ABSTRACT
Karen Clementina Theodora Danielsen was born in Eilbek, Germany, on September 16, 1885. She traveled with her father and experienced life in different cultures, which added to her understanding of human nature. Karen Horney was an avid reader, and her life was greatly augmented and embellished by her own imagination. After passing her medical exams, Karen Horney worked for the influential Berlin psychiatrist Hermann Oppenheim, as an assistant in his clinic. Once she had discovered psychoanalysis, it became the intellectual and emotional focal point of her life. Unfortunately, psychoanalysis was frowned upon by the medical establishment. Karen Horney was a member of the education committee at the institute and a member of the education committee of the International Psychoanalytic Association beginning in 1928. She was a leading psychologist who contributed to understanding the psychology of women, emphasized the role of sociocultural factors in producing neurosis, and developed a new noninstinctivist psychoanalytic theory.
