Manipulator according to E. Shostrom

​​​​​​​A manipulator according to Everett Shostrom​ is a negative type of neurotic manipulator described by E. Shostrom. The popular book by E. Shostrom «The man-manipulator» attached to the concept of «manipulator» a persistently negative meaning, which has become traditional.

For other types of manipulators, see the general article Manipulator

According to Shostrom, a manipulator is a manipulative type of person who seeks to own and control people in the style of a mechanical manipulator. That is, for whom all other people are not their own, not people, but alien, indifferent and inanimate objects, and who treats them as without openness, without trust, as mechanical objects. A person of this type pursues only his own interests, it is strange to talk about the interests of a mechanical object for him, therefore this is a negative characteristic of a person.

Such manipulative people control others through various means, including demonstrating their difficult states. For example, these are “Whiners”, that is, people who are doing well, but when they meet, they can talk for hours about how bad everything is for them and how tired they are of everything.

A manipulator may not understand, be unaware that he is a manipulator or an object of manipulation.

How to determine whether this is a household manipulation or a lifestyle of a manipulator? If the manipulation is situational and is not reproduced in other situations, it is everyday manipulation. If a person behaves like a manipulator all the time, without leaving this role, this is already a lifestyle.

Let’s look at this with the example of a child. The child wants to watch another program or cartoon. I asked, it’s ok. He cried — tried to influence, but distracted — distracted, this is manipulation within the framework of age norms. And if he immediately, regularly and persistently roars until they show him a cartoon, insists on crying his own way, this is already a manipulator.

manipulative and neurotic

A predisposition to manipulativeness is characteristic of a neurotic. One of the needs of the neurotic is the need for dominance, the possession of power. Karen Horney believes that the obsessive desire to dominate gives rise to «the inability of a person to establish equal relations. If he does not become a leader, he feels completely lost, dependent and helpless. He is so powerful that everything that goes beyond his power is perceived by him as his own submission.

Criticism of inaccuracies in the views of E. Shostrom

Following E. Shostrom, manipulators are often called other types of people who do not at all deserve such a negative qualification.

«A person who uses other people to achieve his goals is a manipulator.» Falsehood and stupidity. The student uses teachers for his goal of becoming an educated person — he is a good student, not a nasty manipulator.

«He who uses manipulation is a manipulator.» Confusion and stupidity. A manipulator is someone who is manipulative, not someone who uses manipulation. For example, positive manipulations are constantly used in communication between loved ones, relatives and loving people. Positive manipulation is a natural part of their beautiful close relationships, in which no one is and feels like a foreign or mechanical object. Positive manipulations are a manifestation of concern for the one to whom they are directed, and cannot be the basis for a negative characterization of their author. Look →