Contributions of Carl Gustav Jung (Part 11): Criticisms of Jung’s Work

Author: Jackie Chan, Psy.D. 陳曉洋博士

Criticisms of Jung’s Work

A significant criticism of analytical psychology involves Jung’s contempt for traditional scientific investigating tools. Jung appeared to make the same mistakes Freud had previously made. Rather than utilizing controlled experimental studies, Jung heavily relied on his own clinical observation of patients and subjective interpretation of their symptoms to formulate his theories of archetypes and collective conscious. His research was based on a small, unrepresentative sample of the clinical population, and his data collection procedures were not systematic or controlled (Schultz & Schultz, 2012). Although some appreciated Jung’s effort in clarifying his concepts and held his Liber Novus in high regard, many others vigorously attacked his mystical and semi-religious ideas and regarded him as just dogmatic as Freud for not scrutinizing the validity of his own theories (Allen, 1914; Horton, 1930; Rosenzweig, 1940; Broughton, 1989; Henderson, 2010).

Dissatisfied with the scientific basis of Jungian theories, Gallo (1994) wrote, “The walls of the archetypes are so thin that the one can flow into and become the other may not be a sign of a wondrous unity as much as a way of removing all constraints from the logic of the investigation” (p. 400). Gallo argued the content of archetype can be artificially created and quickly replaced with any subjects to fit one’s subjective interpretation or imagination of an unconscious force shaping human behaviors. In addition, Gardner (1996) stated Jung’s dream theories were merely his personal speculation and interpretation of his own dreams without substantial empirical support. He used the more recent studies in Rapid-Eye-Movement (REM) sleep to explain the bizarre nature of dream was only a result of random neuron firing and brain’s efforts to make sense of the non-sense scenes using self-generated story rather than the symbols of the collective unconscious. To withstand the careful scrutiny from the scientific research community becomes a significant challenge for Jungian theories and his followers.