Evaluation

• :) A strength of the humanistic approach is that it is a very optimistic way of explaining human behaviour

  This is because it focuses on everyone's potential to be happy no matter what happened to us in the past.

  This is important because it contrasts with other approaches that take a more deterministic approach by suggesting that our behaviour is driven by forces that we can't control
• :) A strength is that it has good practical applications

  For example, Maslow's hierarchy of needs is widely applied in the business world to support employees in reaching their potential, and person-centred therapy is one of the most popular forms of therapy

  This is important because it means the humanistic approach has real-world applications that can improve the quality of people's lives
• :( A weakness of the humanistic approach is that it rejects the use of scientific method to study human behaviour

  This means that there is no experimental evidence to back up to claims of the approach, or the theories developed within it

  This is important because it reduces the credibility of the approach for those who wish to consider Psychology as a science. Humanists believe that we are all unique, and therefore, there is no attempt to make general laws of behaviour nor to make predictions about behaviour
• :) The humanistic approach is the only approach in psychology which takes a truly holistic view of the individual

  This is a strength as it reflects the fact that reality is experienced on a subjective level by every single person (i.e. one's reality is unique to them, even the aspects of it that they share with other people)

  By focusing on individual experience and meaning, the humanistic approach acknowledges the great diversity and richness of the human experience.

  Thus this approach is high in ecological validity