The humanistic approach Flashcards
assumptions of the humanistic approach?
- The Humanistic approach was influenced by Gestalt Psychology - Gestalt Ψ proposes that instead of studying different elements of behaviour we should instead, look at the individual as a whole, as the whole person is greater than the sum of their component parts.
- People are born with free will and wish to grow and fulfil their potential (the need to self-actualise).
People are basically good and have an innate need to make themselves and the world better.
It is less scientific than others and often relies on subjective judgements or deals with concepts that are difficult or impossible to measure empirically.
It is holistic in contrast to other reductionist approaches.
what are the topics in this approach??
- free will, self actualisation and maslows hierachal of needs
- the self, congurence and role of conditions of worth
- influece of humantisitc approach on counselllin
what is the free will, self acutalistaion and maslows hierarch of needs appraoch??
- free will =
The approach does acknowledge that there are many constraints on free will: e.g. social rules, laws & morals all affect whether we actually act upon our free will.
Humanistic psychologists don’t care that other approaches have criticised the concept of free will because it cannot be objectively measured.
They also propose that it doesn’t really matter if an individual really does have free will. What is important is that people perceive that they have some choice over what happens to them in their lives.
- self actualisation =
Humanistic psychologists believe that everyone has an innate drive to achieve their full potential.
The term they developed for the state we achieve when we reach our full potential is self-actualisation. So, self-actualisation is a peak state of existence that any individual can attain.
The humanists describe self actualisation as the ultimate feeling of well-being and satisfaction but point out that although we are all driven to achieve it, not all of us do.
- maslows heireachy of needs =
Maslow proposed that in order to achieve self-actualisation we must satisfy different levels of need, represented as a pyramid.
We all start at the bottom of the pyramid where our most basic biological/physiological needs are.
Once we have satisfied these needs we can progress up to the next level of need on the next level, so on and so on until we reach self-actualisation which is at the top of the hierarchy of needs.
The order of the stages is fixed, and if the first need is not met then an individual cannot meet higher order needs.
The drive to achieve full potential means that we are all working though these needs in an attempt to self-actualise.
The state of self-actualisation is not permanent and if all of the five needs do not keep being met, an individual can move out of the self actualised state.
This is why most of us won’t live in a permanent state of self actualisation but will have what Maslow called peak experiences, when we reach the top of our pyramid for a period of time but then climb down
again
For many of us, our journey up the pyramid is not straightforward.
Other people, our insecurities, feeling that we are not valued or not loved or feeling that we do not belong, prevent us from satisfying our higher order needs.
what are the evalistaions forfree will, self acutalistaion and maslows hierarch of needs appraoch??
- Describing self-actualisation as a concept is difficult and as a consequence it is difficult to measure, and therefore difficult to test.
This is not seen as an issue by humanistic theorists as they do not feel measurement is appropriate. However, other psychologists who promote psychology as a science claim this is too subjective.
Self-reports could be used to help gauge this concept - as if you ask key individuals or significant others (e.g., their partners or close friends) you are likely to get different responses.
+ Concepts such as self-actualisation have been widely accepted and the hierarchy of needs itself has been very influential in, for example, sport and business psychology who have made full use of this notion.
Additionally, the hierarchy is used often in education with teachers trained on the importance of being able to identify which needs of students are being met or not being met in order to ensure their academic achievement. For instance, if a student’s basic needs are not being met, they will have difficulty engaging in higher order tasks.
Hence, this has made a positive contribution to society….
- However, Maslow’s hierarchy of needs has been criticised for being culture specific as it relates well to individualistic cultures (where the focus is on the individual) but not collectivist cultures (where the focus is on the well-being of others).
Research by Nevis (1983) found that in China, belongingness needs were seen as more fundamental than physiological needs (which is different to the order proposed in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs).
This implies the theory can be seen as culturally relative. Therefore…
what is the self, congrience and role of conditions approach?
- Humans have a basic need to feel nurtured and valued by significant people in their lives, such as parents (love, praise & acceptance).
If this is given freely, without conditions (unconditional positive regard), then people will develop a healthy sense of self-worth, recognising their abilities & difficulties.
Children who receive negative regard, such as criticism & blame, develop low self-esteem.
To avoid this, the parent’s should criticise the child’s behaviour but not the child. E.g., ‘I don’t love what you are doing, but I do love you.’
- the self = The self refers to the self-concept. It influences both our perception of the world and our perception of ourselves. There are 3 key elements:
The ideal self - this is who we want/wish to be.
The actual self - this is who we really are. This is a difficult self to demonstrate as the subjective experience that is so important in humanistic psychology means that everyone will report this differently.
The perceived self - this is how we see ourselves. This is similar to self-esteem, and can distort how capable someone feels they are. Many people may have a distorted view of themselves. - congrueence =
Congruence is a term used to describe the psychological state when the elements of our self concept are in agreement.
For example - we want to be confident (ideal self), we are confident (actual self) and we see ourselves as confident (perceived self).
Congruence is important for psychological health.
However, if elements of the self concept are not in agreement, it creates a state of incongruence which can cause psychological distress. The greater the gap between the components, especially between the ideal self and the actual self, the greater the incongruence. - conditions of worth =
This refers to what we feel we must do or how we should be to be seen as worthy of love.
Humanistic psychologists propose that ideally the key people in our lives provide us with unconditional positive regard.
This means that that they love us unconditionally - there are no conditions (or strings) attached to their regard for us. Their love/regard is not conditional upon us behaving in a particular way or achieving particular things.
Example - a child knows that their mother will love them unconditionally even if they fail their test at school, come last in a race etc.
According to humanistic psychologists, if we believe that the regard from key people in our lives is conditional it can be very damaging to our psychological health.
It is really important to note that these conditions of worth can be real or perceived.
A person may know that they love their partner unconditionally but their partner may not perceive it is this way.
is the counselling approach?
The three core conditions that are required in counselling to enable the client to bring about change are:
Congruence - The counsellor must be completely genuine
Unconditional positive regard - The counsellor must be non-judgemental and valuing of the client
Empathy - The counsellor must strive to understand the client’s experience
Rogers also suggested that clients would be better helped if they were encouraged to focus on their own current subjective understanding rather than on some unconscious motive or someone else’s interpretation of the situation.
This reflects the emphasis that Rogers placed on the focus on the self.
He placed emphasis on the person’s current perception and how we live in the here-and-now (again, this is very different to the psychodynamic approach to therapy).
The client-centred approach has influenced many therapies in counselling such as CBT (you have come across this when you covered depression) and Gestalt therapy (Gestalt therapy emphasises personal responsibility and focuses upon the individual’s experience in the present moment).
postive evalutions =
The approach has contributed enormously to society, especially the world of psychological counselling and psychotherapy. For example, the core conditions promoted in person centred therapy, such as congruence and empathy have merged into many forms of effective psychotherapy.
A meta analysis of 86 studies found that humanistic therapies were effective at helping people make a lasting change over time (Elliott, 2002). Gibbard and Hanley (2008) found that 70% of participants showed significant improvement after taking part in client-centred therapy.
Therefore, we could argue that the approach has benefited both society and psychology itself….
Although the subjective experience of the individual is difficult to test, this can be seen as a strength of the approach that it acknowledges the effect that our subjective experiences have on our lives.
For example, subjective interpretation of events can help us explain how personal agency seems to be involved in many aspects of mental health ie. the same stressor, such as divorce, can have a positive or negative impact on different individuals wellbeing.
This more holistic view of humans is praised for ‘bringing the person back into psychology’ and promoting a positive and realistic image of the human condition.
There is evidence to back up parts of the humanistic approach.
Harter et al. (1996) discovered some of the dangers of giving conditions of worth to adolescents. It was found that some teenagers create ‘false self behaviour’ doing things to meet other people’s expectations even when they clash with their own views.
Harter concluded teenagers that feel they have to fulfil certain conditions in order to gain parents approval frequently end up not liking themselves and were more likely to develop depression.
This helps illustrate the validity of some of the humanistic concepts in explaining human behaviour.
negative evalutions?
The ideas of the approach are hard to test scientifically and therefore support with empirical evidence.
For example, some of the issues like congruence and unconditional positive regard are very difficult to study without using subjectivity, inferences or retrospection.
What would be the issue with having subjective results etc? - add answer to A03
This means that the assumptions of this approach lack the scientific rigour of other approaches in psychology, such as the biological approach.
The humanistic approach could be criticised for cultural bias.
The approach relates well to individualistic cultures (where the focus is on the individual) but not collectivist cultures (where the focus is on the well-being of others).
Research by Nevis (1983) found that in China, belongingness needs were seen as more fundamental than physiological needs (which is different to the order proposed in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs).
This would suggest that theories that are key components of the humanistic approach are not universally applicable.
