Humanistic psychology

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Humanistic psychology is a school of psychology that emerged in the 1950s as an alternative approach to both behaviorism and psychoanalysis.

Overview of Humanistic Psychology

Humanistic psychology emphasizes the study of the whole person, regarding an individual's behavior as directly related to his inner feelings and self-image. Humanistic psychologists explore how people are influenced by their self-perceptions and the personal meanings attached to their life experiences. They consider conscious choices, responses to internal needs, and current circumstances to be important in shaping human behavior.

Humanistic psychologists usually prefer qualitative, or descriptive, research methods rather than quantitative methods, which have a tendency to reduce human behavior to its behavioral elements losing essentially human aspects that are not easily quantified. This is part of the field's "human science" approach to psychology: an emphasis on the actual lived experience of persons (Aanstoos, Serlin & Greening, 2000).

Humanistic psychology is based on the following five postulates (Bugental, 1964):

1. Human beings cannot be reduced to components
2. Human beings have in them a uniquely human context
3. Human consciousness includes an awareness of oneself in the context of other people
4. Human beings have choices and responsibilities
5. Human beings are intentional, they seek meaning, value, and creativity

Many believe the message of Humanistic Psychology is a response to the denigration of the human spirit that has so often been implied in the image of the person drawn by behavioral and social sciences. It reflects many of the values expressed by the Hebrews, the Greeks, the Renaissance Europeans, and has roots in the existentialist thought of philosophers such as Søren Kierkegaard, Friedrich Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger, and Jean-Paul Sartre, who attempted to study those qualities that are unique to human life and that make possible such essentially human phenomena as love, personal freedom, lust for power, morality, art, philosophy, religion, literature, and science.

The development of the field

In the 1950s there were two opposing forces in psychology: Behaviorism and what has become known as Depth psychology. Behaviorism grew out of Ivan Pavlov's work on learning, particularly the conditioned reflex, and laid the foundations for the approach to psychology in the United States associated with Clark Hull, James Watson, B.F. Skinner, and others. Abraham Maslow later gave behaviorism the name "the first force." The "second force" came out of Sigmund Freud's work on psychoanalysis, and the psychologies of Alfred Adler, Erik Erikson, Carl Jung, Erich Fromm, Otto Rank, Melanie Klein, and others. These theorists focused on the "depth" or unconscious realm of the human psyche, which, they stressed, must be combined with the conscious mind in order to produce a healthy human personality.

In the late 1950s, two meetings were held in Detroit among psychologists who were interested in founding a professional association dedicated to a more humanistic vision: something that had everything to do with self, self-actualization, health, creativity, nature, being, becoming, individuality, and meaning. They also aimed to create a complete description of what it is to be a human being, and investigated the uniquely human aspects of experience, such as love and hope. These psychologists, including Abraham Maslow, believed this likely to become the central concern of a new psychological movement, known as the "third force."

These preliminary meetings eventually led to other developments, among those the launch of the Journal of Humanistic Psychology in 1961. This was soon to be followed by the formation of the Association for Humanistic Psychology (AHP) in 1963 and subsequent graduate programs in Humanistic psychology at institutions of higher learning. 1971 saw the establishment of an exclusive division devoted to Humanistic Psychology within the American Psychological Association (APA), which publishes its own academic journal called The Humanistic Psychologist.

Humanistic Psychology Today

During the 1970s, 80s,and beyond, the ideas and values of humanistic psychology spread into many areas of society in the United States.

Counseling and therapy

Humanistic psychology includes several approaches to counseling and therapy. These include the existential psychology of Rollo May, person-centered or client-centered therapy developed by Carl Rogers, Gestalt therapy developed by Fritz Perls, transactional analysis developed by Eric Berne, and marital and family therapies.

The general aim of humanistic therapy is to give a holistic description of the person. By using phenomenological, intersubjective and first-person categories, the humanistic psychologist attempts to glimpse the whole person and not just fragmented parts of the personality (Rowan, 2001).

Humanistic psychology also seeks an integration of the whole person, what Abraham Maslow|Maslow]] referred to as self-actualization. According to humanistic thinking each individual person already has inbuilt potentials and resources that might help them to build a stronger personality and self-concept. The mission of the humanistic psychologist is to point the individual in the direction of these resources. The therapist is, in some circumstances, closer to a guide, than to a clinician. However, in order to actualize hidden potentials the person might have to give up the safety of a particular stage of the personality in order to embrace a new, and more integrated stage. This is in no way a trivial process as it might include confrontations with new life-choices or existential concerns. Humanistic psychology views psychological instability and anxiety as normal features of human life and development, that can be worked through in therapy (Rowan, 2001).

Humanistic psychology,however, is not exclusively optimistic in its view of human development. It includes both the theories of such thinkers as Maslow and Rogers, who are basically optimistic, and of such thinkers as Schneider, May, and Bugental, who are not particularly optimistic (Rowan, 2001).

Humanistic psychology continues to be represented by the Association for Humanistic Psychology. However, it's influence has grown and it is also represented in a variety of other APA divisions concerned wth psychotherapy and issues of social concern.

Transpersonal psychology

Transpersonal psychology is a school of psychology that studies the transcendent, or spiritual dimensions of humanity. Among the thinkers who are considered to have set the stage for transpersonal studies are William James, Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung, Abraham Maslow, and Roberto Assagioli (Cowley & Derezotes, 1994; Miller, 1998; Davis, 2003). A major motivating factor behind the initiative to establish this school of psychology was Abraham Maslow's work on "peak experiences." Maslow's work grew out of the humanistic movement of the 1960's, and gradually the term "transpersonal" was associated with this distinct school of psychology within the humanistic movement.

A short definition from the Journal of Transpersonal Psychology suggests that transpersonal psychology "is concerned with the study of humanity’s highest potential, and with the recognition, understanding, and realization of unitive, spiritual, and transcendent states of consciousness" (Lajoie and Shapiro, 1992:91). Among these topics we find such issues as self-development, peak experiences, mystical experiences and the possibility of development beyond traditional ego-boundaries. Thus transpersonal psychology is concered with human experiences which apparently are 'trans-personal,'or 'trans-egoic'.

Transpersonal psychology had its formal beginnings in 1969, when Abraham Maslow, Stanislav Grof and Anthony Sutich initiated the publication of the first issue of the Journal of Transpersonal Psychology. This was soon to be followed by the founding of the Association for Transpersonal Psychology (ATP) in 1972. In the 1980s and 90s the field developed through the works of such authors as Stanislav Grof, Ken Wilber, Michael Washburn, Frances Vaughan, Roger Walsh, Stanley Krippner, Michael Murphy, Charles Tart, David Lukoff and Stuart Sovatsky. While Wilber has been considered an influential writer and theoretician in the field, he has since personally dissociated himself from the movement in favor of what he calls an integral approach.

Today transpersonal psychology also includes approaches to health, social sciences and practical arts. Transpersonal perspectives are also being applied to such diverse fields as psychology, psychiatry, anthropology, sociology, pharmacology, cross-cultural studies (Scotton, Chinen and Battista, 1996; Davis, 2003) and social work (Cowley & Derezotes, 1994).

Transpersonal Psychology has brought clinical attention to a number of "psychoreligious" and "psychospiritual" problems. Psychoreligious problems have to do with possible psychological conflict resulting from a person's involvement with the beliefs and practices of an organized religious institution. Among these we find problematic experiences related to change in denomination or conversion, intensification of religious belief or practice, or a loss of faith.

Psychospiritual problems are experiences of a different category than religious problems. Cowley & Derezotes (1994) notes that transpersonal theory has an understanding of spirituality as a dimension that is integral to human nature, yhat is, an essential aspect of being. Thus, psychospiritual problems have to do with a person's relationship to existential issues, and issues that are considered to transcend ordinary day-to-day reality. Among these problems we find psychiatric complications related to loss of faith, near-death experience, and mystical experience. Complications that are considered to present problems of a combined religious and spiritual nature are issues related to serious and terminal illness (Lukoff et.al, 1998).

The term "Spiritual Emergence" was coined by Stanislav and Christina Grof (1989) in order to describe a gradual unfoldment and appearance of psychospiritial categories in a persons life. In cases where this spiritual unfoldment is intensified beyond the control of the individual it might lead to a state of "Spiritual Emergency." A Spiritual Emergency might cause significant disruptions in psychological, social and occupational functioning, and many of the psychospiritual problems described above might be characterized as spiritual emergencies (Lukoff et.al, 1998).

At the beginning of the 1990s, the transpersonal community proposed a new diagnostic category entitled "religious or spiritual problem." This category was later included in the fourth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV) under the heading "Other Conditions That May Be a Focus of Clinical Attention", Code V62.89 (American Psychiatric Association, 1994; Lu et.al, 1997).

Integral psychology

In the 1940s Indra Sen, a devotee of Sri Aurobindo and The Mother, established the field of Integral Psychology, based on Sri Aurobindo's teachings, although his book of the same name only appeared in 1986. Aurobindo's integral yoga involves transformation of the entire being, rather than, as in most other teachings, a single faculty such as the head or the heart or the body.

Bahman Shirazi of the California Institute of Integral Studies has defined Integral Psychology as

a psychological system concerned with exploring and understanding the totality of the human phenomenon....(which) at its breadth, covers the entire body-mind-psyche-spirit spectrum, while at its depth...encompasses the previously explored unconscious and the conscious dimensions of the psyche, as well as the supra-conscious dimension traditionally excluded from psychological inquiry (Shirazi 2001).

According to the integral philosophies of Ken Wilber and others, integral psychology would be a psychology that is inclusive or holistic rather than exclusivist or reductive. Multiple explanations of phenomena, rather than competing with each other for supremacy, are to be valued and integrated into a coherent overall view. An integral view is one that incorporates and honors ancient and modern knowledge, spirituality and scientific research. Ken Wilber researched and synthesized about 200 theorists of human development (ancient, modern, east, and west) that have worked toward an integral view. From this vast research, Wilber created what he calls Integral Psychology. In his book of the same name, Integral Psychology, Wilber identifies an "integral stage of consciousness" which exhibits "...cognition of unity, holism, dynamic dialecticism, or universal integralism...".

Upper-Left Quadrant (UL) "I" Interior-Individual Intentional	Upper-Right Quadrant (UR) "It" Exterior-Individual Behavioral
Lower-Left Quadrant (LL) "We" Interior-Collective Cultural	Lower-Right Quadrant (LR) "Its" Exterior-Collective Social

Wilber is a holist—-he believes that reality does not consist merely of matter, or energy, or ideas, or processes. Instead, it consists of holons. Although you are made of parts (your nervous system, your skeletal system, etc.), you are also a part of your society, your nation-state, your planet.

Each holon has an interior perspective (an inside) and an exterior perspective (an outside). It also has an individual perspective and a collective (or plural) perspective. If you map these into quadrants, you have four quadrants, or dimensions.

Wilber provides a very comprehensive understanding of human development through the application of the Four Quadrant approach, which encompasses the individual, cultural, social, spiritual and political realms. All four quadrants interact and thus all of them are required in order to understand the full scope of human development, motivation and growth. In this approach, AQAL stands for "All quadrants, all levels", and equally connotes "all lines, all states, all types".

• Upper Left Quadrant (individual, subjective, intentional): emotional, mental and spiritual development.
• Upper Right Quadrant (individual, objective, behavioral): physical body, neurological brain and states of consciousness.
• Lower Right Quadrant (social, interobjective): systems, political and civic institutions.
• Lower Left Quadrant (cultural, intersubjective): relationships with family, friends and community; moral development, and contribution to society.

Integral psychology promotes health and wellness through attention to and development of all four quadrants of one's life. In addition, the development in one quadrant reinforces the effectiveness of the others. The more categories that are engaged, the more effective they all become because all are intimately related. This holistic approach and broad view of human development has been brought to bear on an astonishing variety of disciplines for personal, academic, and professional development:the integral approach is being applied to medicine, social services, ecology, finances, politics, business and others.

Criticism and debate

Although any model of human development can only be understood as an intellectual abstraction of reality, transpersonal psychology has made significant contributions to the understanding of human development and consciousness. While authors like Wilber and Battista tend to emphasize the understanding of development in the form of levels, where each superior level includes and integrates its junior dimensions, theorists like Washburn and Grof tend to emphasize the regressive nature of consciousness. Regressive in the sense that the individual has to integrate the deeper and prerational aspects of the psyche before it can re-enter the stream of development in a healthy fashion (Scotton, Chinen & Battista, 1996).

Criticisms of transpersonal psychology has come from several commentators. One of the earliest criticisms of the field was issued by the Humanistic psychologist Rollo May, who disputed the conceptual foundations of transpersonal psychology (Aanstos, Serling & Greening, 2000). May was particularly concerned about the low level of reflection on the dark side of human nature, and on human suffering, among the early transpersonal theorists. A similar critique was also put forward by Alexander (1980) who thought that Transpersonal Psychology, in light of the thinking of William James, represented a philosophy that failed to take evil adequately into account. This serious criticism has been absorbed by later Transpersonal theorists, who have been more willing to reflect on these important dimensions of human existence (Scotton, Chinen and Battista, 1996).

Criticism of Humanistic psychology in general has come from several commentators. Among these is sociologist Roy Wallis, who has questioned the growing adaptation of spiritual values and concepts within Humanistic psychology (Rowan, 2001). Humanistic psychology has also been criticized for lacking an integrated, clearly defined theory. One of the commentators that have raised such objections is Leonard Geller who believes that Humanistic theory is incoherent because it tries to approach both biology and psychology in a way that, in his opinion, is illogical (Rowan, 2001).

Further, in their review of different approaches to positive psychology Seligman & Csikszentmihalyi (2000) notes that the early incarnations of Humanistic psychology lacked a cumulative empirical base, and that some directions encouraged self-centeredness. Rowan (2001) believes that these suspicions are understandable as long as a large amount of time is spent on discussing such issues as the self and self-actualization. However, according to mainstream humanistic thinkers Humanistic psychology must not be understood to promote such ideas as the narcissistic self, egotism or selfishness (Bohart & Greening, 2001; Rowan, 2001). The idea of the humanistic perspective is not to promote such narrow categories, but rather to identify a movement towards a fuller sense of self (Rowan, 2001).

In their response to Seligman & Csikszentmihalyi (2000) Bohart & Greening (2001) notes that, along with pieces on self-actualization and individual fulfillment, humanistic psychologists have also published a wide range of papers dealing with such topics as the promotion of international peace and understanding, the holocaust, the reduction of violence, and the promotion of social welfare and justice for all.

References

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• Aanstoos, C. Serlin, I., & Greening, T. 2000. "History of Division 32 (Humanistic Psychology) of the American Psychological Association." In D. Dewsbury (Ed.), Unification through Division: Histories of the divisions of the American Psychological Association, Vol. V. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
• Bugental, J.F.T. 1964. "The Third Force in Psychology," Journal of Humanistic Psychology, Vol. 4, No. 1, pp. 19-25.
• Alexander, Gary T. 1980. "William James, the Sick Soul, and the Negative Dimensions of Consciousness: A Partial Critique of Transpersonal Psychology.". Journal of the American Academy of Religion, XLVIII(2):191-206
• American Psychiatric Association. 1994. Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth edition. Washington, D.C.: American Psychiatric Publishing. ISBN 0890420254.
• Bohart, Arthur C. & Greening, Thomas. 2001. "Comment: Humanistic Psychology and Positive Psychology." American Psychologist. Jan, Vol 56(1) 81-82.
• Chaudhuri, H. (1975). "Psychology: Humanistic and transpersonal." Journal of Humanistic Psychology, 15 (1), 7-15.
• Chaudhuri, H. 1989. The Evolution of Integral Consciousness. Theosophical Pub House. ISBN 0835604942.
• Cowley, Au-Deane S. & Derezotes, David. 1994. "Transpersonal Psychology and Social Work Education." Journal of Social Work Education, 10437797, Winter, Vol. 30, Issue 1.
• Davis, John V. 2003. "Transpersonal psychology" in Taylor, B. and Kaplan, J., (Eds). The Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature. Bristol, England: Thoemmes Continuum.
• Ellis, Albert. 1989. "Dangers of Transpersonal Psychology: A Reply To Ken Wilber." Journal of Counseling & Development, Feb 89, Vol. 67 Issue 6, p336.
• Grof, Stanislav & Grof, Christina. 1989. "Spiritual Emergency: When Personal Transformation Becomes a Crisis" in New Consciousness Reader. Los Angeles: J.P Tarcher.
• Lajoie, D. H. & Shapiro, S. I. 1992. "Definitions of transpersonal psychology: The first twenty-three years." Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, Vol. 24.
• Lu, F.G., Lukoff, D., Turner, R. 1997. "Religious or Spiritual Problems." In DSM-IV Sourcebook, Vol. 3. Widiger TA, Frances AJ, Pincus HA et al., (eds). Washington, D.C.: American Psychiatric Association, pp 1001-1016.
• Lukoff, David, Lu, Francis G. & Turner, Robert P. 1998. "From Spiritual Emergency to Spiritual Problem - The Transpersonal Roots of the New DSM-IV Category." Journal of Humanistic Psychology, 38(2), pp. 21-50
• Miller, John J. 1998. "Book Review: Textbook of Transpersonal Psychiatry and Psychology." Psychiatric Services 49:541-542, April 1998. American Psychiatric Association
• Milstein, Glen, Midlarsky, Elizabeth, Link, Bruce G., Raue, Patrick J. & Bruce, Martha. 2000. "Assessing Problems with Religious Content: A Comparison of Rabbis and Psychologists." Journal of Nervous & Mental Disease. 188(9):608-615, September.
• Prilleltensky, Isaac. 1992. "Humanistic Psychology, Human Welfare and the Social Order." The Journal of Mind And Behaviour, Autumn, Volume 13, Number 4 ps 315-327.
• Rowan, John. 1993 The Transpersonal: Psychotherapy and Counselling. London: Routledge.
• Rowan, John. 2001. Ordinary ecstasy: the dialectics of humanistic psychology. Hove: Brunner-Routledge.
• Scotton, Bruce W, Chinen, Allan B. and John R. Battista, Eds. 1996. Textbook of Transpersonal Psychiatry and Psychology. New York: Basic Books. ISBN 0465095305.
• Seligman, Martin E. P. & Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly. 2000. "Positive psychology: An introduction." American Psychologist. Jan, Vol 55(1) 5-14.
• Sen, Indra. 1986. Integral Psychology: The Psychological System of Sri Aurobindo. Sri Aurobindo International Centre of Education. ASIN B0007BY850.
• Sherazi, Bhaman. 2001. "Integral psychology, metaphors and processes of personal integration", in Cornelissen, Matthijs (Ed.) Consciousness and Its Transformation, Pondicherry: SAICE online
• Sovatsky, Stuart. 1998. Words from the Soul: Time, East/West Spirituality, and Psychotherapeutic Narrative. New York: State University of New York Press (SUNY Series in Transpersonal and Humanistic Psychology). ISBN 079143950X.
• Turner, Robert P., Lukoff, David, Barnhouse, Ruth Tiffany & Lu, Francis G. 1995. "Religious or spiritual problem. A culturally sensitive diagnostic category in the DSM-IV." Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, Jul;183(7):435-44.
• Walsh, Roger. 1989. "Psychological Chauvinism and Nuclear Holocaust: A Response to Albert Ellis and Defense of Non-Rational Emotive Therapies." Journal of Counseling & Development Feb 1989, Vol. 67 Issue 6, p338.
• Whitney, Edward. 1998. "Personal Accounts: Mania as Spiritual Emergency." Psychiatric Services 49:1547-1548, December. American Psychiatric Association.
• Wilber, Ken. 1989. "Let's Nuke the Transpersonalists: A Response to Albert Ellis." Journal of Counseling & Development, Feb89, Vol. 67 Issue 6, p332.
• Wilber, Ken. 2000. Integral Psychology. Shambhala. ISBN 1570625549.

External links

• Association for Humanistic Psychology
• AHP - Journal of Humanistic Psychology
• APA Division 32 - Humanistic Psychology
• UK Association of Humanistic Psychology Practitioners
• Association for Transpersonal Psychology
• The Institute of Transpersonal Psychology
• ATP - Journal of Transpersonal Psychology
• AHP - John Rowan's Guide to Humanistic Psychology - Transpersonal Psychology
• The British Psychological Society -Transpersonal Psychology Section
• WWW Virtual Library - Transpersonal Psychology: links
• Explore Transpersonal Psychology
• John Davis's Transpersonal Psychology website
• Sandra Stahlman - Commentary on Diagnosis of Mystical Experience With Psychotic Features"
• Second International Conference on Integral Psychology - a summary of a number of papers; from an Aurobindonian perspective
• Sri Aurobindo Center for Consciousness Studies
• Sri Aurobindo's Integral Psychology - books on Aurobindonian Integral Psychology
• Sri Aurobindo's Psychology
• "An Integral Theory of Consciousness", an essay by Wilber.
• Integral Paradigm 101

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