Alexander Willwoll

Alexander Willwoll SJ (born September 27, 1887 in Rorschach ; † October 5, 1961 in Lützel , Department Haut-Rhin ) was a Swiss Jesuit and psychologist .

Life

Alexander Willwoll was the son of the businessman Wilhelm Willwoll and his wife Ursula, née Hendrix. He attended the Stella Matutina grammar school in Feldkirch from 1902 to 1907 and joined the Jesuit order in 1908. He studied philosophy and theology in Valkenburg in the Netherlands and was then vicar at the Church of Our Lady in Zurich from 1921 to 1922 . From 1922 to 1925 he studied psychology in Rome and Vienna and qualified as a Dr. phil. at the University of Vienna .

In 1925 he began lecturing as a professor for philosophical and experimental psychology at the Order University in Pullach ; he stayed there until 1939, during which time he also gave doctoral courses in Rome. When in 1939 the war broke out, he returned to Switzerland and was 1939-1945 Upper and lecturer at makeshift houses of studies. From 1945 to 1946, as well as from 1949 to 1951, he was spiritual in Oberwil near Zug . In 1946 he became a retreat leader in the Lassalle-Haus education center in Edlibach and remained in this position until 1949. In 1951 he became director of the educational center and, from 1959, a retreat leader at various sister associations, including the Lützel monastery .

Alexander Willwoll was significantly influenced by his teachers Karl Bühler and Joseph Fröbes (1866–1947) and integrated experimental and thought psychology into a critical realism .

Fonts (selection)

• On the crisis of psychology. Herder, Freiburg i. B. 1925.
• To the psychoanalytic movement . Benziger, Einsiedeln 1925/1926.
• Concept formation: a psychological investigation. S. Hirzel, Leipzig 1926.
• Courage to live and humility to live. Bern 1926.
• On the psychology of religious life. Benziger, Einsiedeln 1928.
• From the psychological a priori in our judgments. Sausgruber, Feldkirch 1931.
• Belief happiness & belief inhibition: psychological consideration. Benziger, Einsiedeln 1933.
• Community escape and holiness. Benziger, Einsiedeln 1935.
• From the unconscious in the expansion of religious experience. Spiess, Collegium Maria Hilf, Schwyz 1945.
• With Gebhard Frei , Eduard Montalta , Emil Spiess : Riddle of the Soul: Studies on the Psychology of the Unconscious. Walter, Olten 1946.
• Good Lord's Holidays. Walter, Olten 1952.

Web links

• Josef Stierli: Willwoll, Alexander. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .