The humanistic perspective has greatly impacted on the society’s psychological arena like the psychodynamic and behavioral theories. It has triggered new discussions on humanism, human beings’ behavioral free will and the need to comprehend the conscious and subjective experiences that people have (Chatrand & Bargh, 1999). The humanistic theoretical perspective is a perspective that heads conscious experiences, personal responsibility, and explanations of various experiences. The theory is explained to be directed towards issues that are meaningful to people, emphasizing more on the subjective and unique, unpredictable events that occur in our day-to-day lives.
An example of a humanistic perspective instance is of a person who mainly attends to their strengths rather than weaknesses. Maslow and Carl Rogers started humanistic psychology. Humanism is a valiant effort to reorient psychology to more self-directed objectives. Essentially, humanism assimilated phenomenological aspects of Gestalts psychology widening its cover to include more perceptual consciousness of an organism’s state of being. Some of the evident characteristics of humanism includes; a presumed non-mechanistic view of man; a prejudiced criticism of the principle of determinism; an ultimate focus on organisms adaptive behavior; and the unique and subjective nature of each person (Rogers, 1946).
The development of the humanistic theory was triggered by a concern of perceived inadequacy of the psychodynamic theories. Both Rogers and Maslow felt the prevalent theories failed to satisfactorily explain the meaning of behavior and healthy growth. The situation resulted in the development of an entirely new approach to understanding human behaviors (O’Hara, 1992). Maslow, Rogers and Rollo May have, to date, remained the most reputable and dignified contributors to the humanistic approach. Maslow developed a hierarchical perspective of motivation that established, through research, that when basic human needs are satisfied, higher needs may subsequently emerge as the human strives to realize self-actualization (O’Hara, 1992).
Maslow’s view of the human needs was more sophisticated than that of Rogers. Maslow’s view recognized that people had numerous needs that varied in urgency and the respective time at which they are to be satisfied while Rogers held a view of human beings need for unconditional regard. Maslow categorized the human needs chronologically with the bottom having the basic needs and the less demanding needs at the top. Those people who manage to meet all the needs become self-actualized, an occurrence that hardly occurs. This aspect is may be incorporated in explaining human behavior in terms of their preferential satisfaction of needs. For example, one prefers to buy food to satisfy hunger rather than to buy a movie to satisfy entertainment needs since food is more vital as compared to entertainment (Maslow, 1943).
Carl Rogers, however, stressed on people’s unconsciousness of the behavioral identity. He believed that a person would fulfill their ultimate potential if they had a positive self-perception (positive self-regard). That theoretical approach, however, faced one problem that was the fact that people often don’t perceive the positive perception of other people as being unconditional. They usually feel that they are only valued when they meet certain contextual thresholds of importance. For example, a student who believes he can post excellent performance may regard getting a grade ‘B’ as a failure. Thus, denying themselves the joy of an achievement (Putwain & Sammons, 2002).
The core purpose of a humanistic approach is to explain people’s behavior and the reasoning behind it. The approach, however, assumes that human behavior must be analyzed as a subjective experience of every individual. It assumes that the behavior is not regulated or conditioned by neither prior experiences of a person nor their present situations (Matson, 1973). The behaviorists have, over the past years, been the most critical of the humanistic approach since they feel it is dualistic and subjective. The behaviorists argue that the approach has inadequate empirical validity, and its adoption underscores scientific methods by embracing introspection.
Moreover, the self- reports are criticized to be unreliable since it is not a guarantee that what one expresses is an actual reflection of how they feel. To some, humanistic approach is more a religion than a scientific theory since its concepts are considered faith abandoning the notion that psychology is a scientific aspect. Psychoanalysts assert that people cannot explain their behavior since their behavioral triggers, in most cases, are unconscious and independent of their will-power. As a result, one’s explanation of their behavior would be clouded by rationalization and other defenses (Matson, 1973).
In terms of research, humanists embrace methods that enable them to understand other human being’s subjective nature. They tend to avoid methods such as experimentation and non-participant observation due to their objectivity. They usually prefer qualitative research methods over quantitative research methods. The most extensively used method is unstructured interviewing that room for free expression of experiences and views without risk of external influence. The observational method preferred in the humanistic approach is participant observation that involves the researcher’s active participation in the actual study to enhance better comprehension of the participant’s perception (Matson, 1973).
An example is Maslow’s analysis of the traits of self-actualized people from a selection of probable self-actualized people from public and historical figures and use of other sources to determine what they had in common. The conceptual aspects of the humanistic approach greatly aid in ensuring a better understanding of the human behavior in future psychological research and therapeutic interventions for people with behavioral problems.
In conclusion, the humanistic perspective’s value of uniqueness of individual human behavior and its favor of the nurtured nature of behavior over natural synthesis of behavior are highly educative, useful and holistic. It can be positively integrated with the psychological world of behavioral treatments and therapies to aid in better understanding clients when administering behavioral adjustment interventions.
References
Chartrand, T. L., & Bargh, J. A. (1999). The chameleon effect: The perception–behavior link and social interaction. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 76(6), 893-910. Retrieved from http://www.yale.edu/acmelab/articles/chartrand_bargh_1999.pdf
Maslow, A. H. (1943). A Theory of Human Motivation. Psychological. Retrieved from http://www.ahpweb.org/about/history/what-is-humanistic-psychology.html
Matson, F. W. (Ed.). (1973). Without/Within. Behaviorism and Humanism. Brooks/Cole Publishing Company.
O’Hara, M. (1992). Historic Review of Humanistic. Psychological Review, 50: 370-396. Retrieved from http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Maslow/motivation.htm
Putwain, D. & Sammons, A. (2002). Psychology and Crime. US: Routledge.
Rogers, C. R. (1946). Significant Aspects of Client-Centered Therapy. American Psychologist, 1: 415-422. Retrieved from http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Rogers/therapy.htm
