CARL ROGERS (PERSON CENTERED THERAPY)

The Actualizing Tendency:

 The Organismic Valuing Process: Inner sense within a person, which guides him or her
in the directions of growth and health. For eg: the inner vague feeling that choosing a certain
career, or a certain love partner, would be wrong for you, even if everyone else approves of that
choice.
 The Fully Functioning Person: It is a person who is creative, open to experiences,
believes in existential living and experiential freedom along with organismic trusting.
 Subjective Experience, Values, and Science: Spirituality, as well as subjectivity, are
consistent with Rogers’s theory, which does not aspire to be value-free
It is the force for growth and development that is innate in all organisms.
Example:
 a plant’s innate tendency to grow (even in poor soil)
 a person’s tendency toward self-actualization
Incongruency occurs when there’s a discrepancy between ideal self and real self.
Conditions of worth: The expectations that a person must live up to before receiving respect
and love.
Unconditional positive regard: Accepting and valuing a person without requiring particular
behaviors as a prerequisite. Being accepted and loved even if your grades are low, your weight is
wrong, and your attitude is questionable.
Development of creativity:
Statements typical of parents of preschool children who later became creative:
 “I respect my child’s opinions and encourage him to express them.”
 “I encourage my child to be curious, to explore and question things.”
And the parents disagreed with these statements:
 “I do not allow my child to get angry with me.”
 “I feel my child is a bit of a disappointment to me.”
Rogers’ Core Conditions for the Therapeutic Environment (Therapist):

Rogers’ Core Conditions for the Therapeutic Environment (Client):

Rogers’ Theory of Personality Summarized:

 Behavior is best understood through the individual’s reality (perception of experiences)
 Personal growth occurs through decreased defensiveness
 Self actualization is the organism’s one, basic tendency
 Experiences inconsistent with self concept are threats leading to increased rigidity
 Therapy allows the individual to accept and integrate all of their experiences
Congruence = Psychological Adjustment
Lack of Congruence = Psychological Maladjustment
Applications:
 Humanistic Education
 Marriage and Relationships
 Social Welfare Programs
  Business
 Political Conflict, War, and Peace
 Group therapy
 Research

Criticisms of Rogers’s Theory:

 Client-centered therapy is no more effective than other therapies
 Is the theory overly optimistic about human nature, ignoring evil?
Therapeutic techniques in client-centered therapy:
Selection criteria:
 Personality should be flexible. It does not work with rigid and authoritarian clients.
 Reasonable judgment to life. It should be free from delusional flavors.
 Anxiety persons who are prepare to take emotional risk.
 They want to trust their own therapist.
 Client should be ready for desirable change.
 Client should be prepared to share responsibility.
 He/ she should be willing to get in touch with his or her feelings however difficult the
feelings may be.
Qualities of an Effective Therapist:
 Trust worthy Dependable
 Detached but available Therapist can judge his own feelings also
 Genuine Empathy
 Unconditional positive regard Competent
  Professional excellence Thorough knowledge of therapies
 Tone should be soft No sentence is given as assumption.
 Do not express anything by face. He/she should be neutral
 Non judgmental attitude No racial discrimination
Therapeutic relationship:
Deals: Emotional “problems in living” in relationship in which therapy experiencing was denied,
defined or discounted by others.
Basic Skills:
1. Empathy
2. Congruence
3. Acceptance
Other then empathy, congruence, acceptance: Consistency, Boundary, Awareness, Interpersonal
Sensitivity.
What if Therapist is Incongruent?
The client is likely to become confused. Lack confidence in the counselling relationship as a safe
place within which he or she might explore painful or shameful experiences.
Presence means: ‘At my best’.
The therapeutic process: “Greater openness to experience.”
Rogers characterized the direction of therapeutic growth as including :
 Increasing awareness of denied experience,
 Movement from perceiving the world in generalizations to being able to see things in a
more differentiated manner and
 Greater reliance on personal experience as a source of values and standards.
How Did Carl Rogers Do Therapy?
 According to Brink and Farber, Rogers made some responses. Among which some are as
follows:
 Providing orientation:
Rogers tended to start sessions by giving himself and the client an opportunity to orient
themselves to the task.
 Affirming attention:
 He frequently let his client know that he was present and listening, by leaning towards the
client, saying ‘m-hm, m-hm’ or nodding affirmatively.
 Checking understanding:
Often Rogers would check whether he had correctly understood the meaning of what the
client was saying.
 Restating:
Sometimes Rogers’ words seemed directly to mirror what the client has said. On other
occasions, a restatement would take the form of a short statement that clarified the core of what
the client was expressing.
 Acknowledging client’s unstated feelings:
This response involved making reference to feelings that were expressed in either nonverbal
behavior or voice quality, but were not explicitly verbalized by the client.
 Turning pleas for help back to the client
When a client asked for guidance or answers. Rogers would often turn the request back to the
person.
 Accepting correction:
When a client indicated that one of Roger’s responses was not accurate, he would accept the
correction, try again to get it right and then move on.
Goals of therapy:
1. Establish relationship with client through rapport building and catharsis because it helps
client to face anxiety and confusion which further helps in growth development. This will
be challenged.
2. The goal is also to see, feel and experience the world as the client do.
3. Maintain aloof stance that is do not get emotional with client and keeps scientific
objective.
4. To create insight.