Psychology 101, Humanistic Psychology To Help You Reach Your Potential, Be Psychologically Healthy!

Simple to understand. This is why this article provides the best psychology information in this series of Psychology 101 articles. Here we concentrate on the main stakeholders in humanistic psychology and what humanism is all about. We, further, look at the historical perspective and what this means to us today.

Today, many psychology themes merge into one, as aspects of one school of psychology are integrated into other school's ideas and concept. However, humanist psychology is not considered a 'school', but many of the fundamentals do come from the three major schools: psycho-dynamic, cognitive and behaviourism.

Humanism does have its place in society today, as you will understand when you read on.

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Psychology Definition

As this is a psychology 101 based article, I will, as always, start by providing a ‘working definition’ of psychology as a term:

‘Psychology is the scientific study of the mind and behaviour of humans and animals.’

Psychologists concentrate on what is observable and measurable in a person’s behaviour. This includes the biological processes in the body, although, the mind is central to the subject.

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Humanistic psychology developed in the 1960s. It focuses on the individual, free will, creativity, spontaneity and personal choice of the the individual.

The second feature is on an emphasis on conscious experience and, thirdly, anything to do with the wholeness of human nature.

The roots of the humanistic perspective can be traced back to William James, Gestaltists and the school of some of the psycho dynamic founders like Adler, Jung and Erikson.

A pre-cursor to Gestalt Psychology, it is thought that Humanistic Psychology is a development from Phenomenology. This is the study of immediate experience as it occurs.

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Power to the people and the time is right for the flower of humanism to come into bloom. It is the 1960s and the Humanist Psychologists think the Behaviourist Psychologists are much to narrow in their concepts. People are not programmable machines, as the behaviourist think, they are more than that.

They also objected to the demeaning and deterministic nature from the psych dynamic school of Freud. They criticised psychoanalysis and the emphasis on mental illness. The Humanist's were not negative seekers that homed in on Freud's ideas of misery, jealousy, fear, selfishness and hatred. They were more positive than that.

They wanted to focus in on mental health through happiness, contentment, kindness, sharing and unconditional love.

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Abraham Maslow (1908-1970) was the father of the Humanistic Perspective. He has had a profound effect on psychology today, although was inspired by two teachers of his - the Anthropologist Ruth Benedict and the Gestalt Psychologist, Max Wertheimer. You can read more about the School of Gestalt by clicking on the link (Resource Box 1) at the end of this article.

Maslow started off his psychological career as an avid Behaviourist (Resource Box 2) but became disillusioned at the limitation and regard of real people.

He set out to understand why healthy people were able to incorporate the ability "full humanness".

In his search, he investigated many individuals to find common characteristics and patterns in human contentment.

Maslow's theory on self actualization is about reaching our full potential as an innate human motivation. This, therefore, is achieved by using and developing our talents and abilities.

Each time we experience or achieve our full potential, this creates a sense of fulfillment which he termed as peak experience. In order to reach self-actualization, we have to satisfy lower needs or basic needs which exist in various levels. Set in a pyramid or ladder this hierarchy of needs must be satisfied before people can realise this peak experience.

In this ladder, we start from the bottom where each Need must be satisfied before the moving up.  This can motivate us to achieve a higher level of satisfaction.

People in everyday life may climb up and down the hierarchy several times.

They may reach different levels before returning back to the bottom again.

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Maslow's hierarcy of needs has had a profound influence on society of today.

It is used in education, for example, for training teachers in motivating students and by helping students plan their own study.

By planning, setting goals and having regular breaks, students can improve their effectiveness in their studies.

In therapy, the hierarchy helps patients establish their own understanding of their needs. It, essentially, enables them to declutter and organise their thoughts.

This provokes action in their lives.

In management, the hierarchy helps managers to understand the needs of their staff and, therefore, motivate them.

By encouraging and understanding them, it helps to get the best work outcome from them.

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So, now we have centred and appropriately placed Maslow as the stamen within the bloom of humanistic psychology, where are the petals? This has to be Carl Rogers!

Carl Roger (1902 - 1987) developed a similar theory to Self Actualization. He emphasizes a natural or innate drive to people reaching their full potential. This process, he believed, was ongoing. Instead of people reaching self actualization, they are self actualizing because they are always striving toward this goal.

He also focused on the importance of upbringing during childhood, especially the role of the mother. Roger's believed that this was a crucial factor to adult personality. This is about unconditional love or Positive Regard. The opposite of this, he termed Conditional Positive Regard which, as suggests, can limit the development of the self.

Person centred therapy was developed by Rogers as a form of psychotherapy (Resource Box 4).

It is client centred (Resource Box 5) because the patient is responsible for becoming an active participant in improving their lives. This is different to psychoanaylisis and the behaviourist approach but does have some of the elements. However, the client is not passive. He does not have a diagnosis. The therapist is an enabler rather than diagnostic. The therapist is not responsible for the changes in the client.

Rogerian therapy is more fundamentally about counselling where the therapist is more of a confident who listens and encourages the client on an equal footing. Rogers believed that a good self concept enabled patients to work on self actualising.

The humanistic perspective is about centralising the positive aspects of being human. A positive self concept, therefore, makes for a positive person. This positivity shines through and leads to contentment and happiness.

Carl Rogers believed that the role of the Self Concept consist of three parts:

1. The Ideal Self
2. Self Image
3. Self Esteem

Ideas on self concept have had a major impact on self improvement and awareness. Although the humanistic movement has impacted strongly, because there is no strong scientific theory or research involved, humanistic psychology is not considered a school. It is just a perspective.

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This psychology information on humanistic psychology demonstrates the concept that we are all potentially humanistic.  Psychologists in this realm believe in the positive and that we are all fundamentally good and moral.  It is formulated on being unconditional and empowering people to be the best they can be - reaching their full potential.  Born from the 1960s flower power, it seems natural that the seed of humanistic psychology has grown into the people enabler of today.

© This work is covered under Creative Commons License

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1. School of Gestalt
   
2. Behaviourism
   
3. Self Actualization
4. Psychotherapy - link in
   
5. Client Centred Approach