Person-centered Therapy
Intro
* based on concepts from humanistic
psychology
* Carl Rogers is identified as the most
influential psychotherapist
* shares many concepts and values with the
existential perspective
Development of the Approach
1st period (1940s) Rogers developed nondirective counseling
- emphasized the counselor's creation of a
permissive and non-directive climate
- focused on reflecting and clarifying the
client's verbal and non-verbal
communications with the aim of helping
clients become aware of and gain insight
into their feelings.
Development cont'd
2nd period (1950s) Rogers renamed it clientcentered therapy
- characterized by a shift from clarification
of feelings to a focus on the
phenomenological world of the client
- focused on actualizing tendency
Development cont'd
3rd period (late 1950's - 1970s) Rogers conducted
researches on the client-centered approach
processes and outcomes
- based on the findings of these researches the
approach was further refined and expanded; aplied
to eduaction (student-centered teaching) and
encounter groups
4th period (1980s-1990s) considerable expansion to
education, industry, groups, conflict resolution, and
search for world peace
- became known as person=centered approach
Key concepts
VIEW OF HUMAN NATURE
> people are trustworthy, resourceful, capable of selfunderstanding and self-direction, able to make constructive
changes, and able to live effective and productive lives
three therapeutic core conditions that create that create a
growth-promoting climate:
1. congruence (genuineness or realness)
2. unconditional positive regard (acceptance and caring)
3. accurate empathic understanding (an ability to deeply
grasp the subjective world of another person)
View of HN cont'd
Human beings are essentially forward-moving
organisms drawn to the fulfillment of their own
creative natures and to the pursuit of truth and
social responsiveness.
*Actualizing tendency - a directional process of
striving toward realization, fulfillment,
autonomy, self-determination, and perfection.
The Therapeutic Process
THERAPEUTIC GOALS
> achieve a greater degree of independence and
integration
by:
> focuson the person, not on the person's presenting
problems
> assist clients in their growth process so clients could
better cope with their current and future problems
> to provide a climate conducive to helping individual
become a fully functioning person
cont'd
Rogers (1961) described people who are becoming
increasingly actualized as having:
1.
2.
3.
4.
an openness to experience
a trust in themselves
an internal source of evaluation, and
a willingness to continue growing
* encouraging these chracteristics is the basic goal
of the PCT
Therapist's functions and roles
> rooted in being and attitudes, not in techniques
designed to get the client to "do something"
> therapist use themselves as the instrument of change
> to be present and accessible to clients and to focus on
their immediate experience
> PCT do not take a history, they avoid asking leading and
probing questions, they do not make interpretations of
the client's behavior, they do not evaluate a client's ideas
or plans, and they do not decide for the client about the
frequency or length of the therapeutic venture
Client's experience in PCT
clients come to the PCTist in a state of
congruence
> clients are able to explore a wider range of
beliefs and feelings
> with PCT, client distort less and move to a
greater acceptance and integration of
conflicting and confusing feelings.they
increasingly discover aspects within themselves
that have been kept hidden.
> PCT allow them to experience freedom to be
who they are
>
cont'd
>with
increased freedom, they become
more mature psychologically and more
actualized.
>the therapy relationship experienced
in PCT provides a supportive structure
within which client's self-healing
capacities are activated
Relationship bet. Therapist and Client
1. two persons are in psychological contact.
2. the first person (the client) is in a state of incongruence,
being vulnerable or anxious.
3. the second person (the therapist) is congruent (real or
genuine) in the relationship.
4. the T experiences UPR for the client.
5. the T experiences EU of the client's internal frame of
reference and endeavors to communicate this experience to
the client.
6. the comunication to the CL of the therapist's EU and UPR is
to a minimal degree achieved.
cont'd
Rogers - If the therapeutic core
conditions exist over some period of
time, construtive personality change
will occur. The core conditions do not
vary according to client type. They are
necessary and sufficient for
therapeutic change to occur.
cont'd
This approach is best described as a way of being
and as a shared journey in which T and C reveal
their humanness and participate in growth
experience.
CONGRUENCE or GENUINENESS - implies that
therapists are real, that is, genuine, integrated, and
authntic during the therapy hour.
UNCONDITIONAL POSITIVE REGARD - deep and
genuine caring for the client as a person
cont'd
ACCURATE EMPATHIC UNDERSTANDING - to understand
the clients' experience and feelings sensitively and
accurately as they are revealed in the therapy session.
empathy - deep and subjective understanding of the
client with the client.
AEU- implies that the therapist will sense the client's
feelings as if they were his or her own without becoming
lost in those feelings.
Application: Therapeutic Techniques
and Procedures
Emphasis on reflection of feelings - grasping the world of the
client and reflecting this understanding.
The use of Person-centered methods - the quality of the
therapeutic relatonship, as opposed to the techniquesm is the
primary agent of growth in the client.
> experiencing and communicating attitudes - the process of
"being with" clients and entering their world of perceptions
and feelings
> qualities such as skills in listening, accepting, respecting,
understanding, and responding
cont'd
Immediacy - addressing what is going on
between CL and TH
The role of Assessment - emphasizes not on
how the TH assesses the CL, but on the CL's
self-assessment
cont'd
PCT is especially applicable in crisis intervention such as
unwanted pregnancy, an illness, a disastrous event, or
the loss of a loved one.
It is also applicable to clients with anxiety disorders,
alcoholism, psychosomatic problems, agoraphobia,
interpersonal difficulties, depression, cancer, and
personality disorders.
P-C expressive arts therapy - offer clients the opportunity
to create movement, visual art, journal writing, sound,
and music to express their feelings and gain insight from
these activities.