HUMANISTIC APPROACH

• HUMANISTIC APPROACH 


   developed by Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow. It is known as the ‘third force’ in psychology. It focuses on personal responsibilities, free will and individuals striving for personal growth and fulfilment.
• HUMANISTIC APPROACH 


  Humans are conscious and aware of themselves and are purposeful and creative (opposite to Feud).
• HUMANISTIC APPROACH 


  rejects scientific and experimental methods as well as the reductionist and deterministic views. It focuses on the subjective experience of being human, believing that every person is unique.
• HUMANISTIC APPROACH 


  Humans are motivated beyond the basic needs of survival and that our true desire is to grow as people and achieve self-actualisation (peak experiences and ultimate fulfilment).
• HUMANISTIC APPROACH 


  MASLOW

  created a hierarchy of needs which explains how by working through a motivational hierarchy of needs that starts with basic physiological needs such as sleeping and eating, progresses through the needs of safety, love and belonging and esteem and is topped by self-actualisation. 
• HUMANISTIC APPROACH 


  ROGERS

  came up with an aspect of focus on the self. This refers to how we view ourselves as an individual. Rogers proposed that people have 2 basic needs: positive regard from others and a feeling of self-worth (i.e. what we think about ourselves). Self-worth stems from child and parent interactions and further interactions with others e.g. our friends. The closer our self-concept and ideal self (i.e. who we would like to be) are to one another, the greater our feelings of self-worth and psychological health.
• HUMANISTIC APPROACH - ROGER 


  The influence of counselling -

  He believed that with counselling, people would be able to solve their problems in constructive ways. Humanistic therapists help people understand themselves by providing empathy and unconditional positive regards, helping the client to be more true to themselves (client centred therapy). By doing this, it could help the client's conditions of worth ie. able to behave in a way that is true to the person they are, rather than the person others want them to be. 
• (+) HUMANISTIC 


  hierarchy of needs is supported by research - HAGARTY ET AL

   looked at the relationship between economic growth and measures of Maslow’s levels in 88 countries over a 34 year period. Countries in the early stages of economic development were characterised by lower levels of needs. As predicted by Maslow, it was only in the advanced economic development that self actualisation became important. This suggests that reaching one’s full potential results in the ultimate feeling of well being and satisfaction. 
• (+) HUMANISTIC 


  evidence for the role of conditions of worth comes from HARTER ET AL who discovered that teeneagers who feel that they have to fulfil certain conditions in order to gain their parent’s approval frequently end up not liking themselves. Therefore, adolescents who created a ‘false self’ pretending to be the kind of person his or her parents would love, were more likely to develop depression and a tendency to lose touch with their true self. 
• (-) HUMANISTIC - Cultural differences 


  a study carried out by Nevis showed that in China belonging needs were seen as more fundamental study than physiological needs and that self actualisation was defined more in terms of contributions to the community than in terms of individual development. This suggests that Europeans and Americans focus more on personal identity in defining self concept, whereas China, Japanese and Koreans define self concept more in terms of social relationships.
• (-) HUMANISTIC

  has methods that do not establish causality. = Rogers in particular being an advocate of non-experimental research methods = requirements of experimental methods make it impossible to verify the results of counselling. Most psychologists would argue that, without experimental evidence, evaluation of therapy the theory that underlies it becomes very difficult. This suggests that although personal growth has shown as a result of receiving humanistic counselling, these do not show that therapy caused the changes, a fundamental requirement in psychology.