Person-Centered Therapy

1. Person-Centered Therapy Carl Rogers 1902-1987

2. Biography • Child Guidance Clinic- Rochester • 1939 Published The Clinical Treatment of the Problem Child • Ohio State University – Professor 1939 • 1942 Published Counseling and Psychotherapy • Tapes and transcribes therapy sessions to study more objectively therapy process and outcome

3. Biography • U. of Chicago, Professor and Director Counseling Center 1945 • U. Wisconsin-Madison 1957 • Research with hospitalized patients • Higher levels of accurate empathy leads to more positive outcomes • Client's perception of the relationship is better predictor of outcome than therapist's perception of the relationship • Center for Studies of the Person in California 1968

4. Humanistic Psychology • Each of us has a natural potential that we can actualize and through which we can find meaning in life • Emphasizes the importance of the person's subjective experience • Phenomenological approach – exploration method that uses human experience as main source of data

5. Human Nature: Main Concepts • Self-Actualizing Tendency • Basic human drive toward growth, completeness, and fulfillment • Internal Locus of Evaluation • Events that enhance the self actualizing tendency are judged positively and vice-versa. • Need for Positive Regard • Feeling accepted byothers

6. Human Nature: Main Concepts • Self-Concept/Self-Regard • Learned through the perceptions of regard and acceptance from others • Conditions of Worth • Expectations or demands we perceive from others in order to receive their acceptance • These perceptions are internalized and sometimes are out of our awareness

7. Psychopathology • INTERNALIZED CONDITIONS OF WORTH block the natural SELF-ACTUALIZINGTENDENCY, creating a state of INCONGRUENCE between what • we experience from within (internal locus) and • what we believe we should be (conditions of worth) • To resolve the conflict, typically we distort or block the experiences from within

8. Anxiety • State of uneasiness or tension that occurs when the discrepancy between what I feel I need to be or do to be accepted and what I really want to do (internal locus of control) threatens to emerge • Defense mechanisms are invoked to distort the "experiencing" from within, so that the person can conform with internalized external expectations (perceived or real)

9. Goal of Therapy • Facilitate the client’s exploration of the parts of themselves that they have denied or distorted, to promote the self actualization process • Given right therapeutic climate, clients will • Become more open to experience • Achieve self-trust • Develop an internal source of evaluation • Be willing to continue growing

10. Therapy Relationship: Three Conditions • Congruence or genuineness • Agreement between the feelings and attitudes a therapist is experiencing and his or her professional demeanor • (Un)conditional positive regard • Nonpossessive caring and acceptance of the client • Accurate empathic understanding • ability to deeply grasp the client's subjective world

11. Evolution of the Approach • Non-Directive Therapy • Client Centered Therapy • Person Centered Therapy

12. Person Centered Therapy • Emphasizes: • Therapy as a journey shared by two fallible people • The person’s innate striving for self-actualization • The personal characteristics of the therapist and the quality of the therapeutic relationship • The counselor’s creation of a permissive, “growth promoting” climate • Being present in the relationship and focus on the client’s immediate experience

13. Interventions • Communicating Empathy • Attentive/Active listening • Express understanding • Openness to the client’s perspective • Techniques • Reflection of feeling: explicit and implicit • Paraphrasing and synthesizing

14. Motivational Interviewing Theory and Practice of Counseling and Psychotherapy - Chapter 7 (15) Humanistic, client-centered, psychosocial, directive counseling approach Initially designed as a brief intervention for problem drinking Promotes a collaborative process that focuses on solutions for behavioral problems – avoids a confrontational style Emphasizes client’s abilities, strengths, resources, and competencies ©2013 Brooks/Cole Cengage Learning

15. Motivational Interviewing • Goal: reduce ambivalence and increase intrinsic motivation to change • Reluctance to change - considered normal and expected part of the therapeutic process • Reflective listening, empathy, open-ended questions, non-confrontational approach to resistance, support • To increase motivation to change, reflect discrepancies between behaviors and values • Elicit and reinforce “change talk”

17. Contributions Roger’s Theory • Importance of the person of the counselor and of the relationship in the therapeutic process • Initiated research in therapy process and outcome by taping sessions and studying the transcription of tapes • Research findings provide support for the importance of empathy in therapy outcome (Watson’s 2002 review)

18. Limitations • Therapeutic conditions are necessary but not sufficient • Lack of clear goals and structure • Lack of challenge to clients • Lack of guidance regarding behavioral change