Carl Rogers | Person-Centered Theory

Carl Rogers - developed a humanistic theory of personality that grew out of his experiences as a practicing psychotherapist.

• more concerned with helping people

• more likely to ask “How can I help this person grow and develop?” than to ponder the question “What caused this person to develop in this manner?”

• called for empirical research to support both his personality theory and his therapeutic approach

• balance between tender-minded and hardheaded studies that expand knowledge of how humans feel and think

• he wanted to be a helper of people not a constructor of theories

Person-Centered Theory

• in the early years of his approach, it was known as nondirective → which later became

  • client centered, person centered, student centered, group centered and person to person

• follows if-then framework (If certain conditions exist, then a process will occur; if this process occurs, then certain outcomes can be expected)

• If the therapist is congruent and communicates unconditional positive regard and accurate empathy to the client, then therapeutic change will occur; if therapeutic change occurs, then the client will experience more self-acceptance, greater trust of self, and so on

  Roger’s Basic Assumption

  1. Formative Tendency - tendency for all matter, both organic and inorganic, to evolve from simpler to more complex forms

  • universe will come into a zero state?

  • from simpler forms inorganic and organic may become complex (tend to grow in a more complex version of ourselves)

  2. Actualizing tendency - tendency within all humans (and other animals and plants)

• to move toward completion or fulfillment of potentials.

• only motive people possess

• towards completion and fulfillment

• Because each person operates as one complete organism, actualization involves the whole person—physiological and intellectual, rational and emotional, conscious and unconscious

• need to be stable first before next level

• best version of ourselves

  a. Maintenance - similar to the lower steps on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs

  • tendency to resist change and remain the status quo)

  • basic physical needs (e.g food, air, safety)

  • people fight against new ideas

  • conservative nature of maintenance needs is expressed in people’s desire to protect their current, comfortable self-concept

  • ppl fight against new ideas, they distort experiences that do not fit, they see change as painful and growth frightening

• b. Enhancement - strong desire to learn that are not immediately rewarding and willingness to change na hindi agad agaran

  • needs are expressed in a variety of forms: curiosity, playfulness, self-exploration, friendship, and confidence that one can achieve psychological growth

  • people are willing to face threat and pain bc of a biologically based tendency for the organism to fulfill its basic nature

  • expressed in variety of forms: curiosity, playfulness, self-exploration, friendship, and confidence that one can achieve psychological growth

  • people have the creative power to solve problems and alter self-concepts → to be increasingly self-directed

  • perceive experiences as reality and know their reality better than anyone else

  • no need to be directed controlled or manipulated toward actualization

  • not limited within humans

  
  

• Self and Self-actualization

  • Tendency to actualize the self as perceived in awareness

  • self is a from of actualizing tendency

  • infants develop a value concept of self when a portion of their experience becomes personalized and differentiated in “I” or “me” experiences → gradually learn about their identity

    SUBSET:

  • self-actualization - tendency to actualize the self as perceived in awareness

    iba ang actualization ng organism and self

    Self-concept

  • ONE’S BEING AND ONE’S EXPERIENCES THAT ARE PERCEIVED IN AWARENESS (not always accurate by the indiv

    • Once formed = hard to find change and significant learnings

    • things we are only aware of, subjective siya, it is the ego in terms of freud

  • Ideal Self - one’s view of self as one wishes to be (superego ni freud)

    • exists within all of us, aiming to be more organismic self

    • usually positive

    • a wide gap between the ideal self and the self-concept indicates incongruence and an unhealthy personality

    • Gap between self and the self-concept indicates incongruence and unhealthy personality

    organismic self - objective self mo, organs chromosomes n stuff like that (ID)

    Awareness

    • The symbolic representation of some portion of our experience

    • Without this, self-concept and ideal self wouldn’t exist

    Levels of Awareness (batay sa experiences)

    1. ignored or denied

       • ignored - ex. can be illustrated by a woman walking down a busy street, an activity that presents many potential stimuli, particularly of sight and sound. Because she cannot attend to all of them, many remain ignored.

       • denied - a mother who never wanted children, but out of guilt she becomes overly solicitous to them. Her anger and resentment toward her children may be hidden to her for years, never reaching consciousness but yet remaining a part of her experience and coloring her conscious behavior toward them.

       • unwanted child teenage prregnancy kapag nagagalit naprproject yung galit

    2. accurately symbolized - freely admitted to the self structure

       • Such experiences are both nonthreatening and consistent with the existing self-concept.

       • For example, if a pianist who has full confidence in his piano-playing ability is told by a friend that his playing is excellent, he may hear these words, accurately symbolize them, and freely admit them to his self-concept.

       • self concept is “im intellegent” matalino ako kaya mataas score ko, hence, accurately symbolized siya

    3. distorted form - when experiences are not consistent w/ our view of self we reshape or distort the experience to be assimilated into our existing self-concept

       • self concept is v intelligent but grade sa math is 76, incongruent na. pwede sabihin na yung prof kasi panget magturo para maprotektahan yung self-concept

    Denial of Positive Experiences - man people have difficulty accepting genuine compliments and positive feedback even when deserved.

    • When people have difficulty accepting genuine compliments and positive feedback

    • Either because: he/she distrusts the giver or he/she doesn’t feel deserving

    • (e.g.): A student with good academic performance.

    Becoming a Person

    Infancy - person must be in contact (either positively or negatively) to another person which is the caregiver.

  • as children / adults become more aware that another person has some measure of regard for them, they begin to balue posirive regard and devalue negative regard

  • receiving positive regard from others is necessary for positive self-regard. when positive-regard is established, it becomes independent of the continual need to be loved

  • “mas madali magbigay ng love if u were well loved rin”

  • kaya its easy to conform para mas madali magustuhan

  • by default people have formative and self-actualizing tendency. we will become more self-aware and fulfill potential

    • An individual must make contact with another person:

    Positive Regard

    • when a person develops a need to be loved, liked, or accepted

    • a prerequisite for positive self-regard

    Positive Self-Regard

    • experience of prizing or valuing one’s self

    “the person becomes in a sense his/her own significant social other”

    Barriers to Psychological Health

  • Conditions of Worth - perceive that their parents, peers or partners love and accept them only if they meet those people’s expectations and approval. “A condition of worth arises when the positive regard of a significant other is conditional, when the individual feels that in some respects he [or she] is prized and in others not”

  • External Evaluations - perceptions of other people’s view (tintingnan tapos nacoconscious sa mga hindi naman kilala)

  • Incongruence - happens if the organism and the self are not aligned. The person who we really are (orgaismic self) is not aligned with the person who we really want to be (ideal self)

  • Vulnerability - people are vulnerable when they are unaware of the discrepancy between their organismic self and their significant experience

  • Anxiety and Threat - Whereas vulnerability exists when we have no awareness of the incongruence within our self, anxiety and threat are experienced as we gain awareness of such an incongruence.

    Defensiveness

    • The protection of the self concept against anxiety and threat by the denial or distortion of experiences inconsistent with it

    Two Chief Defenses

    1. Distortion

    • Misinterpret an experience in order to fit it into some aspect of our self-concept

    1. Denial

    • Refuse to perceive an experience in awareness, or at least we keep some aspect of it from reaching symbolization

    2. Disorganization

    • People sometimes behave consistently with their organismic experience and sometimes in accordance with their shattered self-concept.

    Rogers (1959) defined anxiety as “a state of uneasiness or tension whose cause is unknown” (p. 204). As we become more aware of the incongruence between our organismic experience and our perception of self, our anxiety begins to evolve into threat: that is, an awareness that our self is no longer whole or congruent. Anxiety and threat can represent steps toward psychological health because they signal to us that our organismic experience is inconsistent with our self-concept. Nevertheless, they are not pleasant or comfortable feeling

    
    In order to prevent this inconsistency between our organismic experience and our perceived self, we react in a defensive manner. Defensiveness is the protection of the self-concept against anxiety and threat by the denial or distortion of experiences inconsistent with it (Rogers, 1959). Because the self-concept consists of many self-descriptive statements, it is a many-faceted phenomenon. When one of our experiences is inconsistent with one part of our self-concept, we will behave in a defensive manner in order to protect the current structure of our self-concept.

    Distortion and denialpeople engage in defensive behavior, but sometimes defenses fail and behavior becomes disorganized or psychotic.

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    Psychotherapy

    • Conditions of Therapy

      1. Counselor of congruence - dapat walang psychopathology or at least di ganoon kalala

      2. unconditional positive regard - “tanggap no matter what” para maisip niya na pwede siya mag bago

      3. emphatic listening - “i feel waht you feel”

    Process of Therapy

    1 - unwillingness to communicate anything about oneself (denial)

    2 - usually talk about other people

    3 - freely talk about themselves

    4 - dating feelings and in the future

    5 - kwento nararamdaman, ifefeel, but cant fully articulate, recognize experiences na dinedeny

    6 -dramatic growth movement toward becoming fully functioning or self-actualizing

    

    Theoretical Explanation for Therapeutic Change

    

    Persons of tomorrow

1. be more adaptable

2. be open to their experiences

3. live fully in the moment

4. be confident to experience harmonious relationships

5. be more integrated

6. have a basic trust of human nature

7. greater richness in life than do other people

Self-Discrepancy Theory

• Real self and ideal self - incongruence may lead to distress kapag may discrepancy sila

• Higgins Self-Discrepancy Theory - actual self, ideal self, and ought self

kailangan lang accountability para maayos yung buhay