258 Part III Humanistic/Existential Theories
of psychoanalysis and behaviorism. As a graduate student, he had studied Freud’s
Interpretation of Dreams (Freud, 1900/1953) and became keenly interested in
psychoanalysis. In addition, his graduate-level research with primates was greatly
influenced by the work of John B. Watson (Watson, 1925). In his mature theory,
however, Maslow criticized both psychoanalysis and behaviorism for their lim-
ited views of humanity and their inadequate understanding of the psychologically
healthy person. Maslow believed that humans have a higher nature than either
psychoanalysis or behaviorism would suggest; and he spent the latter years of
his life trying to discover the nature of psychologically healthy individuals.Biography of Abraham H. Maslow
Abraham Harold (Abe) Maslow had, perhaps, the most lonely and miserable child-
hood of any person discussed in this book. Born in Manhattan, New York, on April 1,
1908, Maslow spent his unhappy childhood in Brooklyn. Maslow was the oldest of
seven children born to Samuel Maslow and Rose Schilosky Maslow. Maslow’s child-
hood life was filled with intense feelings of shyness, inferiority, and depression.
Maslow was not especially close to either parent, but he tolerated his often-
absent father, a Russian-Jewish immigrant who made a living preparing barrels.
Toward his mother, however, Maslow felt hatred and deep-seated animosity, not
only during his childhood, but until the day she died just a couple of years before
Maslow’s own death. Despite several years of psychoanalysis, he never overcame
the intense hatred of his mother and refused to attend her funeral, despite pleas
from his siblings, who did not share his hateful feelings for their mother. A year
before his own death, Maslow (1969) entered this reflection in his diary:
What I had reacted against and totally hated and rejected was not only her
physical appearance, but also her values and world view, her stinginess, her
total selfishness, her lack of love for anyone else in the world, even her own
husband and children... her assumption that anyone was wrong who disagreed
with her, her lack of concern for her grandchildren, her lack of friends, her
sloppiness and dirtiness, her lack of family feeling for her own parents and
siblings.... I’ve always wondered where my Utopianism, ethical stress,
humanism, stress on kindness, love, friendship, and all the rest came from. I
knew certainly of the direct consequences of having no mother-love. But the
whole thrust of my life-philosophy and all my research and theorizing also has
its roots in a hatred for and revulsion against everything she stood for. (p. 958)
Edward Hoffman (1988) reported a story that vividly describes Rose Maslow’s
cruelty. One day young Maslow found two abandoned kittens in the neighborhood.
Moved with pity, he brought the kittens home, put them in the basement, and fed
them milk from a dish. When his mother saw the kittens, she became furious and,
as the young boy watched, she smashed the kittens’ heads against the basement
walls until they were dead.
Maslow’s mother was also a very religious woman who often threatened
young Maslow with punishment from God. As a young boy, Maslow decided to
test his mother’s threats by intentionally misbehaving. When no divine retribution
befell him, he reasoned that his mother’s warnings were not scientifically sound.