humanistic approach

• humanistic psychologists see humans as affected by external and internal influences but self determining (have free will). Psychology should concern itself with subjective experience rather than general laws as we are all unique
• in Maslow's hierarchy of needs the 4 lower levels must be met before the individual can work towards self actualisation. The levels are:

  • safety
  • psychological and physical health
  • love/belonging
  • self actualisation
• self actualisation refers to the innate tendency that each of us has to want to achieve our full potential and become the best we can possibly be
• Rogers argued that personal growth requires an individual's concept of self to be congruent with their ideal self. If too big a gap, the person will experience a state of incongruence and self actualisation isn't possible
• Issues such as worthlessness and low self-esteem have their roots in childhood and are due to a lack of unconditional positive regard from parents. A parent who sets boundaries on their love for their child by claiming 'I will only love you if...' is storing up psychological problems for that child in future
• In Roger's client-centred therapy an effective therapist should provide the client with genuineness, empathy and unconditional positive regard. The aim of therapy is to increase feelings of self-worth and reduce incongruence between the self-concept and the ideal self
• One strength of humanistic psychology is that it is anti-reductionist. Humanistic psychologists reject any attempt to break uo behaviour and experience into smaller components. They advocate holism which is the idea that subjective experience can only be understood by considering the whole person. This approach may have more validity than its alternatives by considering meaningful human behaviour within its real world contexts
• One limitation of the humanistic approach is that it may be guilty of cultural bias. Many humanistic ideas would be more associated with individualist cultures such as the United States. Collectivist cultures such as India, which emphasise the needs of the group, may not identify so easily with the ideas and values of humanistic psychology. Therefore, it is possible that the approach doesn't apply universally and is a product of the cultural context within it was developed