the presentation of this information as his, rather than the information of this writer. Furthermore this may be suggestive of a person who moves against others. In this portion of her theory Horney describes her belief that as children we "adopt one of three defensive stances: moving against, moving toward, or moving away from people (Segal, p 116)." The behavior displayed by this peer suggests he may be drawing from two forms of defensive stance: moving against as well as moving toward. His action to retrieve information regarding the successful program displays "mastery (Segal, p 116)" which can be defined as a person's desire to appear as an expert or someone with exceptional ability. This could