Person-centred Therapy - Carle Rogers Flashcards
What are the main characteristics of the Rogerian therapeutic relationship?
(McLeod)
Respect
Equality
Authenticity
The ‘core conditions’ model - the ‘necessary and sufficient’ conditions (Rogers) are…
Empathy (being heard or understood. ‘A state of being’ (Rogers). A learned skill (Truax & Carkhuff))
Congruence
Acceptance (unconditional positive regard)
Later additions are …
Consistency Boundary awareness (am I secure enough within myself to permit seperateness? Can I be expressive enough ... that what I am can be communicated?) Interpersonal sensitivity. Present-centeredness Presence (Rogers 1980) Tenderness (Thorne 1991)
The client is expert
The person can come to identify and accept her own personal solutions to the challenges in life.
This is called ‘non-directive’ counselling.
Little importance attached to the skill of the counsellor, but concentrates on the philosophy and quality of the therapeutic relationship.
Experiencing
Here-and-now experiencing
The idea that patterns of thought and feeling that are associated with difficulties in everyday life situations are being continually recreated, and that a willingness to enter into the ‘now’ provides opportunities to learn about, and change these patterns.
Person-centred counselling begins and ends with experiencing (McLeod)
Phenomenology- the directly lived feel of what happens. Of how individuals experience. No one fixed objective reality.
An amalgam of bodily sensed thoughts, feelings and action tendcies.
The changing flow of cognition and emotion experiencing.
Process
The concept of process is a central construct in person-centred practice
What are the historical three phases of development of the person-centred approach?
1) mass training of ‘non-directive’ therapists to cope with returning II world war veterans & funding for research. (1945 onwards)
2) during period of criticism for the approach (it impossible for a person in close relationship not to influence someone), the research focus was on the client process. (Early 1950s to 60s)
3) development of the ‘necessary and sufficient ‘ Core conditions. (Empathy, congruence, acceptance)
Who are the key figures in the development of person-centred therapy?
Carl Rogers
Berrett-Lennard
Gendlin
Shlien
Truax and Carkhuff (1967 - new approaches in training)
Rice (Toronto, information processing and cognitive psychology)
Gendlin, Gordon, Goodman and Carhuff (training non-professionals in helping skills)
Mearns and Thorne (2013) subsequent theorizing
Gendlin went on to develop Experiential Focusing
What are the two primary needs of the person within a person-centred approach?
1) The need for self-actualization - self-concept, I am….
2) The need to be loved and valued by others.
Independent of biological survival needs (Maslow 1943)
Congruence
The idea of self-concept is central to congruence.
When a person can say “I am….”
An example of incongruence may not define themselves as nurturing , in a situation where a feeling of nurturance is evoked, they will not be able to put that inner sense or feeling accurately into words and will express feeling or impulse in a distorted or inappropriate way. (McLeod ch7, 172)
‘Conditions of worth’ (Rogers)
In childhood there is a strong need to be loved (Rogers).
Love or approval can be conditional or unconditional.
Where unconditional the child is free to express their potential and inner feelings.
Where conditional the child’s self-concept is shaped by the parent’s influence.
Incongruence results from gaps and distortions in the self concept caused by exposure to conditions of worth.
Locus of evaluation / organismic valuing process
An assumption that each person carries a universal morality, a bodily sense of right & wrong.
The ‘ideal self’
Actuallising
‘Becoming a person’
The human capacity to strive for fulfilment … self-defined ideals.
Rogers describes the fully functioning / actualized person.
Someone who is congruent, autonomous and unafraid of feelings, and able to use them as a guide.
Against labelling or diagnosis
Aginst personality traits, types, labels or diagnosis
Empathy / empathy cycle
Step one, empathic set by counsellorcouns (counsellor is actively attending and receptive)
Step two, empathic resonation (to directly or indirectly expressed experiencing)
Step three, expressed empathy (counsellor communicates felt awareness of client’s experience)
Step four, received empathy (client senses immediate personal understanding from the counsellor)
Step five, the empathy cycle continues (feedback concerning accuracy of empathetic response)
