11. Humanistic Therapy

Abraham Maslow –

• Need Hierarchy

• Person Centered Theory

Carl Rogers –

• Need Hierarchy

• Person Centered Theory

Humanistic psychology

• •Humanistic psychology emphasizes the present experience and essential worth of the whole person, promotes creativity, free choice and spontaneity, and fosters the belief that people can solve their own psychological problems.

•   “The functioning and experience of a whole human being”

• •Humans have positive potentialities that they can develop themselves. The natural development of human beings is toward the “constructive fulfillment” of their inherent possibilities.

________________ is a psychological approach that emphasizes that study of a whole person, and and the uniqueness of each individual.

• Existentialism

• Humanism

________________ is a psychological approach that emphasizes the quest for personal meaning and determining personal values.

• Existentialism

• Humanism

•Humanistic psychology emerged from two philosophical orientations: ____________________ is an approach to understanding each person’s most immediate experience, the conditions of his or her existence, and the necessity of exercising freedom of choice in a world.

•_______________________- encourages consciousness and personal responsibility.

•Human freedom is defined not as freedom from responsibility but freedom to accept responsibility.

• Existentialism

• Phenomenology

•____________________________ involves an attitude of discovery that encompasses a search for essential issues, an emphasis on consciousness, the necessity of describing experience, and a desire to grasp reality as each individual uniquely perceives it.  

•The only reality I can possibly know is the world as I perceive and experience it at this moment.

• Existentialism

• Phenomenology

Assumptions about nature of organism

The force for growth and development that is innate in all organisms.

Taft (1993) “ as living beings we are geared to movement and growth”

Examples:

•a plant’s innate tendency to grow

•a person’s tendency toward self-actualization (to become all that we can become)

• 1. Organism tends to actualize:

• 2.Tendency to actualize is both trustworthy and constructive:

Assumptions about nature of organism

Rogers (1961), “ the inner core of personality is the organism itself which is essentially both self preserving and social. Organismic valuing process: the inner vague feeling that choosing a certain career would  be wrong for you even if everyone else approves of that choice.

• 1. Organism tends to actualize:

• 2.Tendency to actualize is both trustworthy and constructive:

•The human organism is viewed as a total being whose physical, psychological, and spiritual aspects cannot be separated.

•Inner sense within a person, which guides him or her in the directions of growth and health.

•For Rogers, as well as other humanistic theorists, the most important matter in the consideration of personality is the person as a whole, including the individual’s conscious awareness, freedom to choose, self determination, and quality of experiences.

•

• ORGANISMIC APPROACH

• Organismic Valuing Process

• Locus of Evaluation

• GENERAL ACTUALIZING TENDENCY